How to understand which sport to choose for your child. Teacher and psychologist recommendations

Often parents from an early age want to give their child to a sports section and begin to think about what kind of sport to choose for him. It is important to remember that it is very important to take into account the predisposition and desires of the child.

physical education teacher of the Internet Lesson Home School

Most often parents choose the section located near the house, or the sport that they themselves practiced or wanted to practice.

Assess the child’s abilities

Before making a choice, parents should first assess their child’s abilities. Perhaps you notice that they are very fast runners, well coordinated, then you can look at a sport such as soccer. Well-developed flexibility – you can think about artistic or artistic gymnastics. Or the child has certain anthropometric features, for example, high growth, then you can think about volleyball or basketball.

Also very important is the child’s desire, it is necessary to give him freedom of choice. Still, physical abilities and anthropometric data are not always decisive.

Psychological features of the child have priority importance. If the child can’t answer the question of what kind of sport he or she would like to do, you can offer him or her trial sessions in different sections and then he or she will be able to make a choice.

Choose individual or team competition

It is important to understand whether an individual or team sport is right for your child. Tryouts at different sports clubs can help with this. Parents will see the child in a particular activity and observe how he or she reacts to different situations. Maybe he will be attracted to an artistic sport like figure skating. Or maybe he’d rather enjoy the sport of wrestling.

There are children who are very active from a very young age. Such from the age of three can be given to general developmental classes, such as gymnastics. There are more passive, plodding children. They can suit them chess, and do not need to try to make them boxers or soccer players.

Before entering a sports school, a child usually undergoes a screening, during which coaches determine whether he has a predisposition to this sport. In this case, experts look not only at the physical abilities and anthropometry, but also at the psychological characteristics of children.

Although there are certain ideas about how children should be for practicing this or that sport, there are always exceptions, and a child who does not quite match their physical data, can be psychologically perfectly predisposed to it.

When to start and how to do it so as not to put pressure on the child

Each sport has certain requirements for the age at which to start practicing. For example, figure skating can be tried as early as three years old, but some sports are taken only from the age of 10. This is associated with the formation of the child’s psyche and the development of his body. A child should be ready for these activities, for heavy physical exertion.

If we talk about general physical training with elements of a particular sport, children are taken to such classes a little earlier. In this way, both parents and the child have an opportunity to understand whether he or she likes the sport, and it is easier to pass the screening in a sports school.

First of all, it is important for parents to decide why they are sending their child to sport. It is their desires and expectations that sometimes lead to pressure on the child.

Remember: the child does not owe anything to anyone in the process of their training. Training in the section should like it and bring pleasure. And from parents need only support. It is necessary to help the child to relax and self-improve voluntarily. Teach your child to train for themselves, not for a parent, coach or for the sake of reward.

Generalist psychologist, sports psychologist (professional sports, high performance sports).

The most important and valuable thing parents can do is to show their child the world. Show everything that can be shown, as simple as it sounds. In reality, children feel a lot more than we realize. Yes, they can’t always say what they want. They want to play soccer, they want to play hockey, they want to play big tennis, some want to swim and some want to do archery. And yes, I’m not wrong, at a young age they just want to, they don’t understand at all what kind of labor it is, how much they are paid for it someday and whether they are paid at all, and what kind of injuries this sport is dangerous.

In my practice as a sports psychologist and as a mother of two professional athletes, I meet many children who cannot cope with the proposed requirements from parents and coaches, because they want to do another sport altogether. They have a banal lack of physical data, or intellectual capabilities (and in sports without “head” nowhere), or character (and this is 80% of sports success). Accordingly, there is no motivation, there is no desire to engage in any other sport, apathy and literal dislike for all involved in this issue.

And the main thing – it is important not to pressure, not to impose your desires, to hear your child, to feel the mood after leaving the training, to communicate more often and ask clarifying questions: “How do you feel? What happened at practice? What did you get or not? What is your relationship with the coach?” etc. If parents are not involved in their child’s life and athletic career, unfortunately, it is unlikely that success will be achieved.

Effective ways to encourage your child to play sports were described in the previous article.