Browns Fan/Sammy
Are you old school or what? The current mental toughness literature recommends a more sensitive approach, more positive reinforcement especially using more effort based reinforcement....so she hung a drop in practice, big deal; What did she do right? The difference between a good result and a poor result is less than a heart beat. The difference between an all out effort and a half... effort will make all difference, come game time. She needs to build up a store house of positive effort, each piece laid in like a brick wall; in order to provide her a firm foundation to perform a peak power and then she will risk it all. She can not build the foundation if every stone is torn out before she can set it.
Drop the marine drill instructor type berating instruction and give her some space and help her learn to coach herself. You can not be in her head when she goes to the plate or throws that pitch or fields that ball. She will have to hear her own voice. Her mental toughness will come from listening to her own internal voice. She needs to be her own best coach.
The kids that had this type of 'tough' parent generally do okay at the younger age groups but do not progress very far in the upper age groups and into college. In fact the majority will move on to a different game, one that daddy couldn't do the drills or coach from the stands.
lol! Who said anything about "berating" or "getting in her head"? And besides, I was describing my own DD's attitude toward mature pitchers who haven't developed the mental discipline to hold it together when things get tough. Maybe she's a 23 year old "old-schooler"?
The pitcher must be a leader - and what team wants a leader who is in tears out there in the circle? Tears and slumped shoulders might be expected in a 10u rec. game, and then you go get ice cream. But in 14u travel ball, and for a kid who wants to play in college? Rude awakening coming...
I think you're confusing a demeaning style of parenting/coaching with what I would call instilling "internal self discipline". And I disagree with your statement
"The kids that had this type of 'tough' parent generally do okay at the younger age groups but do not progress very far in the upper age groups and into college." I think that is reversed - the "tough" parents tend to instill the wrong message in young kids as to what athletics are about. By the time they reach teen years, the kids are just plain tired of the negative, demeaning style that has been drilled into them for several years. Their dislike for sports didn't suddenly happen overnight, it developed over several years.
For recreational sports and very young kids, it's all about positive reinforcement. Good coaches have a knack for finding lots of things to praise without resorting to sugar-coating "mistakes". Reinforcement of the good is peppered with instruction on how to correct things that are not being done correctly. That has nothing to do with berating in any way, nor is the focus on "You're doing it wrong!". The words "don't" and "wrong" should be the least used words in a youth coaches vocabulary. When a parent or coach has reached the point of using demeaning, berating language when attempting to instruct/correct at ANY age level, they need to reconsider their motives.
What I'm talking about is being honest with your daughter when she gets to an older level of advanced travel ball. When she is mature enough, she deserves to be treated with honesty and respect, and not misled by sugar coating the truth. If her effort is lacking, there's no sin in telling her so - in a respectful adult manner. That's not berating, it's honest evaluation feedback that will help her improve her skill level. It also teaches discipline and "ownership" of her actions, and not to blame anyone or anything but herself. When she's pitching college ball and that hanging curve she just gave the batter sails over the center field fence, she knows how to "**** it up" and move on, because it certainly won't be the last one.
