One Court, Many Games

Once children get into high school they have probably tried a lot of sports and have decided which ones they want to focus on and be really good at. However, it’s hard to be good at sports now a days just by playing the sport. Most high schools and colleges have developed a program which combines running, playing the sport to learn the techniques, and weightlifting in order to stay competitive. Having a weight room on ship is a good idea because not only will the high school and college age young adults use the room but most adults don’t do any exercise outside the modern membership gym which is often just machines and weights. Having a weight room would keep the testosterone down on ship which could keep down tensions that could lead to fights and disciplinary problems among the crew as well as help the children develop a lifelong habit of fitness so everyone benefits.

Sports for Children

When children get out of kindergarten they still need to learn coordination but they now get to the age where their hands and feet obey their mind. Now they need to build strength, speed, and do more detailed things to develop better coordination. That is where sports come in. The different sports give children a reason to run, throw things, and kick things without getting in trouble. As they grow up children learn to aim with their feet and hands to earn praise from their parents. As they grow older they learn to be the fastest and most precise in order to be the best and earn praise from everyone as well as have a sense of pride in their actions.
As ship and culture creator, you need to decide what sports your ship and culture emphasis. Here is a list of sports recognized by most people. True, many of these sports can’t be done very easily in the confines of a space ship, unless you count virtual reality rooms, but there are a lot of sports for you to chose from or adjust your own sport from a few already around. After all, kids are always trying new things and trying to be cool by thinking up a new sport. Bear in mind that one court or field can hold a lot of sports. Things like soccer and American football have the same lines on the field and often volleyball and basketball are played on the same court, just at different times. Many sports stadiums are designed to hold a concert one day, a football game the next, and a basketball tournament the next day. You could always have one large room with adjustable stadium seating and storage rooms with different mats. That way you could allow the children on your ship to learn a large number of sports and not get focused on one sport out of boredom.

Kid's Area on Ship

Every parent knows that children need somewhere to play and run off energy. Most apartment buildings in developed countries have their own jungle gym of some sort for the young children living there or are very close to a park with a jungle gym for them to play on. Young children need to be able to move and climb and swing and play in order to develop full use of their limbs and coordination. If you plan to have young children on your ship, even for a little time, you will need to have a place for children to crawl or walk around to various toys and structures with other children near their own age while their parents watch nearby or a babysitter does.
This may also be a good time to mention that many of the children that work on ship will likely have parents that work at least a few hours a day. Those children will need somewhere to go and you should probably have some sort of daycare plan set up or a network of parents that have it set up so someone is always awake enough to watch whatever children are unsupervised while their parents work. It may be easiest to set up a room where the younger children are watched by the older children and the older children have some incentive, such as money or computer access, to not wander off and leave the children alone.

Having a Laboratory on Ship

No matter how you decide to do your schooling on ship if there is any version on board you need some sort of laboratory. Schools, especially high schools and colleges, will not accept science credits without a laboratory part of the class. How you do your laboratory on ship is up to you. You could have a room on board that is extra insulated in case of explosions or other mishaps or you could have some sort of virtual reality rooms or goggles that mimic what should happen. There are two things to keep in mind when you think about how to create your laboratory though. The first one is that children rarely listen and they love to play around. Even if you have the room securely insulated, you may still want to position it next to the hull. That way if the room does explode for some reason it can be quickly sealed without causing too much damage to the rest of the ship. The second thing to keep in mind is that not only will the children be using the room for schooling but the doctors and scientists on ship will likely want to do experiments in there as well. You should also figure out how the room will be scheduled. I would recommend that during school hours the room is reserved but other than that there is a first come first served in non-school hours or if there are just a few scientists on board maybe they will be content with a fixed schedule. If they have a fixed schedule than they can always switch hours or loan out their hours if they have more research to do before doing an experiment.

Independant Study on Ship

The good thing about high school and college students are that they are mare capable of studying on their own. That means there are a lot more options for their schooling than the younger children may have in the future. Ships that stay close to the ruling government or near large civilized areas can have a version of modern online courses where the teacher chats for an hour or two a week with a class of people on any number of ships before assigning the weekly assignment and the students can ask each other questions through email or the forum. There is also the option that the teacher merely sends out the textbook and the students are expected to email their assignments by the due date each week with a forum for questions. Another option is that there are yearly tests with bibliographies sent out to everyone that passes the last test. The students are expected to read the textbooks and keep up on current events at their own pace in order to pass the tests. If the students pass the test they go on to the next grade level test, if not they don’t pass their test and stay in the same grade. That may work best if the ship will be far from regular culture or if the communications are difficult to get working on the ship but it puts a lot of pressure on the parents to be sure their child id actually studying while the parents work instead of playing games all day. You may also choose to just have a teacher for each age group on ship and a regular school day with homework afterwards. You may even decide to send the students old enough to go to high school or college off ship to an actual school house planetside somewhere. The choice is yours as you create your own fictional space ship but remember that even the smallest detail can make the setting believable and how school is done can effect memories your character may have.

Schooling in the Future

We’ve talked about a ship with children needing family sized living quarters and more medical and dental facilities than a ship without children. The next thing to think about is how long the children will be on the ship. For ships that plan to house children fulltime, some sort of schooling system is needed, but for ships that only transport children and people don’t stay on ship for more than a month or two, a schooling system isn’t necessary.
For those that decide they need schooling they should start with the lower grades, such as kindergarten to 8th grade. There are a few ways you could set up to give them schooling. You could set up a few school rooms for certain ages with a number of teachers or if you have only a few children on ship you could set up one teacher to teach all ages. However, remember that younger children learn at a slower pace and need more guidance than older children. Years ago in the pioneer era all the town children were taught in the same room by one teacher. However the children didn’t start attending the schoolhouse until they were about six and the older children were given reading assignments to do while the teacher worked with the younger children, teaching them to read aloud and do math while checking the older children’s work every once in a while.
Another way to do schooling is by independent study courses set up by a centralized board of education and done on computers. However, younger children will find it hard to learn by staring at a computer screen and pressing buttons. If you’ve been to an American toy store lately you may have noticed a trend that suggests eventually kids will have toys aimed more at education than fun, although the children won’t realize it.

Family Healthcare on Ship

If we are going with the assumption that you’ve decided to put families and children on your fictional ship, whether it’s a colonization ship, a school ship, or a deep space exploration ship such as the Enterprise in Star Trek: The Next Generation, you need to think about medical and dental care. While a ship carrying just a crew of adults could get away with the minimum amount of healthcare a ship carrying children needs more. Not only do children get hurt more due to their natural curiosity, lack of experience on how to soften a fall, thinner bones, and weaker immune systems but they also need different specialty doctors and equipment at different ages. It would probably be best to have an OBGN on board for growing girls, healthy wives, and pregnant wives or girlfriends as well as a pediatrician and pedodontist for the children on board.