Sports parents who never played: should they give advice?
February 8, 2012
Should you give advice to your child about his sport when you’ve never played?
A sports parent asks:
I have a friend who lectures his child on baseball
techniques and strategies when he has never played an inning in his life. What do you think of parents who tell their child the sport’s techniques and strategies when they never played the sport, or maybe played it at a low level? Should we just keep our mouths shut?
There a verse in the Bible and a song from the 60s that says there is a season for everything under the sun, two of them being: a time to keep silent, and a time to speak.
This is especially true for parents.
Don’t blow smoke
The time to be silent is when you really don’t know what you are talking about. And that takes a bit of brutal honest soul-searching. And some humility sprinkled in. It’s okay to say, You know, son, I’m not sure what you should do in that situation, but why don’t you ask coach? Or Why don’t you talk to the high school varsity player down the street? Or little Jimmy’s dad who has coached?
It’s okay that a parent doesn’t know everything. It’s often pride that keeps us from admitting that and in the process we rob our kids of what’s best for them.
Do your homework
However, that’s not to say that you can’t learn. When my husband first began coaching middle school softball 13 years ago, he knew very little about the sport and had only played baseball (anyone who’s played or coached softball knows there are glaring differences).
So he set out to learn and over the next decade, soaked up everything he could about softball
Even if you aren’t the coach, you can still learn enough about the sport to at least understand the basics. But it takes a lot of listening and watching...a time for silence.
Parent first, coach second
When you’ve done your homework, when you’ve listened and observed, when you are confident that your information is correct and will be helpful for your child, your child may listen to your suggestions: From what I’ve observed about hitting in softball… or From what I understand about basketball
But remember, your job is to be a supportive, positive parent first, helping your child learn what’s really important–character growth–and a coach second. It’s okay to delegate the coaching job to someone else and just be a parent.
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I don’t believe parents generally didn’t play sports when young. This alone qualifies them to give advice.
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Well, yes and no. They can give advice on the generalities of playing sports, like good sportsmanship, etc, and for little kids, I’m sure they can give advice on how to hit or catch a ball. But as they get older and need skill development, many parents do not know proper technique. It’s okay for them to seek advice from coaches and experts who know more about the sport technique than they do. Learning the right technique can keep your child from injury and help their performance.
Even if a parent has played the sport in question in the past, it may not be the best relationship to be coach and parent.
I find with my son that I support him in areas that are not directly related to the sports that he plays. For example, we go weight lifting together three times a week. It helps him with wrestling and football, but I leave the coaching to the coaches.
I also video his matches and we review them together. In the heat of the moment he doesn’t remember all that went on in the match. I am able to help him reconstruct what he did and the opponent did. So, I see my role as supportive.
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