Schools need sport to support education

Simon Marcus Gower, Executive Principal, High/Scope Indonesia School, Jakarta

Children love to play and it is right and appropriate that we give them opportunities to play. But we may guide them in their play and they may learn of virtuous traits and conduct through play. Sports create the ideal framework from which meaningful learning and play may take place. The lessons for life that may emerge from meaningful play are abundant and significant.

Playing sport together, children may learn life skills that will prove beneficial throughout school years and beyond. For example, children participating in sports can quickly learn teamwork, taking and sharing responsibility, coping with success and failure, wins and losses, and generally -- through the interactions that sport creates -- develop social skills.

There is also one further life skill that may emerge and be nurtured through participation in sport. In some sense it may not be the most obvious of traits to be associated with notions of play but there can be little doubt that discipline can be developed through exposure to, and the playing of, sport.

Many parents are concerned about how to give their children discipline but discipline can and should be something learned through application; learned by experiencing tasks and challenges that require one learns and practices discipline. Discipline is not merely about punishment, it is rather more closely linked to learning for life.

The following two instances exemplify how sports can enhance notions of self discipline and control. These are notions that do not have to be imposed but may emerge as a natural consequence of realizing that through discipline better results may be achieved. These two instances are of two children of the same age participating in a team sport in Jakarta that sets up opportunity after opportunity for them to learn of interdependence and independence.

The first child could be observed running around the playing field in a generally aimless fashion. His powers of concentration showed themselves to be consistently weak and he was obviously getting bored with the game. Ultimately, his lack of self control made him a liability to the team. If the ball came his way, he was late in getting to it because he was neither attentive nor disciplined.

The other child meantime was showing strength in his powers of concentration; born out of his greater discipline. He was not one for recklessly running around the field. He knew his position and dutifully stuck to it. Consequently he was, throughout the game, an asset to the team. His playing was both positive and disciplined.

So, what was the difference between these two children? Both were getting great opportunities to play and learn but one was showing himself to be much more competent than the other. It is quite likely; however, that the first child could prove every bit as capable and competent as the second but he simply had not had the same kind of training and discipline to accompany his play.

The first child had evidently just been allowed to go out into the playing field and simply play. This kind of total freedom was, very clearly, doing the child no good. Total freedom can and often will lead to a state of chaos that does not nurture development.

The second child had, instead, been given the opportunity to play but had also been guided towards certain parameters within which this playing could take place. He had been given a focus for his play; a focus that helped the play to be more meaningful for him and ultimately more successful.

Of course, success is not always a prerequisite of play but few would doubt that if you are able to play and enjoy success then the play itself becomes even more enjoyable and more memorable. Naturally, it is appropriate for children to be given freedom to play, discover and explore for themselves but we should be cautious to introduce them to acceptable boundaries of and for their freedom. By doing this we are introducing ideas of discipline they may intrinsically and intuitively develop.

Sports provide a perfect means and series of opportunities to introduce and then have children internalize ideas of discipline. Every sport has certain rules that need to be adhered to. Children can quickly comprehend and come to terms with such rules and see their value. In a real sense, they can come to see that if you follow the rules, if you play by the rules, you are more likely to succeed.

Sports can, then, generate opportunity after opportunity for children to learn and in turn get a step ahead in their education. More and more, educators are coming to the realization that a good education is not only about academic skills and success. Increasingly there is the acceptance and targeting of the aim to focus on much needed life skills.

Increasingly it is being recognized that education is not so much about the knowledge that you are able to retain (or memorize) but is more about developing the ability to use knowledge. The complexity of our world is such that we have to accept and admit limitations to our knowledge but the ability to gain, act on and utilize knowledge is far more valid and relevant to today's educational needs.

Participation in sports sets up the possibility of learning life skills, through interactions and playing with and alongside peers. The value of sports for educational purposes should not, then, be underestimated. But often in Indonesia and its schools sports are only vaguely considered. Sports are often only seen as a secondary consideration and even consistently viewed as extra- curricula activities.

But sports can bring a condition of "healthy in body, healthy in mind". Of course, being active in sports is likely to benefit physical well being but also being active in sport allows for the development of the mind too. Sports should not then be undervalued for their educational benefits. Sports should in fact be well supported in schools and integrated into an overall package of holistic education that will help children to develop their skills across a multiple range of intelligences.

The opinions expressed above are personal.