This week the kids come back to school in most of the Peoria area. It is always a hectic week as we get back into the school routine. It will be especially challenging for our family as our daughter has had her driver's license for about a month. We will have about three different things going on and two cars to get us there so I see plenty of logistics ahead for our family. As I sit on the front porch there is a knock-out game of Basketball going on in our driveway. It seems that the kids always sense that school is close at hand and they have only a few treasured nights of play left.
Today I did my annual talk to the JFL Football Coaches of Central Illinois. I have spoke for the last 13 years to this group of adults who are about to embark on a season of coaching young kids in the great game of Football for the upcoming Fall. I enjoy this very brief time with these people. They always have me talk to first year coaches. I try to expound to them the importance of making Football a positive experience. I truly hope that they realize the crucial time that they are dealing with these young people and the game of Football. A youngster can have a great experience, or a horrific experience at that age. It was kind of a bad thing that I walked into the meeting before mine and they were doing a exercise on sportsmanship and not running the score up, etc.. They gave the coaches a scenario where a team was continuously on-side kicking and was putting a pretty good whipping on a team. When asked about this most of the coaches felt that this was ok and it was the other teams job to adjust and react. In my mind I thought; "is the game being properly taught if we continuously on-side kick?". I sure wish there could be a system where kids do learn the game of Football and the adults egos are still satisfied.
This Friday is also always a big night as it is the inter-squad scrimmage for most high school teams. This gives the coaches a chance for their kids to perform under the lights and hopefully get some of the pre-game jitters experienced so opening night is perhaps not so daunting. I enjoy this tremendously. It is a good warm-up for Friday nights to come. I truly experience the whole Football experience in the Autumn. High school Football on Friday, college on Saturdays followed by the NFL on Sundays. My weight usually sky rockets as I indulge in a lot of snacks and tailgating while watching this. Thursday night College Football is also a big hit if I can jam four nights of football watching into my schedule.
This realization that football is right around the corner makes the start of the school year much more bearable!
Sunday, August 14, 2011
Friday, August 5, 2011
Parents
I know that it has been awhile since my last post. I have been back at work for two weeks now. As I sit and relax on this Friday night before our Softball team's first games tomorrow my thoughts turn to going to watch their first game at 8:30am.(Yawn!!!). I truly enjoy sitting in a lawn chair and enjoying kids playing ball.
This summer a lot of my time in a lawn chair was sitting enjoying my own sons Baseball games. It is one of the most excruciating things that an old coach can do. Even though the majority of my career was as a Football coach, I did coach some Baseball. The hardest thing in the world is to sit and not "morph" into a yeller. It is the one of the greatest challenges that I am sure that I will encounter as a dad. In retrospect, I should enjoy watching my kid progress and learn about the various sports that he participates in. It is only natural for you to want your kid to do as well as he possibly can. I can't think of a parent alive that doesn't feel that way. I do think that there is an awful fine line between wanting that success and then actually being embarrassed that your son, or daughter is not the best kid on their team, or on the field. I think in retrospect the best thing that you can do for your athletes is to be a constant encourager and to remain in an advisory role.
I have seen hundreds of parents who have hung on fences and paced and screamed tips and "coached" their kids from the sidelines. In essence, they were probably discouraging their son, or daughter from truly developing a love for the game that they started participating in for the true fun aspect. The toughest thing for a parent is to see their kid "fail". It is a bit of true compassion, but also a bit embarrassing.
Thus, many excuses come about. Many reasons why this may have happened. Many reasons why that happened. This transfers to the student-athlete when they get home, or worse yet, while mom, or dad are leaning over the dugout fence during the respective contest. Kids need to learn to accept responsibility. There will be failures! It's how you deal with those failures and what you do to get better that is the another great lesson learned from interscholastic competition. The best analogy that I can draw is that of the mother bird who pushes her young out of the nest teaching them to fail. Sometimes that needs to happen, eventually the bird and our young athlete will take-off and fly!
So, as we start another school year, enjoy your kids. Appreciate their coaches, appreciate their teammates and most of all appreciate that they are able to participate in games and learn lessons that will help them. They will fail. Be quick to offer them support and constructive suggestions, not excuses to overcome their mistakes. I am looking forward to a great fall and will stay in touch and share some of the things that I encounter along the way. Enjoy the games!!!
This summer a lot of my time in a lawn chair was sitting enjoying my own sons Baseball games. It is one of the most excruciating things that an old coach can do. Even though the majority of my career was as a Football coach, I did coach some Baseball. The hardest thing in the world is to sit and not "morph" into a yeller. It is the one of the greatest challenges that I am sure that I will encounter as a dad. In retrospect, I should enjoy watching my kid progress and learn about the various sports that he participates in. It is only natural for you to want your kid to do as well as he possibly can. I can't think of a parent alive that doesn't feel that way. I do think that there is an awful fine line between wanting that success and then actually being embarrassed that your son, or daughter is not the best kid on their team, or on the field. I think in retrospect the best thing that you can do for your athletes is to be a constant encourager and to remain in an advisory role.
I have seen hundreds of parents who have hung on fences and paced and screamed tips and "coached" their kids from the sidelines. In essence, they were probably discouraging their son, or daughter from truly developing a love for the game that they started participating in for the true fun aspect. The toughest thing for a parent is to see their kid "fail". It is a bit of true compassion, but also a bit embarrassing.
Thus, many excuses come about. Many reasons why this may have happened. Many reasons why that happened. This transfers to the student-athlete when they get home, or worse yet, while mom, or dad are leaning over the dugout fence during the respective contest. Kids need to learn to accept responsibility. There will be failures! It's how you deal with those failures and what you do to get better that is the another great lesson learned from interscholastic competition. The best analogy that I can draw is that of the mother bird who pushes her young out of the nest teaching them to fail. Sometimes that needs to happen, eventually the bird and our young athlete will take-off and fly!
So, as we start another school year, enjoy your kids. Appreciate their coaches, appreciate their teammates and most of all appreciate that they are able to participate in games and learn lessons that will help them. They will fail. Be quick to offer them support and constructive suggestions, not excuses to overcome their mistakes. I am looking forward to a great fall and will stay in touch and share some of the things that I encounter along the way. Enjoy the games!!!
Thursday, July 21, 2011
Commitment
Tomorrow is my son's last conditioning work-out for Basketball this summer. Naturally this got me to thinking the valuable commitment lesson that student-athletes learn from the grind of summer work-outs. As a family, we have planned our time commitment around our kids activities at school. I know others feel this way but our family enacts the commitment. We do not take full-fledged vacations. I have heard parents talk about this and then their kids have missed for this vacation and this event and in the end the commitment to a team seems to get over-looked. I feel that this lesson goes a long way in assuring that young people learn to commit to a group effort and a understanding that outside your family, education and faith there is no other priority. Hopefully, this becomes prevalent amongst an entire team and then it creates a togetherness and commraderie that makes it much easier to trust team-mates and to count on them to do their job. Our daughter does not escape this philosophy either as we do the same for her cheerleading practices.
During all my years of coaching I would become extremely frustrated with parents who were constantly pulling their students from work-outs and activities for their own reasons. I tried tactfully as possible to get the point across that this was selfish and could not help a team. I know that as adults all of our jobs create an enormous amount of stress in our lives and we need some vacation time. I have the huge fortune of having a month off from my job in the summer, as well as, several days off and breaks throughout the year. I do not consider this a vacation from the most important job that I have of imparting and teaching values and work ethic to our kids. Thank the Good Lord that I am married to a woman who shares the same values. She is satisfied with our simple life of movies, eating out and doing things together as a family.
I hope that this writing does not come off as a this is the right way to do things and others are doing it wrong manual. Instead as parents, my wife and I choose to see summer work-outs and commitments to a team as an extension of our kids education. An education, that in all due respect, is much more valuable than anything learned in a classroom. Cindy and I try to model the same commitment in our professional lives for our children to see. We meet many work and professional commitments that might not be necessary, but model commitment. In the big picture, the time spent together as a family is the biggest stress-buster that there is.
In closing, I wish I got paid for every time that I have been told by a former player how many life-lessons that they have learned from these same values that I tried to impart on the young men who played for me. In fact, many over-zealous parents would not agree with me, I think the most valuable thing that coaches and scholastic athletics can provide are these life-long values. One of these values is commitment. So, next time you want to complain about not being able to do anything this summer because of hauling kids around, maybe you have done way more than you ever believed.
During all my years of coaching I would become extremely frustrated with parents who were constantly pulling their students from work-outs and activities for their own reasons. I tried tactfully as possible to get the point across that this was selfish and could not help a team. I know that as adults all of our jobs create an enormous amount of stress in our lives and we need some vacation time. I have the huge fortune of having a month off from my job in the summer, as well as, several days off and breaks throughout the year. I do not consider this a vacation from the most important job that I have of imparting and teaching values and work ethic to our kids. Thank the Good Lord that I am married to a woman who shares the same values. She is satisfied with our simple life of movies, eating out and doing things together as a family.
I hope that this writing does not come off as a this is the right way to do things and others are doing it wrong manual. Instead as parents, my wife and I choose to see summer work-outs and commitments to a team as an extension of our kids education. An education, that in all due respect, is much more valuable than anything learned in a classroom. Cindy and I try to model the same commitment in our professional lives for our children to see. We meet many work and professional commitments that might not be necessary, but model commitment. In the big picture, the time spent together as a family is the biggest stress-buster that there is.
In closing, I wish I got paid for every time that I have been told by a former player how many life-lessons that they have learned from these same values that I tried to impart on the young men who played for me. In fact, many over-zealous parents would not agree with me, I think the most valuable thing that coaches and scholastic athletics can provide are these life-long values. One of these values is commitment. So, next time you want to complain about not being able to do anything this summer because of hauling kids around, maybe you have done way more than you ever believed.
Tuesday, July 19, 2011
I'm Back!!!
I started this a couple of years ago in a graduate class. I kind of half-heartedly wrote some entries chronicling my last season as the Head Football Coach at Dunlap High School. Since leaving the great game of football, I have spent 3 years as an assistant principal at Dunlap Middle School. I enjoy this job tremendously, but I would be remiss if I did not mention how much that I miss football. The connections that were made with coaches and student-athletes are so precious to my life and I am reminded almost daily of them. I am going to try and start this up again and offer some comments and insight into coaching, education and sometimes life in general. I would appreciate your feedback and any comments that you may have. I will be the first to tell you that I am not going to be overly critical, but hopefully add insight into high school athleticsand all that is involved with it. Please follow along and we will see how this goes. Thanks and I am looking forward to it!
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