We ran introductory sessions for all of the age groups of parents from U8 – U16 covering a multitude of different topics from managing dreams and expectations, supporting the development of life and character skills, avoiding comparisons, normalising the ups and downs of the sporting journey and controlling the controllables to name but a few.

All of the sessions were really well attended and parents helped to bring the sessions to life by being so open and honest in sharing their thoughts and views on the complexities of being a sporting parent, often with plenty of humour.

Player Care Manager at Aston Villa Helen Roberts said, ‘The Academy invited Gordon and WWPIS to deliver to our 9’s to 16’s parents, as part of our parent programme. The session was very relatable with great insight into how to try and navigate the demands, challenges and positives of being a sporting parent. Gordon delivered a very engaging session with real life stories and humour!’

CEO Gordon MacLelland said, ‘We loved our first visit to Aston Villa.  It is something we have been working towards for some time with the club and are excited about the plans for next season in implementing a cohesive and sustainable programme across the academy. A number of football clubs who are working alongside us are beginning to see the real value in engaging positively and working with parents to help support their child’s development both on and off the field. We have been running sessions throughout the season for academy management, coaches and parents with the success of this work being dependant on everyone playing their part and not working in silos.’

The experiences of working across so many different academy environments is helping us as an organisation to deliver high quality context specific workshops for parents, coaches and management staff.

We are looking forward to continuing our work next season with a number of Premier League clubs including  Wolverhampton Wanderers and Newcastle United with some new partnership announcements coming very soon.

Outside of the Premier League, this season has seen us deliver face to face and virtual sessions for over 25 clubs across the EFL thanks to a successful first season working alongside League Football Education with early indications suggesting that this number will rise in 2023/2024.

Even those who keep their cool can get swept into the march towards these outcomes and maybe the allure of professional sport. We can hire private coaches, move schools to provide better opportunities, and go all-in, transforming their family into one dominated by whichever sport it is.

It’s natural to want our kids to succeed, to want the best for them. Occasionally, this behaviour is a result of us vicariously living through their children. But more often than not, our heart is in the right place. We want to support our child, to give them the best opportunity to succeed. Which is why a few recent conversations with a few former professional athletes struck me as interesting.

For instance, Lindsay Gallo observed, “My sense…is that (former elite athletes) are relatively more laid back about their young kids’ athletic endeavours.” Gallo was a former teammate of mine on a post-collegiate track club. She was also one of the best in the country, placing 6^th at the Olympic Trials in 2008.

Wouldn’t you expect the parents who made it to the top themselves to be hard-charging, to give their kids the advantages they wished they had, to pass on the lessons that got them to the top?

My inclination is that those who made it to the top understand both the difficulty in doing so and the luck involved. They know that it’s a long, windy path, and that in order to get through, the deep motivation and relentless drive is going to have to come from within. No amount of cajoling will help. Other former elite athletes expressed to me that there will be enough expectations and pressure on the child already, so why add more? Instead of yelling or videoing every move, they sit quietly on the sideline of their kid’s games.

After spending over a decade in the coaching world, helping high school and college athletes excel at and continue their athletic pursuits, I got to interact with my fair share of parents. The vast majority were great. But there are a few lessons that I’d like to pass on.

Parenting is difficult, and I’m not trying to say this stuff easy. This is just one person’s perspective from being on the other side. Consider it a coach’s version of parental Bootcamp, lessons I wish every parent knew when it came to supporting their child’s endeavours, be it athletic or academic.

1. The fire has to come from your kids.

This may seem obvious, but it’s worth repeating. If you look at the research on prodigies and phenoms who eventually become standout adult performers, a deep intrinsic drive is a requirement.The problem is that success often pulls us away from this inner drive. We start out playing soccer or the violin because it is interesting and fun. As we get better, we get accolades from our coaches, teachers, and others. We start winning trophies, hearing our name on the morning announcements or in the online commentary, and before we know it, we’re pulled towards the external.

The best way to create and maintain intrinsic motivation? Let your kids dabble, explore, and find something where their interests and talents align. Then let them enjoy it, without an undue emphasis on success. (For a deep dive on this topic, check out our most underrated, book The Passion Paradox.)

2. Make sure your kids are doing it because they enjoy it, not because they see you enjoying it, and thus want your love and support.

One pitfall I saw quite often is that kids learned that they could get mum or dad’s undivided attention, love, and support when pursuing an activity. If dad was all about football, then of course little Johnny wanted to play football. When kids are young, we often confuse them doing the activity because they like it with them doing it because they know mum and dad like that they are doing it.

Kids just want to be loved, supported, and cared about. If the only way they get that is through some sport or doing some crazy thing, they’ll do it. It’s great to connect with your kids over shared interests. But like most things in life, there’s a healthy balance to be had. One of Brad’s parenting mantras is “love your kid, not what they are doing.”

3. The car ride home is the most important part.

Remember your role in your child’s activities. There’s no need to critique, berate, or even coach your kid up after the game. That’s not your role. If after a win or loss you’re always obsessing about the game, what message does the child receive? It’s very easy to turn a child’s passion into something they dread by ending every activity with a lecture on what they could do better.

In psychology, there’s a concept called the peak-end rule. It’s a heuristic for how we remember past events. We tend to remember the peak of the emotional experience, maybe when you scored the game-winning goal, and the last part of it; in this case, the car ride home.

Be there to support, no matter the outcome. Resist going into coaching mode. You are the parent. Leave the coaching to the coach.

4. Teach your kid how to lose well.

Sports are great for teaching life lessons. A tough loss forces us to deal with our competitiveness and a swirl of negative emotions. The message shouldn’t be that losing is bad; that we should ignore that experience; or that we should learn to hate losing.

Failure is a part of life. The earlier someone learns how to process, learn, and grow from failure, the better. If you see your child losing it, freaking out, unable to handle a tough loss, consider it as a sign they need perspective. (Same goes for the parents.)

Losing well is about creating space between who you are and what you do and having multiple sources of meaning in your life. This allows you to occupy a place where of course you want to get better, but it’s not the end of the world if you suffer defeat. In this way you can more easily rebound and then evaluate what went wrong with a clear mind. We do our best when we are challenged, but not threatened. Don’t set your kid up to be in threat mode.

5. If your kid is going to be good or even great at something, they’ll figure it out.

Private coaching, early specialisation and so forth aren’t going to make or break your kid. If he or she is good enough to make it at the highest level, they’ll get there.

I know this sounds sacrilegious. To just trust that things will work out. To not spend your life obsessing over how to give someone a one-up. But we often over emphasise the minor items, blowing them up as if they are what matter most. Sure, some extra help and support are sometimes needed. But what often happens is people take advantage of a parent’s desire for their child to make it, whatever “make it” means. Be wary of anyone promising results, scholarships, and the like. Be wary of anyone who tells you that their child needs to quit their team in favour of some private coach or special organisation. There’s a whole cottage industry of youth gurus promising performance, scholarships, and more.

Don’t be the parent who thinks the coaching guru or a recruiting service is the difference-maker. It isn’t. If your kid is good enough and motivated, they’ll figure it out.

6. Your support should be unconditional; it should not be dependent on the results of the game (or if they even play a game to begin with).

This is a simple, but worthwhile reminder. Win or lose, be there. That’s it. It’s not complicated.

7. Resist the urge to always step in.

Let your kid figure things out. Support them. But let them figure out how to navigate some of the challenges that come with sport. Look for your spots to step in when needed. But don’t be the overbearing parent who goes to the coach or teacher every time your child underperforms. Let them navigate it. Sport and the classroom are great and safe containers for the real world.

8. Hold yourself back from going all-in.

You may think going all-in to help your child is a good thing. The more invested you are, the more pressure and expectations fall on that child’s lap. You want to support, not obsess. If you obsess, I promise it will end up backfiring. If the child chooses to be a bit obsessive about their sport, it should be entirely their decision. Your job as a parent then transitions to providing perspective, to help ensure that his or her passion is the harmonious variety and not the obsessive, that they don’t fall for the same trap that Lance Armstrong or Elizabeth Holmes did.

9. Relax and step back.

Every coach has a story of a parent who by all accounts was loving, yet them simply showing up to a game or meet would cause their child to underperform. It wasn’t anything they said at the competition. It was just that their parent was in the stands.

In fact, research shows that choking in sport is partially because we perform in front of an audience and feel judged. In an article entitled The Many Threats of Self-Consciousness, Massimilano Cappuccio and colleagues concluded that “concerns about self-presentation may be the origin of the increased state anxiety for choking-susceptible athletes.” It’s not that audiences are a requirement for choking. It’s that they encourage and activate threat mode, when our sense of self is in danger in something that we care about. Choking isn’t succumbing to the pressure; it is a self-protective strategy gone wrong. And one of the items that activates this is when we are performing in front of people we care about, people whose opinions we value.

It’s why when researchers studied a variety of ways to increase anxiety and the impact each had on performance, it wasn’t punishment or playing for money that causes anxiety increase and performance to decline. It was performing in front of teammates or coaches. The same holds for parents. People want to perform well in front of those that matter. They feel like they let you down if they don’t. This occurs even if you are the kindest, most loving person in the world. It’s human nature. You can think of all the above principles as ways not to exacerbate it.

After spending a decade handing out athletic scholarships before stepping away from collegiate coaching, the best advice I can give is to not play the “pursuit of the scholarship or professional” game. If the child is good enough and wants it, they’ll figure it out. If it’s coming from mum or dad, the coach will see that.

My first year in college coaching a parent and kid walked into my office. The parent spent 30 minutes going on and on about their child, the talent they had, and how they had so much more potential than the results they’d shown so far. The kid barely talked.

The tennis coach who had an office next to mine came in after the parent had left. He said, “Just a word of advice, you don’t want that athlete. It won’t turn out well for the kid. And the parent will be a headache.”

And more often than not, in similar situations, that tennis coach was correct. Let your kids be kids. Support them. But don’t get in their way. They’ve already got enough expectations and pressure from living in a world where they are constantly judged on social media, where they have to measure up against the world instead of just their local school. Give them space explore and basic support, and then get out of their way.

The odds are your child isn’t going to be a champion. It’s just how odds work. So do you want to leave them with a positive experience, with life lessons on learning how to fail, compete, be a great teammate, and so on? Or do you want to wring every bit of joy out of the process, in the minuscule chance it helps them make it to the top, when the reality is your pushing probably actually hurts over the long haul.

Take a lesson from those who’ve made it, like Lindsay Gallo. It is okay to be laid back about your kid’s future athletic success. In fact, it probably helps.

Steve Magness is a world-renowned expert on performance, well-being, and sustainable success. His most recent work is Do Hard Things: Why We Get Resilience Wrong and the Surprising Science of Real Toughness. He is coauthor of the best selling Peak Performance and The Passion Paradox. In his coaching practice, Steve has worked with some of the best athletes in the world.

In this episode Jo Davies and Jurgen van Leeuwen join Gordon MacLelland to discuss sports parenting and coaching your own children. Drawing on their vast experience in the world of badminton as Olympians, coaches and now parents to England Badminton internationals Ethan and Estelle, they share many pearls of wisdom, portraying a very honest and humorous reflection of their very unique situation.

“I want ride down this way, Dad.”

It was an option that I hadn’t even considered. My 3-year-old daughter was pointing down a grass slope that stretched down and away from the concrete path on which we stood.

I hesitated for a moment. This would be by far the most difficult thing she had attempted on the balance bike. After receiving the bike for her third birthday some months before, progress had been intermittent, as was her interest. She had always tired quickly of any “practice” even sometimes protesting at the mere suggestion of getting the bike out. Her improvement had taken a bit of an upturn lately – she was now able to generate a little bit of speed on a flat surface – but the prospect of racing down a hill was entirely different to riding around in front of our garage.

I expected a tentative attempt from her, but once she was in position at the lip of the slope, she kicked off and rolled over the edge. I jogged after her, watching anxiously. She built up speed as she ran her feet along the ground on either side of the bike, she a wobbled a little but maintained control. She was going faster than ever before when she lifted both feet off the ground and coasted . . . and coasted . . . and kicked again . . . and coasted some more. She rode faster and further than she ever had before. It was a huge improvement. A monumental leap forward. I was proud, relieved and frankly amazed.

When she finally came to a stop she looked up at me triumphantly and shouted: “Again!” She immediately wheeled her bike around and rode it back up the hill.

This scene was repeated about a dozen times with only fatigue preventing her from continuing.

Her energy, enthusiasm, and perseverance for the activity was in such contrast to previous efforts, it made me wonder what had happened. The dad in me was proud and amazed, and the coach in me was curious.

Athlete-Driven Action

What I had witnessed that day with my daughter was similar to what we should be striving to facilitate as parents and coaches: an enthusiasm and persistence that is completely child-driven.  This is not always possible, but there are times where we can allow this to happen.

It got me thinking.

If we can stumble upon situations that motivate kids to attack what was previously difficult or uninteresting for them, can we subsequently learn to intentionally craft an environment around young children that generates such buy-in and engagement in a sporting domain?

If so, we firstly need to be alert to what factors lead to such self-driven engagement. So, what worked for my daughter?

In hindsight, I suspect that a number of things aligned on the day to provide such a  positive experience for her.

Autonomy

My daughter chose to ride down that hill and completely drove the activity herself. There was no instruction or cajoling from any outside source.

Autonomy is critical to intrinsic (internal) motivation. Intrinsic motivation is a higher quality form of motivation than being motivated extrinsically (from an outside source).

A child is most likely to try something with vigour if it is their idea and driven from within.

Takeaway

Parents should be trying to help their children by guiding and nudging but not taking over the experience.

Coaches should constantly search for ways to turn a sporting experience over to the athletes. Set the scene, and then get out of their way.

 

Desirable Difficulty

The hill was of just the right gradient and length for my daughter’s current level of confidence.

Sensible progressions of a task at a level of desirable difficulty will create feelings of competence and confidence, also critical to intrinsic motivation.

Tasks that are too easy are met with apathy and indifference. Those that are too hard create fear and frustration. Either way, kids will try to avoid them.

Takeaway

Parents should try to set goals and challenges with their children that are realistic.

Coaches need to keep activities within a young athlete’s realistic skill set. Don’t try to rush or jump ahead to quickly.

Safety

The slope that my daughter chose to tackle was a large, open grassed area.

The attraction to a novice rider now seems obvious and I shouldn’t be too surprised that my daughter was drawn to it. There was nothing to collide with and the surface was reasonably forgiving in case of a fall.

Had the surface been concrete and the area full of trees would my daughter have tried coasting down the hill at speed? Probably not. It seems obvious, but creating an environment that is manageable for a learner makes them more likely to try.

Takeaway

Parents need to ensure that their children are in safe learning environments that will allow them to thrive.

Coaches need to create environments in which the athletes feel safe. Remove factors that may cause fear.

Fun and Unstructured Play

There was no sense that the ride down the slope was “practice”. There was no formality about the activity. My daughter was just playing. It was fun, unstructured, spur of the moment stuff.

The presence of fun and play will make it more likely that the kids will engage with and buy into an activity.

Takeaway

Parents need to allow as much free play as possible allowing children to make up the games/challenges, trying not to turn the back garden play time into another coaching session.

Coaches need to plan to make practice tasks feel like play. Look to “gamify” as many activities as possible.

Meaning

Despite the activity being a form of play, it had meaning and intent. The challenge of riding down a hill without falling off has far more real life application that rolling around on a flat square of concrete with no real destination in mind.

Dreariness deters. Meaning motivates.

Takeaway

Parents should try to make games/activities fun, with challenge and perhaps a little bit of competition.

Drills are often dreary. Coaches need to create activities for kids that contain a game, challenge or competition element.

Absence of Expectation

There was no expectation of success when my daughter first kicked off at the top of the slope. There was no pressure. There was nothing at stake. There was nothing to lose.

Unwanted expectation can cause kids to shy away and avoid activities, or perform well below their best due the anxiety that can result.

Takeaway

Parents should try to ensure that their patience does not exceed expectation and have too many pre planned thoughts about what they are expecting to see.

Coaches need to avoid placing unwanted expectation on young athletes.

Early Success

The fact that my daughter’s first attempt was successful and without incident cannot be ignored. It was critically important to her confidence and subsequent eagerness to repeat the activity over and over.

Takeaway

Parents should try to ensure that their child is experiencing some form of success.  Too much failure can lead to children becoming disillusioned and unmotivated.

Early on , coaches should deliberately structure activities to make it more likely that athletes will experience success.

Encouragement, Empathy and Patience

In hindsight, as a long-term coach, I should be well aware that any type of skill or talent does not emerge in a linear fashion. It can consist of long plateaus, backwards steps and triumphant breakthroughs – pretty much what had occurred as my daughter learned to ride a bike.

I had tried to be patient all along. While disappointed when on previous occasions she wanted to stop practising, I accepted it. I gently encouraged, I didn’t push. I didn’t rant and yell when she gave up. Each time she got on the bike, no matter for how short a time, I saw it all as helping her. I was hopeful that even when she didn’t appear to be progressing, maybe she was.

Encouragement, empathy and patience are keys to motivating kids to try something and persist with it in the long term. There is no use forcing kids to do things. We know that external motivation is a low quality form of motivation. Give kids a chance. They may not try it now but maybe will when they are good and ready. Don’t burn the bridge to future attempts with impatience, pestering or berating.

Takeaway

Parents and coaches need to recognise and respect a young athlete’s feelings. Engage with them and don’t dismiss their emotions.

Conclusion

On reflection, it seems that the success of this experience was due to it being driven by my daughter in a supportive, safe, fun environment, devoid of expectation but full of meaning for her.  I provided the means and the opportunity, then became a supportive bystander. The experience was hers. She did it.

There is so much to take away here from a parental and coaching perspective. If the factors that contribute to positive experiences for children can be identified, the challenge for parents and youth sports coaches is to deliberately attempt to replicate these factors within their family activities and coaching sessions. In this instance they occurred mostly unconsciously on my part; ideally youth sports coaches should work to craft them by design.

Recommended Action

Take a deliberate and conscious approach to including some of the discussed elements in your dealings with young athletes. as coaches and in your day to day life as parents.  If you are faced with a child who is hesitant to try something or persist, reflect on what you can do to create an environment that will more likely see them engaged. I would love to hear what works for you. You can let me know by leaving a reply/comment or by using the contact details below.

Summary

Young children are more likely to try things and persist with them if:

1. They are given a level of autonomy.
2. The task is at a desirable level of difficulty.
3. They feel safe.
4. It involves fun and play.
5. It is meaningful to them.
6. There is an absence of unwanted expectation.
7. They experience early success.
8. They are supported with encouragement, empathy and patience.

Thank you to Darren Wensor, a big supporter of our site for contributing this blog.  You can find out more about his work with young athletes here.