Sports Parenting 1

Vincent Fortanasce is a psychiatrist, coach and member of the Little League Hall of Fame. In his book, Life Lessons from Little League , he relates how he asked parents at the initial team meeting about what they first ask their children after a game, if they had not been able to attend. The most common question was “Did you win today?” The second most frequent question was “How did you do?” Fortanasce writes, “What was my point? Simply that I wanted my team parents to re-focus away from ‘I want my child to learn to win,’ or the pursuit of perfection, to the pursuit of contentment and confidence; from ‘I want my child to be the best player on the best team’ and the pursuit of talent, to ‘I want my child to be a good sportsman’, or the pursuit of character.” He suggests that the more appropriate questions are “Did you have fun?” or “What did you learn today?” Join us tomorrow, as all this week we’ll be looking at how to be sports parents to the glory of God, rather than to the glory of our selves.