Learn Some Engaging After-School Activities

Learn Some Engaging After-School Activities

Beyond the elementary education that children get in school, they must also get a chance to explore and expand their horizons with more social and curricular activities. This in turn connects them to the real world. For parents, such after school activities ensures that their child is engaged in learning a new skill and is not sitting idle at home. Enrolling in a new hobby can be both for education and entertainment.

There are several different engrossing after-school activities that your child can get interested into.

The generation today is much advanced, and this is because of the exposure they get. Where learning different languages is still an interesting hobby, now learning to code is an upcoming rage amongst the youth. It can be due to the opportunities it offers in today’s world. That is why, we find parents looking for after-school coding classes for their kids.

With children having to compete in school, they need to relax and unwind when back home. Learning to sketch, paint, play an instrument or sing, are a few such activities that calms the mind and improves concentration, reduces stress and encourages more visual coordination. It helps a child channelize his energy and increases positivity.

In adolescent years a child is filled with high levels of energy. The best way to burn this excess energy is to play some games. It boosts the child’s physical and mental development. Sports like football, cricket, hockey, basketball and baseball build strength and confidence, and help in learning sportsmanship and teamwork as well. Even indoor games such as carrom, chess, and billiards, teach a child to have patience and polish his mental abilities.

Kids today sit with their digital gadgets for hours without moving. Such inactivity leads to obesity at a very early age. Swimming can help such kids add some physical activity to their life.

Another way to channelize extra energy in a fun manner is by dancing. After the school is over the kids can then go to dance classes and burn and sweat on the dance floor. Dance teaches the kids the discipline, dedication and patience required to learn any form.

Along with learning several dance forms, children can simultaneously understand the different culture those dance forms are associated with.

One must think that the kids already have a lot to read and learn in school then why have a reading habit as an after-school activity. Well, reading for one’s own pleasure is different. Encourage your child to read newspapers, magazines, story books, autobiographies and provide them with age-appropriate reading material. Reading has it own benefits. It strengthens child’s vocabulary, broadens his understanding and improves his language skills. Let them indulge in a good book and see them soar high with knowledge.

This is another motivating after-school activity the children can enroll them into. Student clubs based on different niche and topics have come into being. These include poetry club, theatre club, science club, literary club and creative clubs. In these clubs, students with common interests come together and share their creative ideas and valuable opinions.

In this way the students expand their speaking and socializing skills and certainly a level of confidence in putting their opinions across. 

These above-mentioned activities are few examples that parents can keep in mind while deciding what activities their kids can join after school. These activities are not just a way of making them physically and mentally fit, but also expose them to learn something new and incredible. This is a constructive way kids find their other interests, as too much exposure to the digital world is making them physically and mentally stunted in their growth. 

This social and emotional development of the kids is equally important as we are not generating robots but active and positive thinkers of tomorrow. They need to learn empathy, teamwork and sharing. They must also gather confidence, patience as well as socializing skills. Such curricular activities make sure that along with school education, kids can nurture other hobbies as well.