Tweens Club Sports
Three of my boys play soccer. My middle son plays on the club team; the U9 team. Earlier today we got an email from our son’s soccer coach, which he was forwarding from the Director of Coaching for the local soccer association. The Director of Coaching was concerned about some behaviors he had seen from parent coaches and the parent spectators. He believes “the role of parent coaches should be to encourage his/her players, rotate players in and out of the game evenly, and to provide some feedback on expectations (on the sidelines and occasionally from the sidelines to the field).”
He also had some opinions on the parents watching the games. He said:
I also think we should be educating our parent coaches and staff coaches who attend these games to instruct the parent sidelines that they should adhere to the following guidelines:
* No coaching from the parent sidelines. Parents should not be screaming, “Shoot it Jimmy, Boot it Lizzie, Pass it Mathew, etc.
- Basically parents should not give directions to players.* Encouragement of your team and child is great, but should only go this far (i.e. great job Joey, Good hustle Lilly, Nice pass Billy, Good play Aaron, etc.).
* It would help coaches if parents also understood that winning and losing at u9 and u10 is not the point. Developmental soccer should be about having fun, developing skills, learning the rules of the game, learning the value of sportsmanship, team work, etc.
I think he has some good points. I have seen some coaches completely lose their cool on the sidelines. When my teen was playing instructional soccer in elementary school, he had a coach who was constantly red-faced yelling at his players on the field. It irritated me to watch him yelling at these 8-, 9- and 10-year-olds who were still learning the rules of soccer (hence an instructional league).
But I also think it’s ok for a coach to holler instructions to the players on the field. Not scream or screech, but holler. Getting them in to position or telling them to dribble rather than trying to score a goal by kicking from the halfway line or asking the goalie to kick down the sideline instead of across the field is best done while the child is in the act.
Also, this Director is living in a dream world if he thinks these kids aren’t concerned about winning or losing. Club is a competitive league. They keep score. If they wanted to just learn the basic skills they would stay in the (much cheaper) instructional school little league teams that don’t keep score. But with club soccer? They want to win. Part of the point is to be able to play other teams from different schools and different soccer clubs. Part of the point is the win those bragging rights. Granted the focus shouldn’t be on winning. They are still elementary school kids. But a little competition is healthy. it teaches them to be gracious winners and good losers.
What do you think? Should elementary school club teams just be for “development” or should they be competitive? Should parent coaches be quiet during game time and only give instruction during practice? How do you feel about parents yelling instructions from the sidelines?
Tags: club team, parent coaches, parent spectators, soccer, SportsRelated Stories
POSTED IN: Sports
2 opinions for Tweens Club Sports
Christine's Mom
Sep 30, 2008 at 2:49 pm
I agree that teaching is the primary goal for the tween ages (actually for all youth sports!), but I think that learning how to win or lose gracefully is an important lesson to learn.
I agree that if you are keeping score, then the teams are going to be interested in knowing if they have won or lost. Even if you are not officially keeping score, the kids and the parents count the goals - I’ve seen that when your kids were younger :-)
So, I think that part of the role of the “parent/coach” is to help kids learn that they won’t win every time that they play and that feelling “disappointed” and wanted to do better next time are good feelings after losing. But, that yelling, cursing, etc. at the opposing team is inappropriate behavior.
Likewise, when they win, they need to learn to be gracious - to not gloat, to not call the other team losers, etc. While it is okay to feel happy, to feel a sense of accomplishment, they should also remember what it feels like to lose and encourage the other team where possible. And, they should still take the time to learn from their mistakes in their winning game - there are always some.
And, yes, I know I am living in a dream world :-)
Even the parents on the sidelines need to learn about graciousness in winning / losing.
Mom
Angela
Oct 5, 2008 at 7:33 am
Club sports can be brutal. DD has been in some form of sport since she was 4. She quit soccer at age 8 because of the parents. (She loved her coach, as did I.) I think she heard one to many parents screaming “Take that little b**ch out!” from the sidelines. Yep, they were 8, and that kind of thing had been going on since they were 6. Maybe if every game was a “silent sunday” game, she’d a stayed in. (Not that I mourn being able to sleep in most Saturdays and Sundays.) Now she’s in love with volleyball, and we have travel tryouts at the end of the month. CYO volleyball parents are pretty good for the most part, here’s to hoping that travel folks are just as cool!
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