Hugh explains the long-term benefits of football on children…
As well as the obvious short-term physical health benefits gained through exercise at our camps, I regularly see a positive relationship between being involved in physical activities and a child’s confidence, personal development and attitudes to winning.
We all know sport and physical activities are fundamental to the healthy wellbeing of children, but there is also a different set of skills learned during our camps. Through participation, they learn to understand the importance of key values such as; honesty; teamwork; fair play and abiding by rules.
In each session, we focus on embracing our core values:
- Respect for individuals, helping them realise their potential
- Environment based on commitment, teamwork, good leadership and positive and friendly management styles
- Shared common purpose founded on honesty, integrity, objectivity, accountability and success
- Pride in the social and physical development of participants
- Excellence achieved through continual improvement
- Community that is inclusive
- Taking part instilling a winning culture
As any sport, football also provides a forum for young people to learn how to deal with competition, and how to cope with both winning and losing. Life itself is competitive, so building a winning mentality from an early age can only be a good skill to have. I’m not referring to an approach of pushing children to win at all costs, that’s not what I endorse, rather a general sense of doing the absolute best you can and working hard. I have a phrase I regularly use during my camps “Hard work will always beat talent if talent doesn’t work hard”. Children are naturally competitive, this instinct needs to be channelled and combined with great values such as honesty and team spirit to create the right combination that will achieve great results.
So, by encouraging children to attend extra-circular sport clubs, you’re helping them to build healthy active habits that encourage life-long participation in physical activity – and a positive winning outlook.