Raising Winners: A Parent's Guide to Helping Kids Succeed on and Off the Playing Field - Softcover

Kuchenbecker, Shari Young

 
9780812931679: Raising Winners: A Parent's Guide to Helping Kids Succeed on and Off the Playing Field
Softcover
ISBN 10: 081293167X ISBN 13: 9780812931679
Verlag: Times Books, 2000

Inhaltsangabe

A sports psychologist offers advice on helping children develop through sports, discussing the right sport for a child, keeping kids motivated, handling competition, and maintaining a sense of balance in a young athlete's life.

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Shari Young Kuchenbecker has a Ph.D. in early childhood development and teaches life-span development at Loyola Marymount University. She has consulted on sports for USA Today, The New York Times, and parenting and women's magazines. She lives in Los Angeles with her family.

Aus dem Klappentext

child is a casual joiner or a serious athlete, the playing field is a terrific place to learn confidence, sportsmanship, and other skills he or she will need to succeed in life. This comprehensive guide from sports psychologist Dr. Shari Kuchenbecker distills decades of sports research and the author's own experiences as a "soccer mom, volleyball mom, Little League mom, and basketball mom" to create an indispensable guide to children's development through sports. Topics include how to:Choose the right sport for kids--and when they should startSupport a good coach and deal with a bad oneKeep kids motivatedHelp kids eat rightScreen an injuryEncourage girls in sportsDeal with quitting, stalling, and burnoutGet athletic scholarships and more

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" I want my kid to be a winner! A champ. The best!"

Sound like you? Parents just like us fill baseball, soccer, football, and track fields, basketball and volleyball bleachers, ice rinks, gymnasiums, and tennis stands around the world. We all want the most for our children. We want them to be happy, successful, and, if they are in sports, we want them to be winners.

In reality, no one starts out as a winner in sports. Big doses of quality parenting and balanced development create winners. These things plus athletic potential, years of practice, lots of sweat, good coaching, and motivation nurture athletic success stories. How should you guide a young athlete? What are the important underpinnings of becoming a winner? How can you help your young child grow to fulfill his or her true potential?

Tough questions? Not really. Many parents may be surprised to learn that they already have the knowledge it takes to raise a child in athletics because quality parenting and quality athletic training have the same fundamental rules. Amazingly, some truly terrific parents leave their common sense at home when they walk out the door to drive their child to a game or practice. Some rationalize that harsh treatment is a necessary evil in sports. Others defer expertise by acknowledging that they were not athletes themselves. The fact of the matter is, harsh treatment is never necessary, and parents should have confidence in their common-sense knowledge and intuitive insight to their child's needs. Supporting a child in sports simply extends our ongoing quality parenting at home.

I've offered some common-sense guideposts for parents in the dynamic process of raising young athletes in boxed sections entitled Tips. Most are simply reminders of what you already know; use these rules to help you in your day-to-day decision making. Of course, application of a rule takes your love, dynamic judgment, balance, and care.

TIP Trust what you know. Quality athletic training and quality parenting have the same fundamental rules.

SPORTS HAVE CHANGED

I loved the uncomplicated way sports used to fill out our lives. About 4:00 P.M. in the afternoon, after walking home from school, having our snacks (Twinkies were fine in those days), doing our homework (we had a lot less then), and ten minutes of being underfoot, whoever was looking out for us would say, "Why don't you go outdoors and play?" The rest of the family wouldn't be home for a couple of hours and dinner wasn't until sunset, so the afternoon was ours for the taking.

We would trundle out into the streets from our various apartments and houses as if a silent whistle-heard only by the kids of the neighbor-hood- had convened our impromptu afternoon sports practice. Without much fanfare, the practice of the day was determined by the mood and equipment of our ragtag team. If someone had remembered to bring a bat and someone else had a ball, there you go, we played baseball. If a prized red rubber ball appeared, we played kickball or four square, but an open wall often made handball our afternoon choice. If someone brought skates-the old kind you strapped onto your not-so-good shoes and tightened with a key-we would all take a group temperature and trot back to get our skates, too. If no special sports gear appeared, no problem, we could play kick-the-Campbell's-Soup-can between gutter-to-gutter goals. A few kids with a creek or lake nearby had enviable afternoon practices skipping stones to leaf and twig targets across the water.

In the old days, the great athletes rose to the top of our catch-as-catch- can teams through talent, leadership, and regular four o'clock appearances. Some of the great stone skippers became pitchers. Some of the top swingers and climbers became gymnasts. Now, it takes a full-fledged sup-port system for a kid to participate in even one after-school activity- whether it be Little League, park recreation, or an elite club team. First, someone has to find out about it and sign the kid up in advance. Enrollment fees vary, ranging from $5 up to $3,500 per year for some club sports. Parents are lucky if they live within walking distance of practice and game sites. Most don't. Someone needs to drive the kid back and forth-five minutes or as much as three hours each way. Special equipment can be as simple as a pair of athletic shoes for blacktop basketball or as expensive as an entire ice hockey goalie getup costing $1,500 or more. Games themselves are another chauffeuring event, with game watching a major workout for some parents. In addition, parents are on call for snacks and water duty, not to mention the now-traditional season-end party celebrating the close of this often herculean family undertaking. With parents' busy work schedules and driving requirements, it comes as no surprise that many parents recoil and quit after only a season or two.

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Verlag
Times Books
Erscheinungsdatum
2000
Sprache
Englisch
ISBN 10 
081293167X
ISBN 13 
9780812931679
Einband
Taschenbuch
Auflage
1
Anzahl der Seiten
332
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Verantwortliche Person
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