Mind and Body
Children need movement stimuli
In his book, "Livewired," neuroscientist David Eagleman illustrates how the neurons in our brains resemble plants with roots. Like plants (or kittens), those that are enriched grow more than those that are deprived.
Any movement is better than none. Children who are exposed to a restrained form of movement: treadmills, exercise bikes and machine weights, will develop their neurons more than children who sit at home watching screens. Children who walk to school will develop more neurons than children are transported everywhere by car.
This ‘normal’ enrichment is fine if the only physical challenge you are going to face is jogging around a pitch in your p.e. warm-up and then standing in a queue waiting for your turn to kick the ball.
However, most sports require an active brain as well as an active body: decisions need to be made in an instant in the sporting arena (unless you are a Park Runner, in which case mindless jogging on a treadmill will be adequate preparation).
A movement-rich learning environment will help your child’s neurons flourish and prepare them for more complicated and stressful situations in the future.
Movement-rich environments include gymnastics and athletics (if the children practise all the events) or tennis (when they are a bit older). These also happen to include ‘dangerous’ stunts and activities: the type that teachers avoid to mitigate risk.
As I say to our club members: ‘High risk equals high fun.’
In a less varied environment, such as swimming or football, movement can be enriched by including a multi-dimensional warm-up that changes every week to produce a varied stimulus (that’s what we do in weightlifting).
Best still: give the children a variety of different activities each week, plus time to explore and play.
That’s why I set up Excelsior Athletic Devlopment Club: to provide a movement-rich learning environment that helps minds and bodies. Our strength and coordination sessions are not just press-ups and sit-ups (we never do sit-ups) like some adults think children should be doing to the exclusion of all else!
We have a variety of movement puzzles to solve and exercises that challenge both strength and coordination.
This is also brain training. The enriched brain is better equipped to cope with the high-speed, multi-directional, and complex decision-making movements that occur in team sports.
Children thrive when given appropriate challenges. They want to be engaged and to think and make decisions. Are you going to enrich your child’s brain or let it wither with disuse?
Further reading
For parents, either join our club or watch our Willand p.e. videos to see lots of puzzles
For p.e. teachers and sports coaches, read my book ‘Coaches Corner.’
