How movement makes kids smarter

Evidence is mounting for the power of play. Keep kids moving in your OSCAR activities for greater learning, bigger brains and a brighter future..

What parents, teachers and coaches have instinctively always known is being proven by science... young brains behave better when bodies are involved..

In one study, adding energetic movement led to a 50% improvement in test scores.  In another, a link was found between early and frequent physical movement inbabies and young children and superior academic performance later in life.

The benefits are more than just behavioural, with frequent play also proven to increase the size of the prefrontal cortex, and therefore increase its processing speed—that's literally a bigger, faster brain through the power of play.

The brain responds to stimulation.  Though we often teach children to seek the safety of what is known and make "sensible" decisions backed by past personal experience, the brain actually develops through exposure to novelty and risk, and in the juvenile brains of children, particularly the physical novelty and risk that is so closely related to survival.

The job of a growing brain is to develop the ability to keep a mature adult "safe"...first physically, then emotionally and mentally.  As any parent of a two-year-old (or teenager!) can attest, trial and error is the only truly trusted teacher.  The boundary pushing that occurs from the terrible-twos until a fully-fledged adult emerges is not only a crash-course in identity, it's a growth-serum for a mammalian brain that develops through challenge and internal conflict, not through maintaining the status quo.

Movement is spontaneous, unpredictable and creative.  This makes it a safe, easy curveball to throw to growing brains anywhere, any time to leverage the learning in your activities for afterschool programs.

Add more movement to your OSCAR activities to increase:

• Focus and attention through increased blood and oxygen flow
• Memory through stimulating all the senses
• Social skills, self expression and self confidence through exploration and acceptance
• Critical and creative thinking through thinking, moving and feeling simultaneously
• Motor development through challenging strength, flexibility and balance
• Motivation through full engagement
• Fun through release of endorphins 

Ready to move more and sit at your desk less?