From Passive Scrolling To Purposeful Training: Martial Arts For Teens

Nowadays, it’s common for teenagers to spend hours each day on electronic devices like smartphones, tablets, TVs, and gaming consoles. Most of them spend way more time staring at screens than they do on their homework or even engaging in physical activities.

Research shows that children between the ages of 8 and 12 spend around 4 to 6 hours on screens each day, while teenagers average closer to 9 hours daily. Another report found that 50% of 12 to 17-year-olds use screens for more than 4 hours on a typical weekday. Experts warn that too much screen time can hinder a child’s physical health and mental development.

Some of the drawbacks of teenagers spending too much time using electronic devices include:

• Disrupts Sleep: The blue light emitted by electronic devices suppresses melatonin, making it harder to get quality rest.
• Increases Risk Of Depression And Anxiety: Studies link heavy screen use during childhood to increased stress, anxiety, and depressive symptoms, particularly during their teenage year.
• Encourage Sedentary Behavior: People who spend a lot of time using screens typically aren’t running all over the place while doing so. Screen use often replaces active play, potentially leading to poor fitness levels, which leads to weight gain.
• Cuts Into Family Time: Excessive screen time often pushes family meals and meaningful conversations aside.

Martial Arts Training: A Digital Detox For Teens

Martial arts training is a physical activity that many children enjoy. Unlike scrolling all day, martial arts training encourages your teen to exercise, socialize with others, and learn new skills. Research shows that children involved in martial arts training or other physical sports typically have better mental health than their peers who don’t. It gets even better. Studies also show that martial arts training can reduce the symptoms of anxiety and depression!

Physical activity is generally good for people of all ages. Regular exercise helps to improve memory, elevate mood, and lower the risk of depression. Martial arts classes bring all these benefits in a fun package. Teens get to punch, kick, and grapple their way to improved fitness while learning values like patience, discipline, and self-confidence in a safe and controlled environment.

The Best Martial Arts For Teens

Now that we’ve covered the benefits, let’s explore the best martial arts for teenagers to boost physical activity and reduce screen time.

1) Muay Thai

Martial arts like Muay Thai teaches kids to face challenges head-on, helping them manage fear and build emotional strength through every obstacle.

Also known as the Art of Eight Limbs, Muay Thai gives teens an excellent full-body workout. This style mixes punches, kicks, knees, elbows, leg sweeps, and clinch throws fluidly, building muscle strength and endurance.

Muay Thai training also pushes your cardiovascular endurance to its limits. An hour of Muay Thai training can burn as many as 1,000 calories, making it considerably easier to manage a healthier weight.

Muay Thai training also provides various mental benefits like improved focus, discipline, and confidence. Classes require students to stay focused as instructors break down techniques, and confidence builds with every skill mastered.

Muay Thai gyms are usually high-energy spaces, making workouts feel fun and often the highlight of your day. Students get to interact with people from all walks of life while training, which also helps broaden their social networks.

The art of eight limbs is arguably the most effective striking-based martial art, equipping students with effective self-defense techniques that have been proven to work in real combat scenarios. Muay Thai also helps with stress relief since hitting bags and pads counts as destructive therapy!

2) Boxing

Boxing is inclusive and suitable for everyone; beyond being a comprehensive workout, it’s an excellent means to stay in shape!

Boxing is one of the most refined combat sports globally, thanks to the popularity it’s enjoyed in the past century, resulting in many new gyms springing up all around. It’s been refined to a sweet science at this point, making it an excellent choice for teenagers who want the understand the “whys” behind punching techniques.

While boxing restricts participants to only using their fists as weapons, students gain a deeper understanding of footwork, angles, and head movements than any other striking-based martial art. Boxing is the most cerebral out of the bunch, making it an excellent choice for intellectually curious teenagers looking for a fun physical activity.

Boxing gets you in peak shape and delivers the kind of ‘destructive therapy’ that lets you hit reset with every punch, giving teenagers a healthy way to vent frustrations or other negative emotions. Teenagers go through a wide range of emotions during their growing years, so it’s important they have a healthy outlet to release negative feelings.

3) Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (BJJ)

Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu is a full-body, brain-powered workout—like chess with sweat—perfect for building strength, burning calories, and outsmarting bigger opponents.

BJJ is a highly cerebral martial art that focuses entirely on grappling. It’s widely regarded as one of the most effective styles for one-on-one self-defense. Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu plays out like a physical chess match, where every move demands strategy and thinking ahead.

Every technique has a counter, and BJJ was designed to allow smaller, weaker grapplers to defeat larger, stronger ones.

Grappling uses up lots of energy, making Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu an excellent choice for anyone looking for help maintaining or even losing weight. It also builds muscle strength and endurance, especially in your core, since the practice involves explosive movements and constant rolling.

4) Wrestling

Wrestling builds full-body strength, cardio, and confidence. It pushes teens beyond their limits while keeping them motivated through fast progress and growing mental toughness.

Wrestling is one of the oldest sports that focuses on grappling techniques like takedowns, takedown defense, and top control.

It’s a demanding sport that works your entire body and puts your cardiovascular endurance to the test. Wrestling will get anyone in the best shape they’ve ever been because of the grinding mentality the sport embraces.

Many teens find wrestling fun once they get past the initial awkwardness and get used to the intensity of training sessions. The rapid strength and endurance gains teens experience through wrestling help keep them motivated, and many parents notice their kids becoming more energetic and confident.

From Virtual Wins To Real-World Victories

Martial arts training makes screen time seem less appealing as teenagers get instant, real-world ‘milestones’ and ‘wins’ that feel much more satisfying than virtual points. Your teenager will start working toward their next belt stripe instead of chasing likes on social media.

Active teens tend to have better moods, do better in school, and feel more confident than their sedentary peers.

Ready to give martial arts a try? Come to Evolve MMA‘s complimentary Muay Thai, BJJ, Wrestling, and Boxing classes for a firsthand experience of what training is like.

Book your complimentary trial class with our World Champions below!

If you have any other questions regarding Evolve MMA and the programs we offer, you can get in touch with our membership executives at the following locations:

Evolve MMA (Far East Square)
26 China Street
Far East Square #01-01
Singapore 049568
Phone: Evolve MMA (Orchard Central)
181 Orchard Road
#06-01 Orchard Central
Singapore 238896
Phone: Evolve MMA (KINEX)
11 Tanjong Katong Road
#02-52 KINEX
Singapore 437157
Phone: Evolve MMA (Star Vista)
1 Vista Exchange Green
#02-26A The Star Vista
Singapore 138617
Phone: (65) 6539 9590