Childhood Social Development

Childhood social development is possibly one of the most important aspects of a child’s life. The sad thing is that it is often overlooked. Academics generally takes priority over almost all else by well-meaning parents with their child’s best interests at heart. However social development is really what makes or breaks a person in the big wide world of business and life.

So what does childhood social development have to do with fitness and strength and conditioning? Well I will discuss it from this angle, as I believe sports and other physical activities are one of the best avenues for getting children involved in social gatherings and interactions. So lets look at a few factors here…

Favourability

Recently I went through the process of army officer selection. Being an officer candidate means you are scrutinised much more than a general enlisted soldier. They ask all kinds of questions and try to ascertain your potential to be a leader. One of the primary things they look favourably upon is sports. If you play a sport, especially a team sport, you are in good stead for selection as an officer.

The reason they look so favourably upon sporting people is that it shows you have interests outside of your daily requirements. You could be lazy and do the bare minimum like going to work or school then come home, eat and play video games in your own solitary world. But if a child plays sport it shows they have an interest in not only physical activity but in a team environment and that they are good at socialising and working on strategy as a team.

Getting a child interested in sports will put them ahead of their competition when it comes to being chosen for important school positions and later important work/business positions. I mean who would you rather as school captain, the chubby kid with no interest in extra-curricular activities that likes solitary activities and has no interest in their own health? Or maybe the kid that plays water polo on Monday, tennis on Tuesday, competes in all school cross country events and participates in all athletics carnival events and the swimming carnival? Of course you would lean more towards the latter. The same is true in business and work. The unhealthy, overweight shy guy with no interest in sports or team work is not the best prepared for an executive position.

Team Skills and Strategy

Childhood social development requires a dose of healthy competition. Without competition a child is not going to understand the notion of effort, strategy and critical thinking. Childhood social development is more than simply making friends, it involves factors like competing and helping fellow team mates reach their goals for grander purpose of bringing the team forward. This also applies to individual sports where children are most likely to train together and compete against the same people they train with.

Healthy Interaction

What would you rather, your child hanging out and discovering things like smoking, drinking, fighting etc? Or playing rugby and training twice a week at their local oval and hanging out after the game every Saturday eating fish and chips? Healthy interaction is absolutely essential for childhood social development. Without the right interactions children learn bad habits and form unhealthy beliefs because that’s all they know.

Sports teams and athletics meets are great places for kids to interact in a healthy environment and develop a competitive nature that can later be transferred to other aspects of life.

Health and Fitness

Finally an obvious one, health and fitness. Children need to develop physical skills in order to thrive physically in their environment. Without sports and fitness children have no reference for what real physical skill and performance is. In a sporting environment a child is able to see other kids of all genetic make-ups and backgrounds performing at their own physical peak. This creates a reference experience for a child to model.

I remember when I went to school I was involved in just about every sport imaginable. I would enter all events in the athletics carnival, swimming carnival, the cross country etc. There were kids that always performed poorly and others that seemed to be natural athletes. There were other kids that I admired for their skill in a wide variety of sports. Some of these kids I tried to model. I would set a goal to beat the guy that always won races or play rugby like our star centre. Without this experience I would not have had any reference for what real physical skill is and therefore nothing to base my own performance on.

Childhood social development is the one of the most important aspects of a child’s growth and maturity. Engaging in sporting competitions, teams etc, is essentially the best way for a child to develop healthily with skills they can transfer into all aspects of life.

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