ABSTRACT
The worldwide obesity epidemic has led to a disproportional focus on encouraging physical activity (PA) to ensure health-appropriate levels of caloric expenditure. In the last decade, there has been an exponential growth of exercise and cognition research with a neuroscientific approach by exercise and sport scientists. The application of neurosciences to sport and exercise research started with sport, prompted by the interest in sport expertise and performance optimization that is central to the expert performance approach. The evidence that the development and acquisition of motor competence contribute to promoting the development of an efficient brain might seem not relevant to PA advocacy within public health policies typically concerned with the physical diseases provoked by physical inactivity. This chapter proposes the structure of PA games that, tuning repetition and change to match children's developmental level and stage of learning, generate a challenge point that is needed for successful learning and cognitive improvement.
