How To Encourage A Child To Pick Up A Hobby For His/her Own Good

Whether it is drama, sports, music, or photography, hobbies can be just about anything a child enjoys outside school.

Healthy hobbies can:

• Give your kid an opportunity to explore a wide range of activities and discover where his/her strengths lie.

• Give your kid’s confidence and self-esteem a huge boost in the right direction.

• Provide a satisfactory sense of accomplishment to the kid.

• Promote the physical and mental health of the child.

• Help your child learn how to take responsibility for his/her actions.

• Promote academic growth.

Thus, according to the points above, we can easily conclude that hobbies can greatly enrich the life of a teenager provided they are pursued the right way.

Although hobbies are mainly seen as a source of fun, many children are unwilling to try them out for various reasons of their own. But is there any way through which you, as a tutor or a parent, can encourage him/her to pursue one of his/her own in the very near future? Let’s see.

1.  Ask your child questions as to what makes him/her feel good about himself/herself

One way to help a child find a hobby is to focus particularly on his/her strengths and the activities that make him feel good in the long run.

• If you think your child has a natural penchant for things like music, drama, sports, science, crafting, painting, computers, etc., ask him/her whether s/he would like to pursue them a bit more seriously or not; specifically as a hobby.

• You must also realize that a person doesn’t have to be exceptionally good at a hobby to enjoy it. For example,

If your kid shows a natural affinity to gardening but lacks the ability and skill to do it the right way, do not be a spoilsport and disengage him from it. Instead, encourage him/her to pursue it more. As a result, you should definitely see him/her improve in no time.

2.  Find out whether your child already participates in hobbies or not

Most children today, especially teenagers, spend much of their life away from the eyes of their parents. As a result, adults may not always be aware of the fact that the kid may already have a hobby of his/her own.

You, as a parent or a tutor, need to find this out ASAP.

• Ask the kid whether s/he has really developed an affinity to doing something constructive in his/her spare time or not. Be supportive of the activity (as soon as you get a sniff of it from your initial conversation), so you can move on to a more detailed discussion based on the same matter.

3.  Brainstorm different ideas of a hobby with the kid

Children may justifiably need a bit of time to find out where their passion and interests lie. You, as a parent or a mentor, should give them your full support when they are trying to figure out the same from a host of daily life activities.

In fact, it would even be an icing on the cake if you show your personal interest in participating with them in their brainstorming session. So sit down together and start the discussion. Sometimes a frivolous remark may end up being a fantastic idea.

Note: Some of the best ideas of hobbies may include things like:

• Cooking,

• Gardening,

• Fencing,

• Reading,

• Manga drawing,

• Creating video and audio,

• Playing RPG games,

• Quizzes and puzzles,

• Crafting, etc.

4.  Create a positive environment in your home or school for hobbies

Some kids may develop a penchant for unique or odd activities that you may not understand from any possible angle. But as long as you see no harm being done as a result of it, do not discourage them by saying how weird you find the activity as a whole.

• So always be supportive of your kid’s hobbies.

• Try to structure your life in your home or school to support hobbies.

• Provide resource and funding as per requirement (but only if you can afford it; remember, it doesn’t always have to be costly).

• And finally, involve yourself. This can make all the differences in the world either for better or worse.

A final word…

Never force your kid to pursue any hobby of your choice. If you do so, it may not always end well in the long run. So refrain yourself from all possible directions. With that, we’ll bring this article to a close for now. Hope you had a great read.

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