Sports and Music: Both Good for Kids

Both sports and music programs offer many benefits and help to prepare children for future success.

The benefits of sports

Participating in a sports program gets your child more active and healthier! The activity helps reduce the risk of obesity, type 2 diabetes, and heart disease.

Think about these other important benefits:

• Improving physical skills, such as coordination and balance

• Learning teamwork

• Learning discipline

• Learning to focus on a goal

• Experiencing the rewards of participation

• Having fun

The benefits of music

Participating in a music program provides many of the same benefits as participating in sports. Teamwork, discipline, focus, and fun are just some of them. A music program will also improve your child's thinking skills and physical coordination.

Other important benefits include:

• Learning creative thinking

• Learning to express feelings and emotions

• Improving language and reasoning skills

Some studies show music programs can raise intelligence (for example, IQ) and college entrance test (for example, SAT) scores. Music can also improve something called spatial intelligence. This important ability helps with seeing the world and making sense out of what is seen.

One study found that children who took music lessons for 1 year increased their IQ scores by 2.5 points compared with children who didn’t have music lessons. The study suggests that the increase in IQ may be because of the focused attention, memorization, and concentration skills required for music study.

Music and other art programs help to increase your child's imagination and the confidence needed to make decisions on his or her own.

Music and sports: a complete education

Your child needs more than the basics to be successful. A full and productive life also requires social skills, discipline, cooperation, and creative thinking — all learned from the training that sports and music programs provide.

And there is one more benefit of sports and music. They can really be fun, not just for your child, but for the whole family.