Parenting Question (Sports, Small Kids)

emeraldkity4
Wed, 16 Mar 2011 12:40:17 +0000

I agree with a variety.
Both Ds have friends who are Muslim who participate in sports- I will admit it depends on the sport & the organization on making accommodations- but I hope things are getting easier & the childs interest should be the determining factor.

I finished school before Title nine & there were few opportunities to play sports that I might have been at least decent at.( I ran track with a friend, & I was not very good- I knocked over hurdles :o ) My youngest who loved team sports, learned * so much* about herself and gained so much , that I would encourage anyone with an interest to find a sport & a good coach to participate.

Lots of different opportunities.

My oldest was 10 weeks early & had gross motor delay. In order to support & encourage her to move more, she participated as a young child in things like gymboree & swimming lessons. She started taking ballet with a friend when she was about 6 at PNB. She may have continued that, however after she won a part in the Nutcracker which would have turned our family life upside down, I encouraged her to try a different type of performance by bribing her to get her ears pierced when she was 9 ;)

She sang with a girls choir for a few years until she was 12 & we found that our local zoo had volunteers caring for the ponies year round ( you could start when you were 12). She did that until she graduated from high school. ( she also was in track & took modern dance- but in general she didn’t participate in organized sports)
My only criteria for her lessons was that she choose something that she could stick with for a year.

Youngest wanted to play soccer, but ( she has tactile sensitivity), she could not tolerate the shin guards. Very disappointing to her. She began swimming, but she couldn’t handle the community pool- too big, too loud. Safe & Sound a local swimming program had a small pool with individual lessons that she took for several years. ( Both kids also attended elementary schools that had kids swimming once a week)

When she was in 5th grade, her basketball coach retired & she tried soccer again.
She played soccer in a community league until she was 19 & in middle school she was also on the school team. She added rugby when she was in high school, as well as swimming in the winter & track in the spring.
Younger D also volunteered with ponies when she was 14, but they closed the barn when she was 17 )

Just think about the short term, what does your D seems interested in, what are her friends doing now? What things seem to meet your families comfort zone now?

Don’t try and plan her interests 10 years into the future- you have enough on your plate helping her go from a preschooler to schoolage. :)

( just read about the martial arts suggestion. Younger D also did Wing Chun Kung fu which she really liked. The uniform is covered up, they learn a great deal & it is very respectful. However, really depends on what your local area offers & my D was in a class where she was the only girl. At 9/10 yrs old, that got to her after a while, even though she was one of the strongest in the class ( the most stubborn anyway- they had a competition of holding onto the body bag & seeing who could hold on the longest- she won )