The 3 Major Components of the Life-Skills Program
1. Organic/Natural: Competing in sports automatically teaches life-skills
It has long been understood that playing and competing in sports teaches young children valuable life-lessons. From the moment a child steps onto the baseball field, soccer field, basketball court, the ice rink ... or the tennis court, they are required to follow certain rules and behavior.
And this "learned behavior" does not just come from the coaches or instructors, but more importantly from their peers and teammates.
Tennis, perhaps unlike many sports learned in school, is a sport for life. The statistics of the age range for playing the game is from 3-4 years all the way up to 95 years old. The oldest player in this year's senior world championships was 95 years old! A list of some of the main life-skills learned while competing in tennis includes:
- Sportsmanship
- Teamwork
- Reliability
- Time Management
- Confidence
- Responsibility
- Honesty
- Respect
- Physical Skills
2. Skills Learned
Communication skills are a big part of the SPUT Life-Skills program. Simple communication techniques such as shaking a person's hand, looking them in the eyes, and asking a question are skills that help develop confidence. Social skills of respect and recognition of others as well as codes of behavior, fairness and honesty are important life-long skills children need to be exposed too.
Throughout their lives, on a daily basis children are required to interact with many different levels of people; teachers, assistants, principals, friends, teammates, bullies, older and younger students, coaches etc. All of these encounters start with some type of communication...and the more confidence your child has, the better chance those will be positive..
3. Development: (nutrition, eating habits, goal setting, teamwork, listening)
Helping children develop important life-habits is also an integral part of the SPUT Life Skills Program. With a major increase in the obesity levels of youth, especially in the inner-cities, Introducing proper nutrition and eating habits is critical to their overall development.
Along with good eating habits, SPUT participants are introduced to other important life-development skills such as goal setting, listening, and teamwork. These specific character development skills carry over into every aspect of a child's life...especially in school.
