Discussion: Significance and Treatment of Clumsiness in Children

The contributions to this special issue of Neural Plasticity were written by the invited speakers to the international meeting The Clumsy Child." Aetiology, Pathogenesis and Treatment, which was held in Groningen, The Netherlands, from June 6 to 8, 2002. The aim of the meeting was to bring together scientists involved in fundamental aspects of motor development and scientists and clinicians dealing with children with clumsy motor behavior. Two series of sessions dealt with the clinical aspects of children with clumsy behavior, such as their specific motor problems, their co-morbidity, and the prevalence and etiology of clumsy motor behavior. Multiple sessions dealt with the role of specific parts of the nervous system in the organization and development of adequate and task-specific motor behavior. These included principles in the recruitment ofmotor units in order to produce a smooth gradation of muscle force, specific roles of sensory systems such as proprioception and the roles of the motor cortices and the corticospinal tract, the basal ganglia and the cerebellum in the coordination of motor activity. Finally, specific attention was paid to possibilities oftreatment and management of children with clumsy motor behavior. The meeting made it clear that children with clumsy motor behavior constitute a heterogeneous