At the age of 8, when my dad came to watch me play sports or pick me up, the question shifted from "So . . . did you have fun" to "Did you win", and how did you do.
If we lost he would pull over the car and make me walk home, because rides home were for closers.
That is far from accepting mediocrity. You are talking about people who have consistently challenged and won at every level their entire lives to make it to the pinnacle of their sport. That is the definition of success, and deserves to be rewarded.
What I am more concerned about is that by rewarding people for "doing their best" when really what they are doing is giving it a half a$$ effort, we encourage people to accept that even if they don't try hard, they will still be rewarded. That is a terrible way to teach people.
Olympians are not a fair comparison, as I have nothing but absolute respect for them.
To clarify then, your mentality of "if you're not first, you're last" is only applicable to kids, not to elite athletes?
It wasn't meant as an all encompassing catch all, so maybe I should have worded it differently.
What I'm trying to say is that we need to push people to be better, rather than pat them on the back for giving mediocre effort. If you give it 100% and lose, but you worked your ass off I can respect that. But if you give it a half a$$ effort, lose, and then get rewarded for that, doesn't it encourage more mediocrity?
I think reward and praise for participation is good up until about age 8-10. At that point, kids themselves become competative. When I played floor hockey in elementary, we were given specific instructions to play for fun. What did we do? We kept score. Even up until my parents stopped watching games, I was way more interested in answering "did you do well" more than "did you have fun".
Up until the approximate age where kids themselves stop caring about it, I think it's fine. Past that, it gets silly.
I like this. My son is 5 and this describes him to a T. Still working on the best way to change this. Encouragement is definitely a part of it.
I have coached Initation hockey (4-6 year old) for the past 2 years. There is no score kept but the kids still know which team is scoring more goals. In order to keep all the kids motivated and wanting to keep playing, I have had to give certain kids specific tasks.
I told the weakest player last year that his goal was to try to get the puck no matter who had it, even if it was his own teammate. He had been getting really frustrated and had stopped trying before this because he wasn't able to score or usually get the puck before a teammate got it. This way he would get the puck some (taking it from a teammate) and was "winning" because he was able to complete the assigned task.
In my son’s first year, he was getting discouraged because he couldn’t keep up with the better players. I got him to keep going by telling him I wanted him to be the hardest player to play against. I was trying to get him to keep skating, keep working and play “gritty”. This worked for him. On the ride home he would ask if he was the grittiest player on the team. I would be honest when I answered but there were only 2 others on that team that ever worked as hard.
I never changed the goal of the game (score more goals than the other team), just gave the kids tasks that they could accomplish with effort. That way even if the team was losing, as long as they were trying and doing their part they could be happy with their game and want to continue playing.
Let me also say that I don't believe in getting prizes for participating. I feel the support from parents/family/friends should be enough of a reward for participating. kids don't need a ribben or medal for every damn thing they do, some self appreciation for just doing it should be encouraged as well.
And screw Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, and the Tooth Fairy. They'll get a reward when they shovel the driveway.
I think participation awards are fine up until a point, but I don't think they are damaging, they just become equated with a prize for losing. As several have pointed out participation awards can be a really good thing at a certain age. At some point as they mature they'll see the participation ribbon for what it is, and I don't think that's a bad thing either. Failure is an essential part of development, but the development curve is gentle. It's not as though we need to send our kids to the salt mines for not scoring on a shootout, nor should we chisel a bust in their image out of gold for coming in last.
For me the issue extends beyond sport. Sport has the luxury of having a fairly well defined winner and loser. School meanwhile seems to be a little more ambiguous with how teachers are told to treat children. Over the several years my wife has been a teacher she's been asked to do things like mark with a certain colour of pen so the criticism isn't taken as too harsh, or come up with 3 nice things to say about the individuals character on their report card. The kid who comes to class everyday and is a little pr*** to his classmates doesn't need you to take it easy on his poor little emotions and tell him how bloody awesome he is. My personal opinion is that one aspect of a teachers job is to prepare children for the real world, but instead many are kept from doing it.
Sorry, that got off the rails a little bit.
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Kids love this junk. I was throwing out a bunch of this stuff last week and my son wanted to keep some of my trophies so I said he could keep two. Turns out he kept one that was from a hockey tournament where they gave out for "C event consolation runner up". They have been praising poor results for years.....why stop now Out of all the awards I have ever been given in sports the one that means the most to me was a simple medal for a team I was on in college. Most of the trivial stuff found its way to the garbage with the other thanks for comming out stuff
I really didn't keep any of the sports trophies that I won. I kept my City High School Football Championship ring, and I kept a MVP trophy from a bantom hockey tournament. Everything else got pitched. But its not like I still look at or wear the ring, or display the trophy.
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One of the Blue Jay radio hosts was guest-hosting Prime Time Sports a few weeks back. He had an interesting discusssion with a sports psychologist -they agreed that the culture of rewarding participation/ignoring failure, was causing a generation of "entitled" youth.
I agree that we shouldn't be rewarding mediocrity, but in the same sense, we shouldn't be forcing kids to be number one. If the kid honestly gave it his/her best, and came up short, then what's the harm in telling them it's ok not to be first or win, as long as they tried their best? Now being able to tell when the kid gave it his/her all, vs. if they half assed it, that's where the real tricky part is.
I think advocating for having winners and losers is fine so long as the parents are responsible enough to raise their kids to still count on their love and support in any result.
I don't have kids but I have seen some of my peers grow up in families where love and respect at home were earned on the field/ice or in the classroom and eventually it had a very negative effect in adulthood. For those kids who were apt to winning, when they finally reached the point in life where there were people smarter, faster, stronger, better they fell into an existential crisis because their whole identitiy had been based on 'winning' and now they were 'losing' and none of the people they surrounded themselves with cared about them anymore. For those kids who weren't winners as children, they never really amounted to anything as I doubt they had the self esteem or support system to pick up and try to be good at something.
I think it gives kids a reason to play the game. I mean, at a hockey tournament filled with 6-7 year olds, they are still getting the game embedded into their lives and if you don't reward them for playing, they will see no reason to play. Kids always expect something. (And no, the mom who brings the kids orange segments for after the game doesn't count.) Giving a kid a medal or miniature trophy for playing the game will make him or her think "Oh wow this is kinda neat, I got a free shiny thing! I think I actually like hockey! I'll keep playing for as long as I can!" At around age 9 or so then you need to stop rewarding them for participation and start rewarding them for actually winning. And I know this because when I began my first year of atom hockey in (err never mind the year I'll just get beaked more about my age) they stopped giving out trophies for participating and began giving out stuff for player of the game, finishing first in the tournament, tourny MVP, leading scorer, etc. So about age 9 is when you should stop rewarding kids for participation. I'm not saying it's wrong, but if you're 12 years old and still expecting a trophy for playing in the game (like some kids on my team were when I was 12) then you're obviously not going to be prepared for the real world.
My kids played soccer for the first time this year, and for sure, if you want to know which side is winning in a no-score game, ask the kids - every single one knows.
Whether to reward for participation or not seems like a really black and white way to approach the topic, neither side of which seems very helpful to the participant, because it doesn't foster improvement either way, it concentrate on the end rather than the process.
What I found useful was to pick out one good play, something concrete that they can remember from during the game or event, and show approval for that.. "I like how you cut down the angle on defence", or "it was great that you had your head up on that shot you almost scored on". Similarly, you can point out, and commiserate, on the aspects of the game that they did poorly on.
When you point out something they did well on, its amazing to see how much they bear down on that aspect and repeat it, which is how they improve. Kids take enormous pride in improving, I think, and thats what needs to be stressed.
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Last edited by sclitheroe; 09-28-2011 at 06:34 PM.
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I think it gives kids a reason to play the game. I mean, at a hockey tournament filled with 6-7 year olds, they are still getting the game embedded into their lives and if you don't reward them for playing, they will see no reason to play. Kids always expect something. (And no, the mom who brings the kids orange segments for after the game doesn't count.) Giving a kid a medal or miniature trophy for playing the game will make him or her think "Oh wow this is kinda neat, I got a free shiny thing! I think I actually like hockey! I'll keep playing for as long as I can!" At around age 9 or so then you need to stop rewarding them for participation and start rewarding them for actually winning. And I know this because when I began my first year of atom hockey in (err never mind the year I'll just get beaked more about my age) they stopped giving out trophies for participating and began giving out stuff for player of the game, finishing first in the tournament, tourny MVP, leading scorer, etc. So about age 9 is when you should stop rewarding kids for participation. I'm not saying it's wrong, but if you're 12 years old and still expecting a trophy for playing in the game (like some kids on my team were when I was 12) then you're obviously not going to be prepared for the real world.
Having a 15 year old post about "being prepared for the real world" strikes me as quite amusing. Well done.
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there is nothing wrong with recognizing participation and those of us with kids understand the pride of watching your kid get out there and try something.
i really dont care if my kid wins or loses, i care about about how the opportunity will impact their social and physical development.
if they put in the practise time, made the effort to improve their skills, and respect the coaches and teammates, this is what sport and participation is about and positive reinforcement is not "coddling losers".
when my son or daughter spend months practising their karate and then get up in front of 5 black belts and perform their kata, you are darn right I will celebrate their bravery and effort, even if they are last in their group.
when my son or daughter get into a kumate and fight kids who may be bigger or faster, but they dont back down and try their best, i will again celebrate their bravery and effort, even if like my daughter they go an entire belt level without gaining a single point.
if you dont think your kids should know how proud you are of them just because they didnt finish with a medal, then I really dont know what to say.
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I think that a part of growing up is learning to accept winning and losing and learning how to be a gracious winner and a good loser. I think when we reward everyone for participation children don't learn those things.
That being said - I do think that participation should be recognized and supported
Out of all the awards I have ever been given in sports the one that means the most to me was a simple medal for a team I was on in college. Most of the trivial stuff found its way to the garbage with the other thanks for comming out stuff
