In the past few years, esports transitioned from being just fun and games into an organized form of play that can be used to educate children. And while the development of esport leagues into high schools, colleges, and middle schools thrives, very few schools provide mentorship and guidance in-game, especially at the elementary level.
Esports develop not only social skills in children but enhance confidence, decrease reaction time, improve their aptitude for working under stress, and empower them to make hard decisions. On top of that, from a young age, video games nurture responsibility since each action has consequences in most games.
Why Should Middle Schools Care About Esports?
Youth gaming leagues help prepare students for their academic goals. Esports leagues and teams provide structure, particularly at the middle school age, where responsibility, accountability, and identity are key areas of development.
Middle school esports leagues allow students passionate about gaming a way to play what they love while leveraging their school's critical social-emotional support and guidance.
In the same way middle schools introduce dances and social nights to students lives, esports on campus reflects the virtual social realities students interface with. When A school takes the effort to learn and implement what kids respond to, the students exude more agency over their academic trajectory.
How to prevent students from playing games too long?
Children often become obsessed with becoming the best at what they do. They analyze their previous results and think of strategies on how to improve. This innate curiosity and drive to learn about the world can start to fade in middle school.
When introducing puberty and social pressures into a middle school aged child's life, it becomes easier for them to gravitate toward safe, controllable, predictable places. For this generation of children in particular, nothing feels more in their control than technology.
For students interested in gaming, an esports league structures their play and encourages drive, curiosity, and stamina for play. After all, in a youth league, playing to win is not the only focus. Time off-screen, connecting with team members is equally valued and encouraged.
How Extracurricular Activities Such as Esports Help Children
In the past decade, it has become evident that, extracurricular activities at school boost students’ success rates enormously. One of these extracurricular activities can be the students’ favorite video game, League of Legends, or creating in-house Rocket League youth esports leagues in order to motivate students.
But in order to be certain which is the predominant game in your particular school, a survey amongst youngsters could yield great success, and even successfully engage them in improving the school experience overall. Requesting children to play games that they don’t like doesn’t seem like an educated decision.
Extracurricular activities impact a youngster’s life in many ways, including:
- Boosting academic performance. Studies show that extracurricular activities make children more eager to look forward to returning to school the very next day, which increases their overall focus and performance levels.
- Improving social skills. Game-related activities, especially team-orientated games, require a good level of communication in order to achieve victory. Kids often develop these naturally over the course of playing instead of studying this from a book which is often impossible.
- Enhanced decision-making. Group activities that require strategizing and later on applying the chosen strategy often require time management and making decisions under pressure. After-school clubs can also sometimes spike interest among
- Help them impress a university. It is widely known that good athletes get accepted and sometimes could even receive a scholarship thanks to their sports successes. Very soon, the case would become the same with esports.