Aug 3, 2012

How does the parent plan for the lesson?

Skaters in individual lessons actually have two teachers-- the coach, and the parent.

But the parent's job has very little to do with the skating. The worst thing you can do as a parent is to ever talk about technical skills. Your job is greasing the skids, whether it's getting the kid to practice, mediating coaching disputes, or, yes, paying the bills.

Not that I was this sort of parent, but the best way you can help your skater is on the sly.

By this I don't mean sneak around the skater's back, exactly. (Okay, there's a little bit of sneaking around his back.)  I mean create an environment that rewards good skating behavior.

The schedule
Your skater needs to own her schedule, but kids think about this minute, not the next minute, and tomorrow never comes. Twelve hours ahead of the lesson, ask about the lesson. Very innocently, butter wouldn't melt in your mouth-- "when's your next practice/lesson, honey?" For after school skaters, you're asking this in the morning over breakfast. For early morning skaters, you're asking at dinner, or bedtime. Make the kid think about it.

A great idea is to have a calendar on the fridge with nothing but skating on it, so the skater can go check. Tie a bright red sharpie to the calendar, so she can put an X through the practice or lesson once it's done. Put the calendar in a public and accessible place, not the skaters room. The message is "we all support/make space for this" and "it's easy to keep track of."


The idea is to make sure the skater has the schedule in his or her head. You don't want to say "don't forget you have to skate in the morning." Very confrontational, and implying that without you the skater will forget. (This may be true, but don't rub it in.) Ask "when is your practice/lesson?" or ask what they'll be working on, or bring up the new dress or tights (if appropriate).


Speaking of tights
It drives me absolutely insane to see parents 1- rifling through the skater's bag, and 2-complaining about it.  The skater's bag is her personal space at a rink. Serious skaters in particular live their lives in public. They can't practice by themselves, eat by themselves, cry by themselves or even dress by themselves. Give them that small bit of privacy, and let them rifle through their own bags. Of course, since we're being sneaky here, this does not mean you have to always be going to the rink with only one glove.  Give the skater 10 extra minutes (I know that's hard) to go through the bag before you leave the house. Tape a checklist onto the top, or laminate one and hang it off the handle.  Make it part of the bedtime ritual--"check your skating bag!"


And if she forgets her tights, or her gloves or her practice journal? Let her figure it out at the rink. If you're always rescuing her (or him), you're not teaching self-reliance, a crucial skill for a skater. Believe it or not, they can find a solution to the missing tights--other skaters, lost and found, the costume room, or the tights that they in fact know are stashed under the back seat of the car, which you didn't know about.


Late
Everyone is overbooked. But late-for-lessons is THE number one complaint I hear from coaches. Especially when the parents then expect the coach to do the full lesson anyway. Not going to happen. You don't pay for 30 minutes. You pay for a time slot. It's only 30 minutes if you're there at the start of it. If your lesson is 3:30 to 4:00 and you're not on the ice until 3:45, that doesn't mean you get a lesson until 4:15, because someone else has the 4:00 time slot. It also doesn't mean the coach only charges you for 15 minutes.


But you know all that. And you're always late anyway. Which stresses out everyone.


And here's the solution-- Do. Not. Schedule. Lessons...if there is even a chance that you're going to have trouble getting there. Not a morning person? Please don't schedule 6 a.m. lessons. School gets out at 3:15? 3:45 lesson is NOT going to happen unless the school is next door. And you know it. It's like a diet. Don't set an impossible goal, however noble it is.


Post hoc, propter hoc, ad hoc
We're talking about the lesson review. Don't talk about what happened in the lesson. Not after, not before, not about. You can ask "did you have fun" "did you learn anything new" "is there anything I need to ask Coach about." You cannot make the child preview the practice "what are you going to work on today." You can make sure the practice journal is on the bag checklist. You cannot (cannot cannot) make the child talk about the lesson, the practice, the competition on the ride home. Ask any former student athlete the thing they hated most about growing up as an athlete and the ride home Monday morning quarterbacking tops the list. Never do this. It's that private space again--let the kid own it.


But I need to know stuff
Ask the coach. Better yet, ask the coach if she has "office hours" when you can call or sit down, without the child present. Use email. Don't try to get the low down just before or just after the lesson. Chances are the coach has another student and won't be able to give you the attention you want (or deserve). If your skater is right there you won't be able to be as honest, or if you are honest, you're embarrassing the skater.


What are your best tips for sneaky parenting?

25 comments:

  1. LOL I hate it when somebody that I "employ" advises me on how to behave! Coaches do this sometimes, but Governments are far worse (smile).

    Seriously though, many good points in this post. I especially agree with the admonishment about scheduling; it's really a pain for the parents who are prompt to be told that the previous lesson is "running a bit long because they started late."

    Also a parent's oversight of a skater varies quite a lot with the kid's age. Lugging a 7 year old to lessons after school is wayyyy different than hanging at the rink with the home-schooled 7-day-a-week 12 year old.

    -- Jeff
    L.A. SkateDad

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    1. "I hate it when somebody that I "employ" advises me on how to behave!"

      That's part of the coach's job. If you're hiring an expert, they should be able to give you advice.

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    2. Yep, actually that's a point well taken, yet it gets a little smudgily in the gray areas. For example in my DayJob my employer hires me for my software development expertise, and I provide advice accordingly. They don't particularly like to hear my advice however on "How To Motivate Staff", or what coffee the office should buy. You get the picture.

      That said, this *is* Xan's private blog so if she likes to use it for a sounding board to promote certain parental behavior then that is coolio with me.

      (If she actually walked up to me in the rink though and said "no talking about skating on the drive home" I'd give her a rather blandly blank look. Then on the drive home I'd say to my daughter "eh... I think it's time we started looking for a new coach.")

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    3. Part of coaching is motivating the skater. But frankly, letting the kid have some personal space on the ride home, especially after a competition, is not about sound coaching. It's about sound parenting.

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  2. I agree wholeheartedly - let your skater take (age-appropriate) responsibility for their skating. (And their stuff.) I ask that my kid make sure she is all prepared and ready to go the night before (early AM skater). At the rink her things are her responsibility - she needs to keep up with her music, gloves, pads, guards, jacket, dry her blades off, etc.

    She dislikes being asked about practice, so I follow your advice and ask if she had fun. If she wants to volunteer more info., I'm happy to hear about it but I don't pry.

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  3. I dont know if this is a "parenting" issue or a "skating" issue. But I would appreciate your thoughts either way. 9yr old skater is asked before we leave the house "Do you have your bag? Your gloves? Your yoga mat? Your music?" Yes, yes, yes, yes. We arrive. DD meets her coach on the ice and the lesson begins, moments later I see coach gesturing towards me that DD forgot her gloves...Im up and running to find an extra pair or THE pair from her skating bag to hand her on the ice. 15minutes into the lesson I see DD exit the ice again, this time for her music or asking me to buy her a bottle of water. Water? Where is the water you had in your bag? "Uh, oh, I forgot" Am I to blame here or the 9 year old? I feel like she needs to be more responsible. Coach is pretty good at communication and hasn't ever done more than smile/eye roll at me "oh, NINE year olds"! But Im not so sure.....

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    1. Checklist. Attached to the bag. If the kid forgets her gloves, she skates without her gloves. No 9-year old is working so hard that she can't go an entire 30 minute lesson without water. Doesn't bring the music onto the ice?- either she doesn't skate to music that day or SHE goes and gets it. (Also-- why doesn't the coach have her own copy of the music?) I would say the 9-year old is minimally to blame, you are not at all to blame and that coach is an idiot who is facilitating the child's irresponsibility, and then making it your fault, in front of the child.

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  4. I think if your child is a "forgetter" it's only fair to say - "skate without gloves" or have them wear their socks on their hands, or "get water from the fountain after your lesson". She is 9 and 30 minutes without water won't hurt. If she is crafty she can make a cup out of paper AFTER the lesson. :P But seriously...sometimes the only way to learn is to suffer a little. No hip pad? Tell the coach and spend the lesson working on spins instead of jumps. Logical consequences are very effective! I do not want my child off the ice in an ice lesson. It's a waste of money. ~Meg

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    1. Ha, read this after writing my reply. Right on. Princess needs to man up (and so does the coach)

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    2. The only blame on the coach is that she/he is letting the child dictate how they spend the lesson - hunting down lost items.

      IMHO, the coach sees the child as not working hard and having no keen desire to be there and it's easier to stand and wait rather than tell the child to suck it up OR the coach tried in the beginning but was not backed up by the parent (because the child leaves the ice and runs to mom, there is a set pattern now). I am rather hesitant to "blame the coach."

      Mom needs to send the coach an email and let him/her know that there are new rules (the suck it up rule) and he or she needs to be on board to make it work - it might be easier for mom to wait in the car after drop off.

      Our coaches DO NOT carry the child's music and never have since she started at age 5. Forget the music? Oh well - you do your routine without it.

      Her coaches do have it at comps, but we check in our "pretty" copy, they carry back up. ~Meg

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    3. I do the coach-has-music thing as part of "pick your battles." This is an easy one to fix, although it does train the parent and child to rely on the coach for the music.

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    4. With how many kids that have iPods of some kind these days I don't see a reason why said child can't put their music on their iPod, especially if they are allowed to play music from an iPod through the sound system. I know some rinks with music monitors this won't be possible, but at my rink we just have the cd player on the ice for those who have their music and the auxiliary cord for those who keep their music on their iPod so they never forget it.

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    5. Even more, WHY do competitions still make you bring your music with you on CD? Why not have them email it ahead of time with the registration materials. This has been mystifying me for years.

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    6. I have only seen the negative side of emailing - all of the emailed songs had horrible pops and didn't play well. Given the choice, I'll bring 2 cd's the nice copy and the practice copy as a back up over emailing. ~meg

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  5. Thanks! I find myself wondering what she does when I am not there(more than I am) I do think she should take more responsibility and not waste lesson time. I am considering that she takes it all a bit for granted. She is getting more lessons and practice times than many of her peers. Id like for her to develop an appreciation for that. Not sure how to make that happen, but Im working on it.

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    1. oo, oo, oo! Blog topic! Anon for the win!

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    2. I will look forward to it!

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  6. Another good way to handle this when they get around 9 is to start a weekly allowance (I used to pay something like $5 a week, but that was 15 years ago, smile). No gloves? We'll walk down to the skate shop and you can use *your* allowance to buy some more.

    -- Jeff

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    1. Or some sort of reward system. Why Me St. Lidwina" set up a scrip system-- I think it was a negative earning (he started the week with a certain number of chits, and every time he forgot something or was late, she'd take one away. What was left at the end of the week could be used to "buy" treats or special outings.)

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    2. I don't do rewards or incentives. Skating is the reward. A lesson is the gift. I struggle to provide skating; I do not need to struggle with a child who doesn't take responsibility for their own stuff.

      At 5/6/7/8 we would check the bag before we left the rink and house together - jacket-check, skates-check, guards-check.

      at 9 it became HER job. She has skated without tights (she wears pants so she was in bare feet), she has had to hunt down missing guards (a rink gave her one and she wore mismatched from the lost and found bin) for a season, and she has had a week with no skate jacket (found shoved in the couch). She has skated in borrowed gloves (she had to ask a friend). She is very shy and it took a lot out of her to go to the desk at 3 different rinks to have someone help her check lost and found. She rarely misplaces anything anymore.

      ~Meg PS I may seem like a "hard parent" but we are surrounded with people who have a lot more. She has to understand that we are not that kind of family - we have to make do and we can use creativity to make our situation easier. She has learned to knit fun hats and scarves, to make cute towels, and other treats. Everything worth having requires effort.

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  7. I need to stop asking "how did it go?", but - and maybe this is another blog topic - but depending on my teenager's mood, I've been getting "You don't care about my skating" if I say nothing and "You ONLY care about my skating" when I say anything. ARGH. I know that it's tough 1) to be a teen girl and dealing with a body and world that is changeable every day, and 2) difficult being in a "solo" sport where really it's all on you and not a team as to how practices/competitions go. I know she needs to vent and that I'm the ventee.

    But if anyone has any magic for dealing with this, I'd love to hear it. I can't seem to win - if I hand over more responsibility to her, she get's frustrated with me because I'm not helping her out; when I help out even being sneaky, I'm "ruling/ruining her life."

    We have more good days than bad days, by far. But boy, oh boy, they bad days make me want to scream and just say "done".

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    1. My first thought was, "children of bloggers should know better than to feed the beast" lol

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    2. LOL!!! Yeah, it's taking great feats of resistance to not write more openly about just what it's like to live with an adorable by sometimes crazy person. The biggest thing holding me back is that the teen crazy person might start her own blog about her lovely but sometimes crazy mother. I'm sure the kid has her own stories to tell, so we hold a sortof truce. :-)

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    3. You could try asking her if she wanted to talk about the skating today..
      My teen has recently taken to the front seat but has to "pay", by talking to me. If she sits in the front I know it is OK to ask about things. Back seat means no conversation for a little while.
      I'm always ready to chat about my day too. My lass likes to hear about my day as it makes her feel more adult. Commiserating together is lovely.

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    4. That is a brilliant solution. Can I go back 10 years and implement this?

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