The best way to nourish an individual’s mind and heart is to pursue a sport. Sports helps an individual exceedingly in learning the life skills like: communication, coordination, understanding, altruism, discipline, team building, compassion and many such traits that shape the personality of an individual.
However, sports cannot teach life lessons overnight. The role of parents in supporting their kids is pivotal. Parents are expected to be the harbingers in identifying the skills in their children.
Here are some of the important tips for parents, who play an important role in helping children absorb what they learn from sports and transform it into life skills.
- Communication
Communication plays vital role in any field. Sports is one such area where the child explores his competencies of interacting with the team mates and even opponents. As a sports person it is very essential to interact with other players and understand their point of view. This a sports person does eventually as he is a part of a team. This way, your child becomes more equipped to state his/her points of concern in a confident and clear tone. It also allows him/her to hear the coach’s point of view.
- Coordination and Team Building
Playing sports evoke coordination and team building among the players. Coordination is the fundamental trait to be a successful sportsman. Team building and coordination fosters children to understand the personality of other children. This lays down the foundation of a personality facilitating them to find solutions for different situations, like trouble at practice or high-stakes championship games, meets or matches.
When children have time to think about the consequences of their actions, they can consider how they may react. This prepares them to present themselves in the way they would like to be perceived.
- Emotional understanding
When children are involved in any kind of sport, they become empathetic and try understanding one another’s emotional state. As players they seek for those who understand their emotions. It’s more productive to challenge him to find joy through the commitment. Through perseverance and commitment children understand the meaning of being winners. It’s important that kids understand how to stay committed to a situation they signed up for, just as it’s important for adults to see commitments through. This is quite easily attainable through sports.
- Altruism and respect
According to studies people’s first impulse is to cooperate and not to compete. People spontaneously help others out of genuine concern for their welfare. This is found in animals as well. We have instances of Heroic Altruism in our mythological stories and folklore. Sports plays a very important role in bringing up altruism among children. Children as sports persons start thinking from the point of view of other players. They think of other’s welfare. Children also learn to take criticism when they do not perform. As this is reciprocal, it helps in dignifying one another.
- Discipline and Integrity
In simple terms, discipline is the practice of training people to obey rules or a set of behavioral codes. Discipline helps in decision making. Sports enforce obedience and order. It automatically brings in the notions of self-control and self-governance. We need to support kids in making the right decisions, even if it means things are harder in the immediate future.
Sports provide so many unique opportunities to teach kids valuable life lessons. Parents, guardians, coaches and friends must work together to ensure young people are fully supported in understanding how to transfer these lessons to school, work and social situations.
Every individual will surely accomplishes all these personality traits through sports that makes a person unique and one in the crowd.
SPORTS MAKES AN INDIVIDUAL HARD. HE DOESN’T ONLY BECOME HARD, HE BECOMES HARD TO BEAT.
Prakash Ghulanawar,
TGT Coordinator,
Pune campus.
