Hopefully this type of "everyone's a winner" trophy doesn't hurt more than it helps though. There is a lot of buzz out right now about how kids today lack "grit". In today's world, many kids- especially those in suburban neighborhoods- are not being allowed to fail.
What's wrong with that, you ask? I thought the same thing, and the more I read about it, the more I felt guilty. I have always been a bit of an enabler- not in an overly bad way, but more in the line of being over-motherly (aka Smotherly). Simple things like putting the 10-year old's clothes away or making his lunch for him are things I have had to force myself to make him do. When he is struggling with homework, I catch myself wanting to help too much, which in turn teaches him to rely on others instead of himself.
When it comes to sports, I feel that I am much less of a Smother. I have always been the type of parent that is just fine with a coach yelling at my kid if he screws up. My husband and I both played sports, so we know it's part of the package. I'm also not unrealistic about my son's abilities- he's not the worst, and he's not the best. So if he complains about not getting more play time- I simply tell him he hasn't earned it and needs to practice harder. But my husband and I are always willing to practice with him. I was also never the parent to play a board game with one of my kids and purposely let them win- even at the age of Candyland. Not only am I competitive...but I really felt like they needed to understand that sometimes you win- and sometimes you lose. If they started to get a bad attitude when they hit a "chute", I would tell them to suck it up or we would put the game away- nobody wants to play with a sore loser.
Letting your kids "fail" is one of the hardest things to do as a parent. We instictively want to swoop in and save the day. We don't want our kids to fall, or miss a goal, or have negative interactions with others. But the reality is these are true life lessons that they need to learn- the sooner the better. If you never lose, you don't learn how to use that anger and frustration to work harder towards a goal- and the sweetness of a victory after a failure is twice as nice. Learning how to deal with negative interactions- whether from a coach or a peer- will help them as young adults when they are thrown into a world where their parents aren't there to protect them. And making their own lunch and folding their own laundry will teach them responsibility, respect, and allow them to have life-skills later on in life.
So don't be afraid to let your kids slip, stumble, lose, or fail. Stand by their side as they pick themselves up, brush themselves off, and keep moving forward without whining. It can be rough- on both of you- at first, but in the end they will have "grit" that will help them be successful in life.
No comments:
Post a Comment