The Educational Relationship Between Teachers and Young Tennis Players Continued During the Covid-19 Outbreak: Is the Online Teaching a New Start also for the University?

During the lockdown children, teenagers and young adult university students discovered a new type of distance learning through online platforms and conferencing tools. Extra-school sports activities were also suddenly stopped with a sharp interruption of all the social and pedagogical processes involved. Aim of the present work was to evaluate if the educational relationship between pupils and teachers continued during the lockdown; secondly, to monitor the levels of physical activity and the level of enjoyment and motivation in children and adolescents in the emergency context. 140 among children and adolescents filled in three questionnaires: one to investigate their sports and physical activity habits, the second was the Physical Activity Questionnaire to monitor the physical activity status and the third one was the Physical Activity Enjoyment Scale (PACES) . About 90% of pupils attended online school classes and about the same percentage received indications from Tennis School about home-exercises and other forms of distance learning. More than 40% of the sample did not follow physical education classes and 45% declared to be inactive during free time. PACES questionnaire revealed that pupils mostly enjoyed doing physical activity staying at home and did not consider it as a frustrating or annoying practice. Also, for higher education, it would be advisable to potentiate the traditional didactics with some of the best digital practices experienced during the lockdown.