PARENTS

Building Confidence in Kids

Parenting would be a lot easier if parents could just give their kids self-confidence. But parents can no more give their kids self-confidence than they can give them a solid work ethic or compassion for others. Parents cannot give their kids these inner strengths, but they can help set the right environment so that kids can learn and appreciate these lessons for themselves.

Kids’ self-confidence grows when they feel they are succeeding. In sports, this success does not mean playing in championship games or for winning teams. This success can be as simple as making a good play. For parents, helping kids build self-confidence is about helping them experience a large number of these small successes.

1. Cheer the small things – Praise by itself won’t give kids self-confidence. However, praise can focus a kids’ attention to their own achievements and help them feel like they are making progress.
2. Let your child brag a little – When kids make a good play, they may have a tendency to brag about their accomplishment. While it may be tempting to correct them or to remind them about humility, their bragging is a sign of growing confidence and parents should be patient and give their children a chance to relive their success.
3. Don’t place your child in over his or her head – Kids who have been playing longer or are more physically mature will naturally play better than those who are lesser experienced or lesser developed. It is important that kids play with kids who share similar skills and development so they do not feel out of place.
4. Help your child work through difficulties – While kids can sometimes figure out how to develop a skill, a little instruction can greatly speed the process.
5. Give your child examples – Hearing the stories of other kids and athletes who struggled but still managed to achieve success helps inspire kids to keep trying.

Building and keeping self-confidence is a never-ending task (even in adults). It is a constant process of doing, struggling and succeeding. The greater the struggle, the greater the self-confidence that comes with success. By helping set the right environment, parents can help their kids acquire the self-confidence they will need to keep trying in all areas of their lives.

COACHES

Building Confidence in Players

Kids need to confront, struggle and ultimately prevail against challenges in order to build self-confidence. Praise alone will not work. Like parents, coaches cannot make their kids play with confidence. Coaches can only help provide an environment that facilitates kids’ inner growth. Here are five ways that coaches can help create that environment:

1. Start with simpler skills – Starting with basic skills gives kids a chance to gain needed confidence early in the skills development cycle. If they feel good about their ability to achieve small things, they are more likely to carry this confidence forward into attempting more difficult skills.
2. Don’t assume any task is easy – When coaches minimize the time or skill needed to master a task, they set a presumption that players who do not immediately master the task are not very good. It is normal for some players to require additional time or even a different instructional approach. By not setting expectations for a task’s achievement, coaches give players the necessary time to learn without affecting the players’ overall self-confidence.
3. Define simpler player goals – Any larger goal can often be broken into smaller steps. By focusing on these smaller steps, coaches make it easier for players to see progress and develop self-confidence along the path toward a larger goal.
4. Create a secure environment – If kids feel like they can make mistakes while trying hard to learn new skills, they are more likely to try harder and less likely to let a failure to immediately master a skill take away from their self-confidence.
5. Talk one-on-one – Each player responds differently to challenges and draws different lessons about his or her own performance. By talking with players one-on-one, coaches learn better how to motivate and steer each one to the right conclusions.

Building player self-confidence is a necessary step towards building team self-confidence. Though wins can help the process, losses don’t automatically slow the process. By keeping the players and the team focused on their progress rather than their failures, coaches can continue to build confidence in any situation.

PLAYERS

Which Comes First, Skills or Confidence?

It is easy for players to believe that if they had more skills they would automatically have more confidence. Yet, confidence is not something that comes after a skill is mastered. Confidence is something that comes from going through the process of mastering a skill. Confidence comes before the end of learning when players realize they are making progress and will eventually be able to apply a new skill successfully.

Developing confidence before fully mastering a skill is an important part of learning. Confidence in a particular skill lets players attempt to apply a skill more aggressively. Even .400 hitters in baseball miss more balls than they hit. Yet, the confidence these hitters have in their ability to hit lets them swing harder and with more certainty than without that confidence.

Thank you MYS for this article.