Organized sports play a vital role in the development of a child’s life. The purpose of my essay is to explain why organized sports is essential to a child’s life and will teach them valuable lessons in leadership, teamwork, and discipline giving them a better chance to avoid pitfalls in life and groom them for success. Through my life experiences and statistics I will explain why organized sports not only develop a child’s life, but also are instrumental in so many other ways that the reward far outweighs the risk.

There are many arguments that organized sports at an early age can injure a child, and makes many of parents nervous and uneasy. While the evidence supported in the statistics of Boston Children’s Hospital state that 20% of all children that participate in sports will receive some kind of sports injury, it states that 60% of these occur in practice and are only mild strains or sprains. The research also shows that children are more likely to hurt themselves in everyday activity, and these injuries are more serious than those that occur in organized sports. I can attest that all injuries I had in sports were minor, and the main injury that prevented me from continuing to play came as a result of falling on a slippery pavement, and not while engaging in sports.

Organized sports have been proven to develop leadership in individuals. I feel that without sports I would not have developed into the leader I am in the corporate world. For example playing football I was a quarterback which is the leader of the offense, and as a quarterback my role was not only to know what the other 10 players on my team had to do to execute the play flawlessly, but also know what the defense on the other side was going to do to try to stop the offense. When seeing something on the defense that didn’t sit right, I had to call an audible, which is a change of plans and direct my teammates to change direction. This is no different in my current role. In sales things change almost immediately, when this happens, I have to direct my team to change their direction to achieve the results for success.

In organized sports according to Dr. Jim Taylor Ph.D., his research shows that sports have been found to enhance brain development and raise the IQ. Dr. Taylor’s research also shows that sports help build confidence, develop focus and teach children about emotional control. I can attest to this, thinking of my playing days, the quarterback position in football, as well as the point guard position in basketball requires quick thinking with only seconds to react. In the beginning, you will make lots mistakes, but as you develop the mistakes are less, and you will see the results of quick thinking, and when positive these results build your confidence to continue to make decisions. As your decisions yield more positive results, your teammates, and your coaches start to develop more trust in you.

Sports also teach you how to deal with negative results and to control emotions and deal with loss. No matter how good you or your team is, there will be disappointments, such as losses. When faced with this kind of adversity, you learn that there will be a next time, and not to be a sore loser and what to work on for the next game. I have had my share of losses in my life, and because of sports I was able to learn how to move on and learn from those experiences to improve myself for next time.

Sports also attribute to the health and wellbeing of children as far as fitness, social and mental health. (Porter, 2011)Social health is a vital part of a child’s development, and organized sports teach kids to be more social and communicate with kids their age, but of different races, backgrounds, and sometimes of different sex. One thing sports taught me was how to deal with all kinds of different people, teammates, coaches and fans. This helped me in my carrier as I deal with the public daily and have all different walks of life that I encounter.

Organized sports also help children avoid the pitfalls in life, such as drug use, gang violence and teenage pregnancy. Girls that play sports or other organized activities are more likely to hold on to their virginity. Research shows that they are more likely to wait before having sex, and often have less sexual partners decreasing the risk of an unwanted pregnancy or contracting a sexually transmitted disease. The study also shows that girls who are not engaged in sports or other organized activities are more likely to have multiple partners and run a higher risk of becoming pregnant. Teens are less likely to use drugs, when I played sports in high school I was turned away from drugs as we had random drug tests, and I did not want to have a lack of focus on the court or field. I had a teammate and a friend that used marijuana frequently and it cost him a scholarship to the University of Tennessee, and he ultimately died as a result of his drug use. I feel had he been more involved in sports, and took it a serious as I did he would not only still be alive, but possibly be playing professional basketball.

When a child is involved in sports the desire to join a gang or another harmful group is less likely to happen. Children usually join gangs to create a sense of belonging and when engaged in organized sports this gives the child this sense of belonging they may be looking for and this will have a positive impact, as oppose to a negative impact a gang would give them. The research shows that kids also join a gang to create a sense of belonging that may be missing at home. With the teams I played on we had a sense of family and had a love for one another, sure we had our disagreements like any other family has, but just like a close knit family we worked through them, only difference was it was on the basketball court or football field. The research also shows that gangs are seen as a money making opportunity through either drug selling, or robbery. Organized sports will provide this opportunity to the truly gifted and at the very least pay for their schooling through scholarships, which will teach the children and give them the skills for better success when they enter the “real world”.

In conclusion, there are pros and cons to organized sports. However as I have outlined in my essay, the pros far outweigh the cons. Without organized sports, I can only imagine how my life would have turned out. I would encourage a parent that has a child interested in a sport to allow them to participate. As a parent you are going to worry that is a condition of being a parent, but with the life lessons organized sports teaches a child, a parent will worry less as they see this can be a foundation to building your child on the path to success, and the role it plays into developing them into a responsible and successful adult.

References

Research provided by:

• (Boston Children’s Hospital, 2011) http://www.childrenshospital.org/az/Site1112/mainpageS1112P0.html

• (Chessman, 2011) http://www.sheknows.com/parenting/articles/818473/Team-sports-How-kids-benefit-from-organized-athletics

• (Porter, 2011) http://www.livestrong.com/article/208831-kids-sports-benefits-vs-non-benefits/#ixzz2Vjk3DDrp

• (Education.com, 1997) http://www.education.com/reference/article/Ref_Not_Just_Another/

• (ncpc.org, 2001) http://www.ncpc.org/topics/by-audience/parents/gangs-and-your-child

• (The Outlaw, 2006) http://voices.yahoo.com/how-teach-children-hard-work-team-work-42893.html?cat=25