Child Fitness

6 Reasons Why Martial Arts Are Good for Your Kids

Martial arts are a fitness regime that combines mental and physical concentration to get results. Today’s kids are spending less and less time outdoors and plenty of time indoors with their attention fixated on PlayStation consoles, television, mobile gadgets and video games. Martial arts can provide an opportunity for your kids to engage in physical activities that can be beneficial to their health and wellbeing.

You might be surprised to find that your kid might be already interested in combat sports. If they object or aren’t sure about taking up a class, take them with you to the local studio and request the instructor to allow you to observe a session. Watching a training session in Karate, Judo, Kung fu and even Taekwondo could end up stimulating interest in your child to enroll.

If your child is not a fan of team sports, taking on a class is a good option. This is a great opportunity to get him or her out of the couch to get some physical exercises and also to meet new friends. There is a whole range of martial sports that can help a kid develop their fitness, agility, concentration, and discipline. Here are six reasons martial arts make a good fit for your kids.

1 They make kids active

This is probably the best reason why kids should take up these sports. Child obesity is at an all-time high, and the main culprit is inactivity. Extracurricular activities are no longer stressed in our schools and the time allocated for physical exercises, and sports activities has been cut.

2. They are safe

When parents are faced with making choices about activities they allow their kids in; safety comes first. In these sports, kids are taught different techniques under the close supervision of a qualified instructor. Your kid will be guided on the safe way to make a move without posing a risk to themselves or other people. Activities such as weightlifting pose a higher risk of injury due to the equipment used and the nature of the physical activities.

3. They learn to get up after getting knocked

In sports like boxing, a pugilist learns to persevere after getting his nose bloodied. But in martial sports, the trainee learns how to get up after getting knocked down by his adversary. Trainees are taught that not all sparring ends with a win. Therefore, they must learn how to take a beating with pride and conceal this feeling of anger and resentment. If your child is exposed to humiliation early, they will learn how to handle failures and disappointments in their life. From doing poorly in the swimming pool to getting tackled in a football match, they will gain the skills to get up when things go wrong.

4. Setting goals

There is no pretending that physical exercises aren’t exacting. Apart from learning to absorb pain, your kid will also learn that setting goals and achieving them doesn’t come easy. They have to work for success. The greatest achievements in martial sports are measured by earning a belt. A belt can only be received after months of hard and strenuous training. They will learn that dedication and hard work makes the achievement even more outstanding. This will help him or her to learn to apply dedication in other spheres of life whether in class or employment.

5. Fitness earns respect

In martial sports, one element that encompasses all disciplines taught is respect. At the beginning of a training session, your child will be taught to bow to his or her instructor. At the end of the session, they will bow again. This is a sign of respect. They will also be asked to respect trainees with high caliber belts than their own. If friction arises during training, your kid will be taught how to calmly take control of the situation without resorting to aggressive and coercive behavior or physical fights. These skill of conflict resolution will come in handy when your kid gets upset with his peers, family or friends. It will also form a strong foundation of their expected duty to respect classmates, peers, instructors, parents, and colleagues at their future employment station.

Once they learn how to respect, it will be easy for them to learn important skills such as teamwork that are crucial to life. So apart from being active and making new friends, martial sports can bring growth to your kid in all areas of their life. Children learn to handle the challenges of life. They become confident, mature and learn to accept the ups and downs of life.

6. Self-defense and self-discipline

The ability for your kid to defend themselves or their family against an adversary is an empowering feeling. The core discipline at the center of martial sports training is self-defense. And the different methods applied vary from discipline to discipline but you can be certain that with constant practice your kid will learn to defend themselves and those close to them. When it comes to self-discipline, martial sports can help kids better control their emotions, thoughts, and responses. Studies have shown that taking on a martial sports class can improve behavior and can make kids more attentive and sociable.

Conclusion

There are many disciplines to choose from, and it is difficult to say what is better than the other. All of them focus on discipline and developing inner strength. Kicking and punching are the two key elements of instruction and are unique to karate, and Taekwondo. Kung Fu is perhaps the oldest discipline and confines itself on strong blocks to prevent getting stuck. Others like Aikido focus on tricking your opponent and using their strength and moment to prevent them from hurting you. Some disciplines apply wrestling while others focus on kicks. Interestingly, some disciplines confine themselves to using traditional weapons such as nunchaku, one of the most popular weapons used by Bruce Lee. This is a combination of two hardened sticks fastened with a metallic chain.

The post 6 Reasons Why Martial Arts Are Good for Your Kids appeared first on Better Kids Institute.

Children and the Martial Arts

Martial arts has long been known for its practice of honing and training the mind and body into one. Various styles, such as karate or taekwondo, train body and mind so the practitioner can become a stronger, healthier version of themselves. There are many benefits in enrolling your child in karate, judo, or taekwondo. This article will highlight the importance of exercise and what karate or taekwondo can do in your child’s development.

The Importance of Exercise

Children and exercise, in whatever form, should go hand in hand. They are like small bodies of energy that want to explore and play. Finding an outlet for physical activity, such as sports, dancing, or even karate, is important for their overall development.

According to the CDC, children should have some form of physical activity for an hour or more every day. They feel less stressed, have more self-confidence, can keep a healthy weight, better focused in school, and build and strengthen bones, joints, and muscle. These are just some of the benefits they gain. Staying active improves their overall health and channels their energy in better ways than sitting in front of a computer or television.

In fact, there are three types of physical activity children should partake in to develop correctly: aerobic, muscle-strengthening, and bone-strengthening. Aerobic activity includes walking or running. Muscle-strengthening is gymnastics or push-ups and bone-strengthening includes activities like running or jumping jacks. Martial arts focuses on all of these and more.

Overview and Benefits

The most commonly known styles are karate, judo, and aikido, all originating in either China or Japan. Taekwondo, another common style, originated in Korea. Krav Maga was developed in the Israeli Defense Forces, a hybrid of karate, aikido, boxing, and wrestling. Jiu-Jitsu originated in Brazil as a style of grappling and ground fighting. THe most suited and available styles for children are karate and taekwondo.

The goal of all self-defense schools is to channel and focus the body, mind, and spirit as one. For children learning any style of self-defense, they can learn life-long skills and lessons that can help them become better people as they grow up. Here are some of the skills and lessons children can learn.

Health and Fitness

Whatever style your child chooses, self-defense is physically demanding. Warmups include jumping jacks, stretches, and push-ups. The strikes, poses, and kicks are good for cardio and muscle building. Self-defense students are known to be toned and physically fit, especially at the higher levels.

Self-Discipline and Focus

The strict routine and discipline of the dojo instill a mental focus for your child. They are better able to focus and finish the task at hand. This skill translates into their personal lives as children start to pick up their rooms, help with chores, and stay better organized.

Self Defense

Naturally, the moves of karate, taekwondo, and judo help kids prepare for if they need to physically defend themselves or someone else. A good school will emphasize the skills their students learn are only to be used for self-defense and not to become bullies. Furthermore, they teach kids street-smart techniques to get out of situations without throwing a punch or kick or avoid them altogether.

Self Confidence

In any style of self-defense, there is usually a color belt system identifying the level of experience a student has. Ranking up through the system provides children a way of measuring how much they are improving. This gives them self-confidence they can take outside of the dojo and apply to their personal and school lives. Many children who take self-defense can also take the self-confidence they gain from it into their adult lives.

Respect

The minute you walk into a dojo, punching, and kicking are secondary to the environment of respect a child starts learning. They bow to their teacher, or Sensei, and the masters before them. They learn to encourage and respect their friends and peers within the dojo, treating each other the way they want to be treated. Instructors teach the subject of respect regularly and instruct their students to take those lessons to their students, teachers, friends, and peers.

ADHD and Karate/Taekwondo

While on the subject of children and karate or taekwondo, is worth to note the difference the sports make with ADHD kids or other mental disorders. Karate or taekwondo gives ADHD children the structure and self-discipline to help them become better organized. The fast-paced classes help keep attention spans that might otherwise be overwhelmed and wandering, alert and focused. Hyperactive kids are able to release pent-up energy, while kids that are inattentive or “daydreamers” can hyperfocus on their instructors and the task given to them. While they are also building strength and muscle, the complex movements of karate and taekwondo can also help improve coordination.

Conclusion

The martial arts has long been known for its intense physical activity and focuses on honing both the body and mind. But the benefits don’t stop there. Karate and taekwondo, the most commonly available styles, help students focus, become better organized and instill a sense of respect and self-confidence in themselves. This is especially helpful for children who have ADHD or other mental disorders as it can also improve coordination and giving wandering attention spans something to focus on. For parents that are looking to get their children more physically active, karate and taekwondo are perfect avenues of healthy fitness that can benefit them well into their adulthood.

The post Children and the Martial Arts appeared first on Better Kids Institute.

Fitness and Martial Arts

Martial arts incorporates a number of traditional combat practices that aid in physical, spiritual, and mental growth. People also learn these techniques for self-defense and entertainment. Many parents view the sport as violent, and as such, discourage their children from taking part in it. Ironically, these fighting arts are a lot safer than many other common sports. They are always practiced in controlled environments, meaning the chances of anyone getting injured are very low.

These fighting techniques are especially important for fitness. Here are some ways the sport can make your child grow fit:

• Flexibility

These sports involve a lot of complicated kicking movements. As such, most students have to start off with stretching exercises. These are meant to loosen the muscles that have grown sedentary over time. As a student, your child will be instructed on how to practice without hurting their muscle fibers.

One of these flexibility stretches is the seated and standing hamstring stretch. In this workout, you have to raise one leg up and rest it on a bar in order to stretch the rear leg muscles. The training also involves the hurdler’s stretch, which loosens the muscles in the groin and hamstrings. This specific workout has to be performed under supervision as it can cause stress in the knee ligament.

For the inner thigh muscles, participants are given instructions on how to perform the seated groin stretch. The standing hip stretch is much simpler and helps to ease the hip and buttock muscles. To improve the flexibility of the front thigh, hips, and buttocks, students will perform the lunging exercise and the thigh stretch.

There are many variations of these workouts, some of which are too complicated for beginners. As your child becomes more flexible, he or she will learn tougher stretching exercises.

• Strength

Sports such as jiu-jitsu require participants to workout heavily in order to handle their opponents well in self-defense. Participants need to be able to pack enough power behind their punches. Students will be enrolled in sessions that involve pull up exercises, push-ups, and burpees. These workouts also help to condition the students.

The fighting sports mainly focus on building the art of fighting. These include quick responses to attacks, coordination, fighting techniques, and motor control. However, these are incomplete if the child lacks the strength to resist and initiate attacks.

• Stamina

Physical endurance is important in these sports. Without enough stamina, a fighter easily loses technique, and their movements become sloppy. If any part of a fighter’s body gets too tired to move with mobility, they will be unable to fight as well. Even a fighter with the best techniques will lose any fight as long as they don’t have the stamina to endure the duration of the match. This is why stamina is always listed as an important aspect of these fighting sports.

Stamina is achieved through the vigorous training offered to students. These workouts raise the heart rate steadily and require the participants to keep going without giving up. As a result, the children will be able to develop physical and mental endurance, both of which are important in living a healthy and fulfilling life. Stamina is measured by the length and intensity of an activity, and the muscles involved in the workouts.

Some schools improve the stamina of their students through simple cardio activities such as rope skipping and running. Strength training can also be included in the workouts as a way of conditioning the students for more aggressive fights. Since these workouts are only meant for training, the instructor will be careful enough not to let the children injure their muscle fibers or even do cardio beyond what their bodies can handle physically.

• Posture

Good posture and balance are often neglected in young people. Children need to care of their backs just as much as older people. If they learn proper postures at young ages, they are likely to maintain it as they grow up. In these fighting sports, people build healthy body postures and balance through specific workouts.

Posture, in these arts, is directly linked to coordination and structure, both of which are of critical importance. A good fighter needs to coordinate all the parts of their body so that he or she can work in harmony.

To coordinate their movements against opponents, their bodies need to be well-balanced, and this means their bodies have to be aligned with gravity. That way, their movements will not be affected by excessive tension.

Building good posture will go a long way in maintaining proper breathing and improving the health of your child’s spine.

• Healthy Body Weight

These sports also incorporate cardio exercises. However, participants don’t necessarily have to engage in separate workouts in order to burn calories. Workouts such as karate, judo, and other kicking exercises are enough to keep them fit. In fact, a person can burn more calories with these exercises compared to workouts such as the stationary bike. Young children are unlikely to engage in workouts that they consider boring. These sports help them find an enjoyable activity, which is also highly effective at burning fat.

It is important to note that many movements can be dangerous if done improperly. So, ensure that a professional trains your child at all times.

• Self Confidence and Discipline

The fighting arts also make children become mentally fit. This is because they get to learn new techniques and skills, and at the end of every stage, they receive a belt as a reward. That way, they are able to grow into disciplined people who can see a task to its end. Also, these techniques are not easy; the children will have to make sacrifices to learn the skills successfully. This further teaches them self-discipline. At the end of the day, they will have a sense of capability since they completed a task successfully.

Conclusion

Traditional fighting arts are important in the development of children. The sports will help them gain fitness, physically and mentally since this is important to their development. You should consider signing up your child in martial arts school for them to enjoy the highlighted benefits.

The post Fitness and Martial Arts appeared first on Better Kids Institute.