Teen Sport Positively Contributes to Adolescent's Live as They Transition to Adult Life - Coursework Example

Teen Sport Positively Contributes To Adolescents Live As They Transition To Adult Life Introduction The life of human beings develops in stages from childhood to adulthood. The character and behavior of individual at each stage is shaped by the surrounding environment. Transition of the adolescents from teenage to adulthood is quite technical. Adolescence is an important stage in life since it is the foundation for individuality and self identity (Slater 1). The adolescents need to develop skills to prepare them for adult life. The community is thus required to provide an enabling environment that enhances competence of the teens in academic, social and cultural lives. For the teens to successfully move to adulthood, it is a central requisite for them to develop and interact with the world. Interaction with the world is possible through engagement in meaningful activities like sports and being responsible for any function. Activities like teen sports nurture different character traits to the adolescent. Teen sport and adolescent’s life Sports play an important role in modeling the lives of adolescents as it bears a positive impact on development. Teen sports include; basketball, football, gymnastics, athletics among others (Steinberg 96). Teen sports are usually offered through community recreation centers, learning institution and private clubs. Teen sports nurture the adolescents’ self-esteem and enhance positive peer relations. This helps in evading negative pressures. The engagement of teens in sports ensures that their do not lay idle. This eliminates the incidences of evils associated with idleness such adultery, theft, alcoholism among others. However, it is necessary to have controlled teen sports because some are unhealthy, dirty and risky. The community and the government in general should take an initiative to control the teen sports to prevent moral decadence (Wepner, Feeley and Strickland 67). Sports enhance interaction of teens from various ethnic groups, race and gender. This encourages exchange of ideas, experiences and learning from each other’s way of life. . This promotes diverse relationship of the peers. Diverse relationship eliminates the evils of ethnicity, racism and gender disparities. Relationship brought about by teen sports castigates courage in the way adolescents conducts themselves. Diverse relationship makes the teens stop considering parents and relatives as the only people to relate love and interact with. Thus sports play an integral part in molding the relationship interaction of the adolescents. Participation in sports makes the adolescents proactive and healthy. Teenagers who are physically active in sports feel healthy and are more satisfied in life (Horn 137). Some teen sports such as athletics and football enhance vigorous physical exercise. Such exercises build muscle and strengthen the bones. The risks of contracting diseases such as cardiovascular diseases and obesity are reduced as exercise facilitates burning of calories in the body. Well developed muscle and strong bones make the adolescent feel attractive and fit. Teen sports provide an avenue for the adolescents to eliminate stress and live comfortable lives. Adult life involves commitment and sound decision making. Teen sports prepare the adolescence for commitment and being responsible in their next stage of life. Sports involve numerous practice and this makes the adolescents who participate in sports develop the virtue of commitment in their lives. The virtue of opportunity cost in decision making is also developed. The adolescents have to choose between sports and other alternative provisions of life. Idleness and time wastage is erased in their minds. The teen sports enhance teamwork among the adolescents (Edelman, Mandle and Kudzma 527). Most sports such as volleyball and football require the teenagers to play as a team. This psychologically prepares them to practice teamwork in their present life and future. The virtue of teamwork teaches the teens to appreciate and learn from others experiences. Working in solidarity as a team and knowing how to cooperate with others aids an adolescent to develop social skills. Being in a sports team inculcates respect among the team members. The team members learn to respect and coordinate with their coach. The virtue of respecting and cooperating with the team’s coach contributes to the adolescents respect and cooperation with their seniors in the society and leadership position. The virtue of teamwork is important for attainment of goals and objectives in life. It is indispensable for the teenagers to be aware of how to operate as a team as they transform to adult life. Education is an important development and transformation tool. Unfortunately, it is not easily accessible to everyone due to financial constrains. Teen sports help students who excel in sports finance their education through sports scholarships. Attainment of quality education is an important asset for transforming the entire life of the adolescents who benefit from the sports scholarships. This adequately prepares the teenager for transition to adult life. Some elite teen sports like athletics and football become source of livelihood in the future of young people. The money acquired from these sports provides the teens, who participate, with money to structure their lives (Gatz 51). Such teen become independent financially and relief parents the burden of bringing them up. Teen sports help develop better intellectual skills and adolescents’ excellence in academics. Adolescents who play sports most probably get better grades than those who never participate. Sports facilitate teens’ ability to think with their bodies engaged and synthesis various types of information simultaneously, for instance, paying attention to coach’s instructions and coordinating with teammates. Several research conducted all over the world have documented that there is a significant positive correlation between physical activity and academic performance (Griffin 41). As the adolescents transform to adulthood, there is change of behavior (Kail and Cavanaugh 47) Participation of teens in sports prevents bad behavior such as promiscuity, alcoholism, taking drugs and many others. The time which would have been spent engaging in bad behaviors is diverted to sports. Thus, teen sports prevent engagement of teens in immoral acts. Teen sports impact leadership skills in adolescents’ life (MacGrego and Taswell 7). The teens develop better decision making skills. This is because the teens grow with upright moral status. Leadership involves team building and decision making. All these skills are acquired in teen sports. The teens learn to work in a team, division of labor and specialization. Acquisition of such skills prepares the adolescents to take leadership positions in future. Teen sports help the adolescents learn to define goals and develop mechanisms of achieving them. The desire to achieve better performance builds the character of pursuing excellence by consistently setting higher standards. The injuries suffered during sports as the teens competes to be the winners, teaches them how to cope with challenges in goal achievement. Sometimes adolescents participate in teen sports competitions. Competition always poses a challenge and motivation in any field it is experienced. Competition nurtures creativity and innovation in teens. To succeed in any sports competition, unique techniques must be applied. In the struggle to device unique techniques the adolescent develop critical and creative thinking skills. Conclusion Participation in sports whether individually or in a team plays an outstanding role in psychological, social, physical and emotional development of an adolescent. Successful experience in sports offers several benefits to the participant which last throughout life. Such benefits include sober-mindedness, psychological well-being, interpersonal competence among others. The future of any community or nation depends on its young people. Therefore the society must offer the adolescence with the necessary guidance to help become competent in all spheres of life. The young need to be involved in sport activities that are educative, challenging and motivating. Works cited: Edelman, Carole; Mandle, Carol and Kudzma, Elizabeth. Health promotion throughout the life span. St. Louis, Missouri: Elsevier.2014. Print. Gatz, Margaret. Paradoxes of youth and sport. Albany State University of New York .2002. Print. Griffin, Robert. Sports in the lives of children and adolescents: success on the field and in life. Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 1998.Print. Horn, Thelma. Advances in sport psychology. Champaign, IL: Human Kinetics. 2008. Print. Kail, Robert and Cavanaugh, John. Human development: a life-span view. Belmont, Calif.: Wadsworth Cengage Learning.2013. Print. MacGregor, Mariam and Taswell, Ruth. Building everyday leadership in all teens: promoting attitudes and actions for respect and success, a curriculum guide for teachers and youth workers. Minneapolis: Free Spirit Pub.2006. Print. Slater, Judith. Teen life in Asia. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press.2004. Print. Steinberg, Shirley. Teen life in Europe. Westport, Connecticut; London Greenwood Press. 2005. Print. Wepner, Shelley; Feeley, Joan and Strickland, Dorothy. The administration and supervision of reading programs .New York: Teachers College Press. 2002. Print. Read More