Children need time to recoup and regroup after sports, Marsh says. Factor in that children grow and mature at different rates, Marsh explains. Children of wide-ranging size, fitness, and skill may be paired together in competition. Young athletes are more susceptible to injury because their bones, muscles, tendons, and ligaments are still growing, says Laura Tosi, MD, chief of orthopaedics at Children's Hospital National Medical Center in Washington. A young child is more likely to sustain a long bone fracture, while in a child who is starting to approach skeletal maturity, growth plates that are made of cartilage are more susceptible to injury.
Growth plates are areas of the bone, usually near the ends, from which the bone grows in children.
Still, participating in sports can provide enormous psychological and physical benefits to kids. Parents can ensure their children reap all the benefits of regular physical activity by seeing that they get adequate rest, stretch before play, eat a healthy, well-balanced diet, and use the proper equipment, Marsh says. For example, if your son runs five miles his first week, make sure he increases it to no more than five and a half miles the following week, he says. In addition, she says, adolescence is the time when children build the bone mass that will last the rest of their lives. All rights reserved.