The Covid lockdown generation… can’t throw, can’t catch, can’t run, can’t jump
With Rochelle Eime
COVID-19 was the perfect storm to stop community sport in Victoria, Australia, particular for winter sports across both 2020 and 2021. Recently released research reports that Victoria lost more than 231,000 sporting participants due to COVID lockdowns representing a decrease of 27%.
The Sport Participation Research Project (SPRP), funded by VicHealth and Sport and Recreation Victoria, analyses club-based data across 10 major sports: Australian football, basketball, cricket, football, gymnastics, hockey, netball, sailing, swimming and tennis. The latest SPRP data highlights that those most impacted by the lockdowns were very young children aged 4-9 years. This is the age when most start playing sport. Participation amongst those aged 4 dropped by 69%, those aged 5-9 by 38% and those 10-14 by 18%.
It pays to focus attention on this very young age group as the impact of not being able to play sport for the best of two years represents almost half of their lifetime. Without being locked down children normally develop essential fundamental motor skills during this life period. Beyond learning to hop, skip, jump, run, catch and throw, participation in school and club-based sport teaches children social and interactive skills and helps them to develop broader physical literacy. Physical literacy is to have the motivation, confidence, physical competence, and knowledge to understand the importance of being physically active for life. It is unlikely that parents have been able to make up for this loss of opportunity when taking their kids to the park, for a bike ride or a run, or for some backyard cricket or football.
Physical education experts agree that developing excellent physical literacy early in life is critical. Physically active children, and in particular through sport, develop not only sport specific skills, but also learn to play together, what it means to win and how one can gracefully lose. They learn about commitment, about dealing with disappointment, and about how skill levels differ, about cultural difference and about different reasons why people play. But most of all, they play because it is fun to play with friends.
There is an increasing body of research evidence that those who are physically literate lead more active lives which in turn delivers better physical, mental and social health outcomes. In other words, a large group of young children – call them the sport lockdown generation – will struggle to catch up on two years of no sport. The impact of this loss may well last into the long-term future and have far reaching social and physical health consequences. And this is not the only group of youngsters in danger of falling short.
Whilst participation in sport peaks for those aged 10-14 years historically there has always been a big drop off in participation for those aged 15-19 years. This drop in participation for older adolescents and young adults was dramatic with almost 30% fewer participants during COVID.
Research about the impact of COVID-19 lockdowns showed that restricted access to competitive sport for young adults more negatively impacted girls and individuals involved in individual only sport or physical activity. Involvement in team-based sport in that regard seemed to provide a buffering effect against declining physical, general and mental health outcomes.
It is likely that fewer of these young adults will return to community sport as they have not had the chance to overcome the skills and experience barrier that comes with reaching open-aged competitions. In a way, young people in two critical age groupings are going to face significant challenges in regard to their lifelong involvement in sport and physical activity, due to being locked down during a pandemic. This further highlights the fact that community sport organisations in general, are too focused on providing opportunities in the traditional competitive sport model, that favours those who love competition and are good at the sport. With the danger lurking to lose many from the sport lockdown generation to sport forever, sport organisations need to widen their scope and more think about sporting opportunities that bring people together, that help them develop their skill levels and as such less emphasise the importance of winning the premierships. This requires a rethink about how community sport is organised, in the club, and at the level of the governing bodies. For example, partnerships with primary and secondary schools – where facilities outside school hours are largely underutilised – seems an obvious opportunity. But it does require some visionary leaders to facilitate such changes – at the political, governance, and at the club level. If such change is achieved, then the COVID-19 crisis was not wasted for community sport.