When should you start sports?
I was talking to one of my fellow pre-school parents on the playground, and she was talking about her 4-year old son was avidly taking to golf and soccer, with weekly lessons, etc. Meanwhile my kids were happily running around the playground climbing stuff and playing random games. Now I know that Eldrick was probably hitting in the 80s already when he was 4, but I think that is the exception to the rule.
When I was growing up, I think my first real organized sport was junior league baseball which started at the tender age of 8. I played 2 years of that, missed the 1 year of intermediate league because of a hernia operation did played 2 years of little league before bowing out of baseball and concentrating on silver spoon sports like tennis. With tennis, I think I did like 2 seasons of indoor lessons over the winter, then summers were spent hanging out at the, um, American Yacht Club in Rye, NY and playing tennis and swimming all day, and raising minor-league hell. The two years I played tennis over the winter did help my game significantly, instead of having to relearn every summer, but I never really stuck with that either. I ultimately made all-county in tennis my senior year, but had a rude awakening when I went off to Princeton, and quickly realized that I wouldn't even make the JV squad. Fortunately, I saw a flyer for ultimate frisbee practices during freshman week, remembered that I had enjoyed playing 10 on 10 a couple of times in high school where I sat back and hucked backhands to the tall guy (yep, I pigeonholed myself early), and figured I'd give it a whirl. Well, never missed a practice or tournament in 4 years (except for a heel injury early senior spring), made college nationals 3 times, and the rest is history. And I definitely found the right time window for getting into frisbee. I'm not sure I would have had the patience to work my up through B squads.
But enough personal history and back to the topic at hand. What I was starting to say before I got sidetracked was that when I was growing up back in the 70s (I'm 38 now), there was very little in the way of organized sports outside of high school. Now there is a whole panoply of sports and they are all available to kids at outrageously young ages. I know there has been a backlash recently about hyper-scheduling your kids, but what makes sense? I have no intention of living off my kids professional sports proceeds (unless they actually get them...), but what makes sense. I want to lead them pretty strongly away from hockey and swimming because I'm selfish and don't want to have to get up at 4 in the morning to get them ice and pool time.
The 3 sport star in high school also seems to be going the way of the dinosaur, as the highest levels of high school and lower now have travelling teams, etc., so the kid has to make a conscious effort to say NO to all of the single-sport opportunities and probably piss off some coaches to be able to play multiple sports at a high level.
The easy answer is to throw them out to the soccer wolves and see what happens. But when should I start that. I was embarrassed when I came home from work to find our 2-day a week nanny throwing the frisbee to my son, who was making a perfect pancake catch, and realizing that I hadn't even really thrown with him yet. Talk about sheepish guilt... Also, don't know about you guys, but when I was doing little league etc growing up, even when I was 8 years old, I don't remember my parents EVER coming to a game. I had to bike all over town to get to my events. So I'm also a little resentful now that parents seem to be a necessity at EVERY event of their children. Of course, when they actually start happenening, I suspect that I will want to attend, but am afraid of the recent soccer mom/dad mentality, and wonder how I would handle my kids being benched, not playing, sucking (hopefully not), etc.
Ah, the woes of parenthood. Anybody have any thoughts, suggestions, advice on what they did with their kids to wean them into sports? I have 4-year old boy-girl twins.
When I was growing up, I think my first real organized sport was junior league baseball which started at the tender age of 8. I played 2 years of that, missed the 1 year of intermediate league because of a hernia operation did played 2 years of little league before bowing out of baseball and concentrating on silver spoon sports like tennis. With tennis, I think I did like 2 seasons of indoor lessons over the winter, then summers were spent hanging out at the, um, American Yacht Club in Rye, NY and playing tennis and swimming all day, and raising minor-league hell. The two years I played tennis over the winter did help my game significantly, instead of having to relearn every summer, but I never really stuck with that either. I ultimately made all-county in tennis my senior year, but had a rude awakening when I went off to Princeton, and quickly realized that I wouldn't even make the JV squad. Fortunately, I saw a flyer for ultimate frisbee practices during freshman week, remembered that I had enjoyed playing 10 on 10 a couple of times in high school where I sat back and hucked backhands to the tall guy (yep, I pigeonholed myself early), and figured I'd give it a whirl. Well, never missed a practice or tournament in 4 years (except for a heel injury early senior spring), made college nationals 3 times, and the rest is history. And I definitely found the right time window for getting into frisbee. I'm not sure I would have had the patience to work my up through B squads.
But enough personal history and back to the topic at hand. What I was starting to say before I got sidetracked was that when I was growing up back in the 70s (I'm 38 now), there was very little in the way of organized sports outside of high school. Now there is a whole panoply of sports and they are all available to kids at outrageously young ages. I know there has been a backlash recently about hyper-scheduling your kids, but what makes sense? I have no intention of living off my kids professional sports proceeds (unless they actually get them...), but what makes sense. I want to lead them pretty strongly away from hockey and swimming because I'm selfish and don't want to have to get up at 4 in the morning to get them ice and pool time.
The 3 sport star in high school also seems to be going the way of the dinosaur, as the highest levels of high school and lower now have travelling teams, etc., so the kid has to make a conscious effort to say NO to all of the single-sport opportunities and probably piss off some coaches to be able to play multiple sports at a high level.
The easy answer is to throw them out to the soccer wolves and see what happens. But when should I start that. I was embarrassed when I came home from work to find our 2-day a week nanny throwing the frisbee to my son, who was making a perfect pancake catch, and realizing that I hadn't even really thrown with him yet. Talk about sheepish guilt... Also, don't know about you guys, but when I was doing little league etc growing up, even when I was 8 years old, I don't remember my parents EVER coming to a game. I had to bike all over town to get to my events. So I'm also a little resentful now that parents seem to be a necessity at EVERY event of their children. Of course, when they actually start happenening, I suspect that I will want to attend, but am afraid of the recent soccer mom/dad mentality, and wonder how I would handle my kids being benched, not playing, sucking (hopefully not), etc.
Ah, the woes of parenthood. Anybody have any thoughts, suggestions, advice on what they did with their kids to wean them into sports? I have 4-year old boy-girl twins.
posted by Alex de Frondeville at 7:38 PM
4 Comments:
if you care...
1) the sports that produce the highest level of burnout by High School are the ones specifically associated w/ year round play: Swimming and Soccer.
2) at least here (4a school w/ 5 state champs this year (track, b/g swimming, b/g XCski) 2 top 3 (g golf, XCrunning) 3 top 4 finishes (g track, g golf, baseball)) only the soccer players and swimmers are 'soccer only'... so I don't think it's as bad as you think... although the ones going DI scholarship are track, swim, golf...
In any event, I don't think you have to throw your kids to the 'soccer wolves' yet...
that said they're your kids. for yours, or anyone else's for that matter...
do you really want MY advice?
luke
Play sports with your kids in the backyard. If they like it, let them play whichever sport they like. If they don't want to, let them not. But in the backyard... always play everything.
If your kid wants to play soccer year round, let em play. If your kid wants to try to play 5 sports, let em play.
This gives them ownership over some part of their lives. Also make it clear that when their sports/activities conflict that *they* need to talk to their coach and such.
My point is this: If you just let your kids do what they like, they'll pick something out that they really like and try to do that a lot. If you decide what your kid likes, you'll all be unhappy.
(But I bet you already know that)
And watch out for injuries. Kids' bodies aren't mature so they can't handle the repetitive stress that comes with playing one particular sport year-round.
I'm coaching my kid's coach-pitch baseball team for 6- and 7-year olds. It's great fun and very non-competitive. No outs, no scorekeeping and an emphasis on fundamentals and having fun. I like similar soccer leagues for kids, but they're harder to find. But I hear you on parents always being there. I've had a few practices with 100% parental attendance! I wanted to tell them all to go find something to do for an hour.
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