In our neighborhood and circle of friends, my wife and I are sometimes regarded as the godparents of competitive swimming....meaning we are now old and regarded as some sort of font of attempted wisdom.
We have been involved for 18 years at various local level positions and our kids were competitive swimmers and coaches.
One of our friends emailed yesterday asking advice on how best to encourage his kids in the sport. All of his numerous kids swim. They all have had differing degrees of success as classically measured by placement in races. He wanted to know my thoughts on the best way to encourage his kids in swimming.
As a precursor to my answer let me point out that if you are new to kid's sports and your long term goal is to get your kid a scholarship to college in a sport like swimming, soccer or gymnastics, you will spend a college $cholarship in the preceding years trying to attain it.
There is no monetary savings. Also if your kid is that good and can get a scholarship, Division One practices 25 hours a week and the college owns your kid. This is not conducive to doing well in school.
To make it to the top levels of American sports requires that your kid not only be a genetic athletic phenom but LOVE the sport so much that they almost do nothing else in life.
It requires that kind of dedication to beat out the competition. In soccer we have known multiple parents who have spent $40k over a 13 year period funding their kids effort to get a scholarship only to see him/her lose it in the first year because of injury or apathy.
So...live in the present. The kid has to want it for himself. There is no way you can bully him into greatness over a 14 year period...and it will make everyone miserable.
So.....support your kids at whatever level they care to attain, leave the coaching to the coaches, don't live your dreams of athletic achievement through your kids (this is hard for every parent) and have a lot of family fun.
Here is my friend's question and my attempted answer of wisdom;
Bob: Mr. Bachman,
So, here we are, trying to focus each of our swimmers on improvement, making a big deal about personal bests, and the effort that goes into each event ... and Tommy wins the 13-14 fly at the November Open, with a new time that makes him the fastest on the team in his age, and in the top 5 of this year's crop on his team (even counting 15-18s).
My messaging to all the children emphasizes doing their personal best, but I think it would seem artificially restrained not to congratulate Tommy on the competitive placement at all, and so I did that too, but it left me wondering if you could share some of your hard-earned wisdom there on how to encourage all my kids?
Steve: "Tough question Bob, though it sounds like you are already doing a great job in this department.
My guess is that your other children already know how hard brother Tommy is working. Kids notice a lot more than we think they do in these avenues.
All anyone can do is what their bodies are capable of doing with a certain amount of effort and time in water.
If your praise for all your children is based on their work ethic, and they DO THE WORK, the times will take care of themselves.
We seldom made a huge deal over race placement, but focused on personal best times.
Race placement is often determined by the quality of the competition, not your kids effort. By choosing certain meets, I could almost guarantee my kid a first place finish...that is not a true measurement and we never did that.
I often made the general statement in front of my children that I was always more impressed with diligence in practice than with a 2 minute event result in a meet. .... and I meant it and still mean it. Practice is hard and long. The event is short.
When my gifted kid needed a particular cut time for an advanced meet I would speak to her in private, so as not to upset the one that had no chance of going to an advanced meet. We always kept our praise based on work ethic, technique improvements, and personal bests...the rest is just God given athletic ability that is beyond an individual's control.
Also, each child will not love the sport equally...to continue in it to whatever level they want requires an affection for it. Not everyone has it.
Also, take the long view. In my children's lives now ......their past sports achievements are meaningless. What remains forever though is how they felt supported and loved by me and my wife in the past. You want those to be good memories.
Being as even as possible in your parental praise for each child's effort will make everyone happy in the years ahead.
Also, I would advise being totally open with this subject with your kids...just tell them what you told me...." Hey, I am not perfect in this praise thing but I want you to know that I love you all and I appreciate the effort that each of you is putting in.
At the moment Tom is having some success because of his time and effort. If it seems that I am praising him more, that does not mean that I love him more than you, but as a Dad part of my job is to point out and praise extra effort.
Does everyone understand that? Are you cool with that? If it seems to you that I am being unfair or showing favoritism, please let me know because that is not my intent"
Good luck and have fun!
Steve
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