I am a helicopter parent in once specific way: Education.
I am the dad who checks out the teacher’s reputation amongst staff and students to get a gauge of who I am dealing with. I want to know that when my kid enters the learning space, they are getting one full year of learning, no matter where they start from. If my kid started from way behind, he ought to get to a point where he’s learned as much of the catching up as he can. If my kid started way ahead, he ought to keep or extend that distance in learning from the rest of the pack. I apply this rule to all kinds of teaching, and that includes youth sports.
I get it. Youth sports don’t matter–especially small town rec leagues. I agree. Nobody is signing my kid to a college scholarship because he went beast mode on the 6-7 Maricopa Youth Football League. Nobody outside of ‘copa actually cares. Heck, most folks inside of ‘copa don’t care. But that isn’t the point. The teaching is where I get all messed up.
Why? It is just rec ball! Yeah, well you never hear a parent say, “well its just the 2nd grade” No, because we realize that this is where children learn their fundamentals. Sports are the same way. A bad rec coach and crush the desire and development of a young man just as quickly as any other bad teacher can. Moreover, these are people working in a strictly volunteer position and more often than not they appear to be doing it more for ego-driven reasons than for the sheer service of developing kids.
I am not immune to this. I want to win every game. I want to see my kids win every game. Sure, I’d like them to lose as well and become hardened and smarter for the experience, but I want the loss to be based on merit not on bad coaching. In other words, I want losses that there are no pre-built excuses for. I want losses that make you step back and say, ‘okay there are people out there flat out better than me. So what do I do now?’
As I watch my 7 year old prepare to take the field as a flag player for the first time ever without me as his coach I find myself being particularly hard on his coach. I expect the level of commitment and skill that I bring to the task, and if I don’t feel that is happening I am left to wonder why he is coaching my kid and I am not. In this instance it is because I was too worn down to coach. Heck only one of the three is even playing and that took some doing to convince me to get him on a roster. Part of the stress was knowing that I would not be coaching and would be incredibly scrutinizing of whoever was.
How is it going so far? I allowed myself to go to one practice and wound up helping coach it. One season of learning is all that I ask, and if I have to provide that myself then so be it.