A game of tennis especially designed for the kids of the age group of 4 to 11 years is popularly known by “Mini tennis”. It is the modified version of tennis for young people or inexperienced players, in which all the qualifications and tactic of the real tennis play is employed. It is an introduction of tennis with puts of colours and excitements to the people unaware of the game so as to create a sense of interest to support them to accept tennis for the life long.
In order to generate agility, balance and coordination which is the primary skills to play the game of tennis. Mini Tennis is just an introduction so as to help young people develop these skills while having fun. Mini Tennis involve a little training session for those who are interested in the game. There are various exercises involved in the training that help kids to develop a sense of team spirit .
Based on the age of the player, the courses has been divided into three categories which is accepted globally. These are Red course, Orange course and Green course. Each of the three courses are explained in details in the following paragraphs.
Red Courses: This course is specially designed for the beginners which include the children of the age group of 4 to 7 years. This course helps the kids to learn and develop the basic movements, how to coordinate and to develop ball skills. In this course kids are taught the fundamentals of the game with fun. The sponge balls and small rackets are used in this course of mini tennis.
Orange Courses: The kids of age between 7 to 9 have to undergo this course. After a successful completion of the Red course and after learning the basics of the play, kids enter the orange course where they are provided large court with low compression tennis balls to play with. Here, all the emphasis in on playing the game along with enjoying the competition and to learn all the shots of the play.
Green Courses: The green course admits children which are aging in between 9 to 11 years after they had successfully completed the orange course and learnt the shots and movements. Here, full size court is provided to the kids with ball which is little softer and lighter than actual tennis ball. This course involve playing competitive matches in order to push them into the real game.
The most interesting part of the mini tennis is the award where each couse has has 3 levels. The most basic level is level 3 and the 1 is the most advanced. Again, covering the various aspects of physical skills, tactical achievement, sportsmanship, technical skills and off the court commitment, each level has been divided into 5 sections.
Each section has three tasks to do that means overall 15 tasks together compile a single level of the game. The child which complete all the 15 tasks of the level is awarded with a certificate and medal. Special stickers are awarded for each task completed at “red” stage. Once it is completed, kids are now ready for the next level. There is no time bounds for the tasks to be completed.
In each of the stage, level 3 is the easiest which could be achieved in 1 or 2 sets of courses very easily. Level 1 and 2 are tough and takes longer time to go through.
