How Sports Help Students: 8 Benefits of Physical Activity
A child's educational journey is not just about learning information from books and giving tests to check one's performance and retention. It is a rather holistic experience consisting of many dynamic activities that directly or indirectly improve a child's cognition. This is the reason why there is a lot of stress on the importance of extracurricular activities in a child's life.
These activities can range from practicing arts and crafts, singing, dancing, drama, and playing various sports. Each of these activities comes with a certain number of benefits. While some may improve your child's soft skills, the other may improve your child's fitness and ability to concentrate. Hence, practicing various extracurricular activities can truly improve a child's cognition and performance. With so many activities to do, parents truly can explore and decide what's best for their kids.
Here are different activities that can truly improve a child's performance and learning experience at school while also keeping them engaged.
Debating is an activity that requires a child to prepare well for the final day of activity. A child is given a topic, and they have to prepare an argument either for or against the topic. During this process, the child has to indulge in deep experimentation and exploration of the topic, where they uncover a lot of facts. This may enhance a child's knowledge about a particular topic. Similarly, the child has to have clear communication skills and prepare counterarguments against their rival team. This may enhance a child's ability to translate their ideas and logical explanations more rationally.
Declamation is another activity in which a child has to prepare a proper speech related to a particular topic. However, during this activity, there is nothing such as a rival team and the child has to prepare their speech with a proper introduction, body, and conclusion towards the end. Since there are no counter arguments involved, the child has to put forward a very balanced perspective highlighting all the important pointers related to that particular topic. This activity is specifically beneficial for kids who want to improve their pronunciation, speech, clarity, and confidence, and get rid of stage fear.
A quiz is an activity in which kids are divided into three or four teams. Now each of these teams gets the opportunity to answer a particular set of questions that are asked to them turn by turn. If one team is not able to answer the question asked to them, then it gets past the other teams. Towards the end, the team with the maximum points ends up winning the competition. Quizzes can be organized for various subjects, such as science, English, mathematics, and general knowledge. It can truly check a child's understanding and knowledge of a particular subject and their environment. It may also make a child more confident and spontaneous.
Essay writing is an activity in which a child is given a topic on the spot, and they have to write a proper essay related to the same. It is a long-form content writing activity in which a child has to put forward their subjective views, provide some real-world insights, and make the piece extremely engaging to read. This is an activity that is beneficial for kids of all age groups as it improves a child's vocabulary, writing skills, spelling, and grammatical clarity.
Conducting experiments at home or school is a part of an experiential learning process. Through this hands-on learning technique, a child can truly become more reasonable and understand a particular concept rationally. Subjects like science and mathematics that are backed by logic can become easier for a child to understand through these activities. For a scientific experiment, the teacher can encourage the kids to make a small circuit of their own or show magnetic charges with the help of magnets. Similarly, small volcanic eruptions can be made through chemicals and teachers can show litmus paper tests to kids.
Performing on stage can help a child get rid of stage fear and become more confident. Additionally, it may also make a child perform on stage without any fear. A drama club would want a child to play different characters and understand various storylines. This may also enhance a child's understanding of emotions and how to properly portray them on stage. It may also improve their vocabulary and speech delivery on stage. Overall, it's very beneficial for kids who like performing on stage and are inspired by the theatre and movies.
Each of these activities can teach a lot of soft skills to kids while also making them more confident. Additionally, a child needs to practice a number of hobbies other than studies to make their learning more holistic and balanced.