Sports and physical activities not only teach children about physical development and to have fun with their friends. It allows creative thinking, skill improvement, mind liberation, cognitive and psychomotor development which can be transferred to their classrooms.
By Jenson Rajkumar
What are the things that come to our mind when we think about children playing sports or when they get involved in physical activities? Our head straightaway zooms to them running, chasing each other, getting active and getting physically fitter. Yes, physical and skills development comes to our mind.
But do we ever think about things like cognitive development, expressiveness, logical reasoning, thinking and creativeness? The answer to this will mostly be ‘no’. And that’s perfectly fine because skills and physical development is at the top of the priority list.
Even I was on the same boat. When I started working with in primary school all abilities sports sessions, I planned sessions which were focused heavily on skills and technical development. Guess how those sessions went? Only a few children became interested, and the rest of them felt isolated.
When sessions became much of a free-play and simpler activities were done, it became inclusive, the children had so much fun and challenged themselves physically. Add a few challenges/conditions every now and then, they started forming ideas and brought out some wonderful solutions.
For example, when they move at a fast pace in a playing space with many others, they’ll subconsciously move around to avoid bumping into others. That’s when regular discussions and dialogue sessions become really important, helping them to rewind back on the skills they have used and its relation to particular instances in the session as well as how those skills can be used in other sessions or in their daily lives.
Sports and physical activities not only teach children about physical development and to have fun with their friends. It allows creative thinking, skill improvement, mind liberation, cognitive and psychomotor development which can be transferred to their classrooms.
Isn’t that how we all want our children to learn? Have a well-rounded development that will translate into their adult life. Now, we can say that the answer will most likely be a big ‘yes’.
And at Sports Plus, we firmly believe in the mantra of children’s wholesome development through simple, fun-filled activities which helps them in their physical and mental fitness.
(The writer is the founder of Sports Plus and a Fitness Trainer with the Manipur Cricket Team)