Important message for all parents, coaches,  and players

A careful man I must always be;
A little fellow follows me.
I know I dare not go astray
For fear he’ll go the self same way.

I cannot once escape his eyes,
Whate’er he sees me do, he tries.
Like me he says he’s going to be;
The little chap who follows me.

He thinks that I am good and fine,
Believes in every word of mine.
The base in me he must not see;
The little chap who follows me.

I must be careful as I go
Through summer’s sun and winter’s snow,
Because I’m building for the years to be;
This little chap who follows me.

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Positive Coaching Alliance  National Conversation on Good Coaching

“The Specialist”

Situation – As practice is winding down, Coach Hastings motions you over for

a private conversation about your child, who shows enough raw

athletic ability to excel. Coach tells you your child has great potential

but should specialize as soon as possible, eschewing other

sports and training year-round, especially if you hope for a college

scholarship for your child. Coach Hastings is a technically skilled

coach who has had a number of athletes earn college scholarships.

Query

• How do you respond?

• What considerations inform your decision?

• How, if at all, do you discuss this with your child?

• Would your response vary depending on the age of your child?

• Is there a certain age at which specialization makes the most sense?

Response by PCA Founder Jim Thompson

As I speak to groups of parents around the U.S., I am more often asked about the pressure they feel to encourage their child to specialize in one sport than any other issue.  Often the question is asked in a way that suggests that the parents feel they have no choice but to acquiesce to the pressure, or their child will fall behind.

Here are some thoughts about dealing with the decision to specialize (or not):

1) It’s up to you.  There is no one else who can advocate as well as you for what’s best for the child.  It is up to parents to resist the pressure to specialize and step up to the responsibility of doing the right thing for their child.  If we can’t resist pressure on behalf of our kids, when can we?

2) And your child.  Depending on the age of your child, you will want to involve him in this decision.  As writers below have noted, a young child may not be in a position to decide this, but even for a younger child, involving her in the discussion has to be a learning experience for her.  She can see how you evaluate and discuss the coach’s statement and learn from you a little bit more about how to make good decisions.  If the child is older, you absolutely will want to bring him into the conversation, even to the point of allowing him to make the decision after considering all the different aspects, pluses and minuses, etc.

3) Coach Conflict of Interest.  Relying on the advice of a coach, no matter how successful or skilled he or she may be is inadequate.  Coaches may have a conflict of interest that can skew their perceptions.  A coach may want your child to specialize in his/her sport so much that it affects his/her judgment about what’s best for your child.

4) Multiple sports help.  If your only goal is to shape your child into a great athlete (which is not a good idea!), you would have your child experience multiple sports.  There are many examples of professional athletes who say their success in their ultimately-chosen sport was enhanced by their playing other sports until a pretty advanced age.  General sports skills such as balance and game sense can be enhanced for an athlete’s ultimate sport by experience with other sports.

Another reason for exposing your child to multiple sports is because you don’t know which sport will catch his fancy to the point where he wants to stay with it for a lifetime.

5) The age of 12.  Dan Gould of Michigan State’s Institute for the Study of Youth Sports says the problem isn’t specialization, but PREMATURE specialization.  Most athletes who attain an elite level specialize at some point, but it is much later than many coaches and parents believe.  The research indicates that for most sports, specialization before the age of 12 is not a good idea.

6) Dangers of specialization.  While year-round focus on a single sport may speed up the acquisition of skills, there are dangers that can outweigh that advantage.  Chief among these are burnout and repetitive stress injuries.  Enjoyment makes it more likely that an athlete will be able to maintain the long-term commitment to a sport (something that is harder than it may seem) that is needed to reach elite status.  And there are few activities that don’t get old when you do them all the time.  Year-round specialization makes burnout more likely.

Repetitive stress injuries also increase with specialization, which then can undercut motivation.  It’s hard to be as excited about a sport when it hurts to play the sport.

7) Child-Driven v. Adult-Driven.  I would be much more open to specialization if the child is the one driving the decision.  If a child says she wants to focus on a single sport year round, she is less likely to burn out, for example, than if she feels she has to do it to ensure a place on a team.  Commitments freely entered into are more likely to be enjoyed than commitments one feels forced into making.

Your child’s chances.  Tom Farrey in his new book Game On:  The All-American Race to Make Champions of Our Children cites the “jockocracy” of professional sports.  So many professional athletes are the offspring of former professional athletes.  The chances of your child becoming a professional athlete in the absence of physical gifts are not good.  Recognize this and don’t put so many eggs in the pro career or college scholarship basket.

9) The good news.  Helping your child have fun and learn life lessons from her sports experience is a good strategy whether she makes the pros or not.  If an athlete loves playing his sport and has the talent to be a professional athlete, he will find his love of the sport a big asset.  If your child doesn’t ultimately have the ability to go pro, at least she will not be deprived of the chance for a lifelong love of sports and physical activity.  Focusing your emphasis on your child having a good time with sports and taking away life lessons will benefit him in any event.

– Jim Thompson, PCA Founder

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2. Is Winning An Excuse For Yelling?
3. Are You a “Positive” Coach?

Each week, Single Dad Life publish articles of interest about youth sports.

PCA annually releases this list of the worst and best behavior in sports from pee-wees to the pros to stimulate discussion among parents, coaches, players and educators. And, in an excerpt from his book, Positive Sports Parenting, PCA Founder and Executive Director Jim Thompson explains how coaches and parents can help youth and high school athletes process the life lessons contained in the Bottom 10 and Top 10 Moments.

Enjoy the Video of the Top Moment!

For a printable PDF of this feature, click here.

Bottom 10 Moments in Sports, 2008

10. Former Philadelphia Phillies and Chicago Cubs pitcher Mitch “Wild Thing” Williams lives up to his nickname by cursing officials at his daughter’s fifth-grade CYO basketball game, leading the director of officials to say that if Williams “enters the gym…we will stop officiating.”

9. Suburban Portland, OR sherriff’s deputies rush to a sixth-grade girls basketball game that nearly turns into a riot after a coach is ejected, slams his clipboard, cutting a player and threatens a 17-year-old referee.

8. A minor league baseball brawl between the Peoria Chiefs and Dayton Dragons is lowlighted by a player attempting to throw a ball into the opposing team’s dugout, instead striking a fan, who was taken to the hospital.

7. On the same court that hosted the infamous Pistons-Pacers brawl, the highest-profile women’s sports brawl in U.S. history breaks out between the WNBA’s Detroit Shock and Los Angeles Sparks.

6. A 7-on-7 summer exhibition football game between two of South Florida’s top high school teams, Pahokee and Miami’s Booker T. Washington, devolves into a brawl, resulting in the hospitalization of a coach.

5. A Georgia high school baseball catcher is caught on video ducking under a pitch so that it smacks the mask of the umpire with whom the catcher was arguing.

4. In a post-game handshake line, a St. Louis-area youth football coach is caught on video violently shoving the face mask of an 11-year-old opponent.

3. Angered by an official’s call in an Olympic-medal taekwando match, Angel Matos demonstrates his superior skill by kicking the official in the face.

2. In a dispute over playing time at a game for seven- and eight-year-olds, a Lubbock, TX soccer dad aims his gun at his daughter’s coach’s husband.

1. A Chicago high school volleyball coach is caught on video paddling players in practice for their on-court mistakes.
Top 10 Moments in Sports, 2008

Top 10 Moments in Sports, 2008

10. A little-known basketball player parlays the life lessons he learned while playing for PCA Trainer Chris McLachlin at Hawaii’s Punahou High School into a successful U.S. Presidential campaign.

9. With the USC football team facing an NCAA-mandated loss of a timeout for restoring the tradition of wearing home jerseys at the rivalry game with UCLA, UCLA Coach Rick Neuheisel volunteers to burn a timeout to even the playing field.

8. At the expense of a potential playoff berth, Kirtland Central (NM) High School girls soccer coach Danene Sherwood blows the whistle on her own team, which officials erroneously deemed victorious after granting Kirtland extra attempts in sudden-death penalty kicks.

7. Fans of the NHL’s Minnesota Wild flood the team with e-mails of protest after the team signs Chris Simon, suspended eight times in his career for such deeds as stepping with his skate upon the prone leg of an opponent, taking his stick to the head of another and uttering on-ice racial slurs against a third.

6. Olympic swimmer Dara Torres asks officials to delay the start of a 50-meter race to give a competing swimmer time to change out of a ripped swimsuit.

5. Myron Rolle, a starting safety for the Florida State University football team, earns a Rhodes Scholarship, choosing to attend a final interview for the honor even at the expense of missing the first half of a critical conference game against Maryland.

4. Green Hope (NC) High School cross country coach Michael Miragliuolo leads the state’s third-ranked boys team and second-ranked girls team, while keeping 205 runners in his program, including a hearing-impaired runner with cerebral palsy, who has cut five minutes off his time.

3. Tip-off of the NBA Finals between Phil Jackson’s Lakers and Doc Rivers’ Celtics, a championship series featuring teams coached by PCA National Advisory Board Members.

2. Despite his status as a starter on the Washington State University basketball team, Taylor Rochestie gives up his scholarship so the Cougars can award it to a needier player.

1. When Western Oregon softball player Sara Tucholsky is injured rounding the bases after her hit clears the fences, opponents from Central Washington University, Mallory Holtman and Liz Wallace, carry Tucholsky around the bases, to complete her home run at the possible expense of Central Washington’s playoff hopes.

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Capitalizing on “Teachable Moments” in Televised Sports

An excerpt from the new book, Positive Sports Parenting
by Jim Thompson, Founder and Executive Director, Positive Coaching Alliance

Case Study 8: Watching a game on television with your child, a player taunts an opponent after making a great play. The taunted player retaliates. As a Second-Goal Parent, what should you do?

Your objective here is to reinforce character traits and life lessons you’d like your child to embrace. Televised sporting events provide a wonderful source of “teachable moments.”

There are two ways to handle these conversations. One is for you to assert what you think of the situation. “I think both of the players blew it. Player A made a great play and then acted like a jerk. But Player B would have done better to have ignored Player A’s taunt rather than letting it take him out of his game.”

This is fine and is necessary sometimes, but an even more effective way would be to ask rather than tell. “What do you think about Player A’s behavior after he made that great play?” It is more powerful and lasting when a young person comes to a conclusion himself rather than simply nodding his head along with something his parent or coach said.

Starting the conversation with a question doesn’t mean you can’t add your thoughts later and even push back if your child says something that you disagree with. “I agree Player B may have been justified in retaliating, but I would have liked to have seen him control himself and Honor the Game. Even if Player A acted like a jerk, Player B could rise above it. I’d certainly like to see you rise above your opponent’s behavior if he dishonors the game.”

Of course, the other opportunity watching sports together on TV is to point out positive examples of players respecting their teammates, opponents, the officials, and the rules.

Related posts:

1. What is the Positive Coaching Alliance
2. Parents – Grab A Whistle and Give it a Try
3. Recommended Reading – Get Your Game Face On by Kathy Toon

Founded as a non-profit within the Stanford University Athletic Department in 1998, Positive Coaching Alliance (PCA) has the mission of “transforming youth sports so sports can transform youth.” To that end, PCA has conducted roughly 6,000 live group workshops nationwide for more than 300,000 youth and high school sports leaders, coaches, parents and athletes. Workshop attendees have helped create a positive, character-building youth sports environment for more than 3 million youth athletes.

PCA has the support of elite coaches and athletes on a National Advisory Board, including National Spokesperson, Los Angeles Lakers Coach Phil Jackson; NBA and NCAA Champion Coach Larry Brown; Former University of North Carolina Basketball Head Coach Dean Smith; Kansas City Chiefs Head Coach Herm Edwards; Former Senator Bill Bradley; NBA Player ShaneBattier; NFL Hall of Famers Ronnie Lott and Tony Dorsett; and Olympic Gold Medalists Jennifer Azzi, Ruthie Bolton, Nadia Comaneci, Bart Conner, Joy Fawcett, Dot Richardson, Summer Sanders and Kerri Strug.

As a proud PCA Champion, SingleDadLife.com  and it’s founder hope you invite us into your league or district for training on how to become a Certified PCA Partner. For more information about how to schedule a Training for your Coaches and Parents, visit www.positivecoach.org

Winning and Positive Sports Parenting Actually Go Together

Interview with Jim Thompson, author of Positive Parenting & Founder & Executive Director of The Positive Coaching Alliance

Related posts:

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2. Should My Child Specialize in One Sport?
3. Grown-Ups Get a Little Lesson In Sportsmanship