The Benefits of Ping Pong

So you thought the “-pong” in my name stood for something else? Perhaps it does, but it also fits conveniently here. Maybe this was a subconscious motivation for my choice of name.

Most of us are only good at doing certain things. You’ve heard the saying: Jack of all trades, master of none. But if we’re fortunate and work hard, there might be one or two things we learn to do fairly well. For me, one of those things is ping pong (table tennis). For whatever reason, I’m fairly good at it. Maybe it’s because I had access to a table when I was a kid, so I played a lot. Practice, as they say, makes a person somewhat better (though only approaching and never reaching perfection).

I had not played this game in many years, but one day there was a super-sale on a ping pong table. On a whim, we bought the table and put it in our garage. Since then, our family members have played ping pong nearly every day; my children love it.

This is the ideal game to play with family.

Why?

First,

because it’s a casual pursuit. It’s less of a commitment than suiting up to go out riding bikes or playing some other sport. We can stay whatever clothes we are wearing and play for just two minutes if that’s all we have. Generally, we’ll play for longer than that.

Second,

it’s a fun game, so the kids actually want to play it, and we can talk while we play casually (when we’re just rallying, not playing for score). The kids may be upset with us or they may not want to talk otherwise, but once we start playing and they loosen up, they will tell us everything that’s going on at school, etc.

Third,

even though it’s a casual game, the kids have a competitive instinct and they want to beat Mom and Dad at ping pong. Hitting the ball with the paddle, though it is not an overly aggressive or physical action, allows the kids to release some pent up energy. I am not holding up ping pong as an alternative to more physical sports and exercise, which also are needed, but it can supplement them nicely.

Fourth,

ping pong builds eye-hand coordination and an understanding of disciplines such as geometry and physics. There are rectangles and circles and curves. The ball moves and bounces and spins and reacts upon return. The kids watch, they experiment, they make adjustments, and they see the results. If you play a game like tennis (which I like also), in an hour you might hit the ball x number of times. You’ll spend the rest of that hour picking up balls. But with ping pong, picking up balls does not take nearly as long, and because the table is relatively compact in size, kids can sustain longer rallies. Hence, each person hits the ball many, many more times, and it accentuates the learning of spatial awareness, motion, angles, bounces and more. They also get better a the game more quickly than with larger sports.

Unfortunately, I may have made one mistake when we got the ping pong table. Hoping to encourage the children to improve their playing and WANT to get better, I announced a prize for the first person who could beat me at a game (score to 11, in at least 3 sets). I told them I would take the winner on a vacation to a place of their choice. And so, both of my kids are competing to get better and eventually beat me, though most of the time I insist that we just play friendly rallies with no scoring.

Here is why that may have been a mistake. My challenge has encouraged the kids to practice and get better at playing ping pong. And it has not made them more competitive than usual, which is good. I only regret it because I CANNOT lose a game to them. Someday, I’ll be glad to lose and reward them as they deserve. But only when they can genuinely beat me. I cannot let myself lose easily.

Parents sometimes lose games on purpose to help boost kids’ confidence in their own ability to excel and win. I’ve done it before, though not as much as some parents probably do. But with ping pong, that is off the table. Whenever we play, until they can beat me naturally, I must win. So when we are playing scored games, I have to play near my best.

It’s been a fun ride so far. Watching my kids play and practice and learn and get better is a delight. And getting the opportunity to let them loosen up and talk with them, when they might not otherwise open up to chat, is priceless. It’s good family time. This ping pong table is one of the best investments I have ever made. Whatever I paid for it was a bargain compared to the benefits it continues to provide for our family.

All images are public domain.