Sports as a Teaching Aid: 3 Valuable Life Lessons Your Child Can Learn

1. Learning Perseverance

In our modern society, if you get bored with what’s on TV, all you have to do is change to another channel. There is a very little incentive to have to stick with a show or program.

Yet, perseverance is a very important real-life skill that your child can learn from sports. For example, it takes determination to show up for practice and games day-after-day, week-after-week, for an entire season (or multiple seasons).

Also, playing sports requires being willing to stick with it through both the wins and the losses. Even if your child’s team has never made it to a championship, there is still the perseverance of giving it your all and trying your best.

Now, imagine your child using valuable life lessons like these as an adult as they attend school, go to a job, or handle any problem in life that requires sticking to it.

2. Mastering a Skill

Consider for a moment, when was the last time you can remember that your child mastered a skill? Was it cooking a meal or playing a musical instrument?

In sports, you need to master at least two kinds of skills. One is the physical skill to play the sport. This can mean developing the fine motor skill to pass a soccer ball or to dance. The other skill is the mental skill needed to strategize and solve problems. For example, in football, that could mean knowing the right play to score the touchdown and win the game.

If your child does any sport for a certain period of time, they will see themselves mastering the skills needed to play the game. This easily translates to other areas of their lives and can create the self-confidence needed to master all sorts of other kinds of skills.

3. Managing Time

When you think of all the valuable life lessons that your child learns from playing sports, time management probably isn’t one of them. But really, it’s true!

Think about it. First, your child needs to be able to schedule their time adequately to attend practices and games. They can’t sleep in on the morning of a Saturday soccer game or skip a practice without there being consequences.

Of course, for very young children, they will need help from their parents. However, they still learn the importance of showing up on game day.

Also, during the game or sport, there is a certain level of time management that is required. For example, in several sports such a football, basketball, and hockey, being able to score points within the allotted time frame of the game is essential. This also adds learning to deal with the pressure to be able to perform under a time constraint and be successful.

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The aforementioned benefits are all the lessons that you may not have realized your child is learning while participating in sports until many years down the road. Yet, they are lessons that can have positive consequences for your child.

The lessons of perseverance, skill mastery, and time management certainly have meaning, both on and off the field or court.

So, regardless if your child plays just pee-wee sports or becomes a high school athlete, the valuable life lessons they can learn from sports will easily translate to other areas of their lives well into adulthood. Help them to make the best of those lessons.

Parenting SupportPathways To WellnessJanuary 14, 2019