The Importance Of Sports And Character Development

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Introduction

Participation in sports for children and youth is ever growing and there have been many benefits associated with it, including self-confidence and self-esteem, social and life skills development and improving mental and physical health. (Allender et al., 2006; Coplan & Findlay 2008; Donaldson and Ronan, 2006) Apart from these benefits, advocates of sport participation believe that sports provide the appropriate context for social and life development skills, which brings about the idea of character development through sports participation. (Weiss, Smith, & Stuntz, 2008). Life skills as suggested by The World Health Organization (1999), play a very important role in the healthy development of adolescents, as it helps prepare them for their future. The use of sports to help with such development is further supported by sport psychologists whom have argued that life skills can be taught in combination with athletic skills in sport contexts (Danish & Nellen, 1997).

Sports has been thought to be a platform whereby children and youth are able to learn and cooperate with their teammates, develop self-control, display courage and leadership, communicate and form solutions to internal or external group conflicts and the learning of good virtues such as teamwork, fairness and good work ethics. (Shields & Bredemeier, 1995; Weiss & Bredemeier, 1990). Many parents therefore encourage and enroll their children into sports in hope that they will be able to learn and pick up these positive character-related values and behaviour.

On the other hand, there have been other studies to argue the fact that sports instead of developing character, it undermines character. (Bredemeier, 1985, 1994; Bredemeier, Weiss, Shields, & Shewchuk, 198...

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...certain behaviours which they interpret as being able to gain praises from their coach. As such, the way in which coaches verbalise, comment and teach the rules of the game to their players, will ultimately determine the way in which the players will interpret and act upon the rules during game play. (Bar et al., 1989)

With the increasing number of primary school students taking part in sports, sport can present itself as a great platform for character development; but the positive outcomes are not always guaranteed. A coach who is able to capitalise on this invaluable and unique platform to inculcate good values is essential in order to ensure positive character development outcomes.

This study aimed to describe and analyse a successful primary school netball coach's experiences, strategies and the desired outcomes for athletes as a function of her coaching.

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