Parenting the Young Sports Star
Size and speed are the enemies of pre-maturation sport. They give the early developers an undue advantage, and they unbalance the game. Anyone who has ever coached or refereed these games dreads the arrival of the man-child: the boy who scores five tries every game, or the girl who scores the same number of goals. Other parents look on enviously, as their own children play a bit part (at best). The show is dominated by the dramatic effectiveness of the early maturer - whose parents are kings of the touchline.
It is, however, the parents of the dominant player who have the most difficult task. In the face of lavish praise for the child’s sporting “talent”, often accompanied by considerable attention from the pillaging parties of senior schools, it is easy to overlook the science. Research clearly identifies that those born early in the school year have considerable initial advantage. If they have early success, and parents who play with them in the garden, the advantages compound. They command all the game time, are given dominant roles by coaches keen for victory and enjoy all the adulation that a school can offer. However, science is equally clear that these advantages can easily disappear when the maturation lottery evens itself out. Prodigious sporting success at prep school does not predict the same for adolescents.
How is the success of a young sports star measured? Is it the outrageous number of goals she scores at Under 11? Or international recognition at Under 18? Or a career in professional sport? Or is it a lifetime of enjoyment of the game? Each of these would demand a different approach.
There is a significant difference in the skill set of a great player and a dominant one. The latter rarely pass. And, consequently, score often. However, there is a point in the evolution of a young sportsman in which distribution becomes the primary skill, and where persistence becomes the quality that predicts success. If early maturers have been allowed to dominate every game - scoring record numbers of goals, tries and runs - they find themselves as adolescents without the tools to progress.
It is essential that early maturers develop two things. The first is a technical skill set high on distribution and creativity. The second are the psychological skills of emotional intelligence. The determination, empathy and selflessness that are at the heart of teamship. If the star players never experience difficulty, are never substituted and are celebrated for dominating the game to an absurd extent, they will have no capacity to cope when these advantages have been evened out. If these players are efficiently used to win the game, it will often be at the expense of their development.
Players must develop their sport, but also be developed through sport. Without the drive to improve, defined by Ellen Winner as “the rage to master”, success soon dries up, and the relative age effect dilutes in the teenage years. If early achievers are allowed to believe in talent, and their dominance of it, they will soon lose motivation when the goals are suddenly harder to come by. If they enjoy the process of getting better, and working towards this ambition, they have a chance of surviving the speed ramp of slowing progress. Parents cannot be seduced by the intoxicating idea that prep school success predicts anything beyond maturation. The only place where success comes before work is in the dictionary.
The parents of the man-child have a difficult task. They must find an environment which values development, and finds ways for their child to fail. One that rewards effort and improvement, ahead of performance. They need to work closely with school (and club) to ensure that the messages are the right ones, and are consistent. The child must be constantly challenged - physically and psychologically- and encouraged to see endeavour and application as more valuable than victory. She must experience disappointment, whilst constantly seeking to improve skills - even when the competitive environment does not always demand them.
When the senior schools come with their well polished seduction techniques for their Sports Scholarships, there is a key question: ask not what the child can do for the school, but what the school can do for the child. The programme of experiences that the Scholarship involves, and the school’s philosophy for dealing with early success are critical for the medium term. Many of these programmes are little more than sordid fee discounting aimed at securing the match winning services of the the prep school stars. Promising performers need to be in the right environment.
Children need intrinsic motivation to become the best that they can be. Not satisfied by being defined relative to the limitations of the opposition. They must be armed with the technical skills, and attitudes, to enable them to achieve this.
Parents, teachers and children ride the wave of early success. The adulation that comes with game-dominating performance. But the wave always crashes. That might be a disaster - or it might not be. It all depends on the environment where the early achievement occurs. Its values, its messages and its philosophy. Children don't choose that environment: adults select it for them. It's a big responsibility.
Neil Rollings is Chairman of the Professional Association of Directors of Sport in Independent Schools (www.padsis.com), and Managing Director of Independent Coach Education, the country’s leading provider of training, recruitment and advisory services to schools, in sport (www.independentcoacheducation.co.uk)