Dads love being spectators. Just look around the stands, we come out in force. But should Dads be watching practice as well? Is it a good thing to bust out the folding chair and keep an eye on the soccer workouts? If you do stay to watch, is cheering okay?

If you elect not to watch, do you worry that a problem or injury might arise in your absence?

Let us know how you manage you athletic child's practice time.

I'm still quite aways from this issue with a 1 and 2 year old, but let me ask you...

Did you sit and watch them in daycare playing and learning?
Do you sit and watch them while their in school?
Letting them go on there own is part of letting them grow up.

Practice time sounds like time they have together with their team for bonding and preparation and while under trained adult supervision.
if there's a problem, it should be handled the same way as anywhere else with the school or town and something happens, no?

My policy has always been very clear: I do not watch practice. I think that watching practice creates distortion. Games are to be observed; practice is for getting better. I think that watching practice prevents kids from seeing that as a time when experimentation and failure are allowed. As pfann mentions, I think it's also a time to be away from parents, listening to coaches and teammates.

My wife disagrees. Mostly because she has become friends with several parents on my daughter's soccer team. When, for a short time, this team practiced at the school where we live, practice literally became a happy hour at our house (I approved of that, but we always had to kick people out of our house so we could put the kids to be).

My wife also had misgivings about leaving our youngest (6) at basketball practice. I insisted. Of course, when she showed up to pick him up, he was sobbing in the corner being consoled by a (good, practice-spectating) mom.

Didn't help my argument.

Daddy Clay. You are right, practice is for getting better. Shouldn't part of getting better include positive feedback and constructive criticism from the parent? Your kid looks up to you and wants to hear what you have to say... most of the time...

Dan

I'm a bit late to this conversation, but I'll add my two cents anyway.

I would start by saying, it depends on the type of league and the ages of the children. I've been coaching my son's either soccer or baseball teams since he was 3. And we have him in a recreational league (no scores, no team records, etc).

In that situation as a coach, I absolutely want and EXPECT at least one parent/guardian for each child at practice. It's not a drop and return sort of situation. Additionally, I encourage all parents to come dressed to participate. At any age before elementary school, it's primarily herding cats and playing. So all of the adult involvement/supervision that we as coaches can get is essential to ensure everyone stays engaged, active and safe. As a note to Daddy Clay -- at age 6, I'd have to disagree with you. I wouldn't leave my child at a practice at that age.

As kids get older (late elementary) and get into more competitive leagues, I don't think regular or parental involvement/observation of practices is necessary. At that point, I tend to agree with Daddy Clay's thought that it's better for the kids to take their lead/direction from coaches and teammates and to develop their independence from their parents.

On the other side of it, I suspect, but don't know, that a child might like to see a parent in the stand on occasion, but not all the time, and certainly not actively engaged in trying to coach/direct from the sidelines. I expect that they'd find that distracting and embarrassing.

Daddy Clay, I'm a bit confused at your post. Here is yet another time when I wish I were more eloquent so I could get my point across more clearly.

What do you mean by distortion and who has it?

The only way I can read that is as a distortion of your childs real ability or performance, as in listenning to a symphony as it's being written on the piano rather than when it is finished and ready to be performed.

But that is not what I want my relationship with my daughter to be. I am not there because I want her to perform and do her best for me. I am there because I want to see her live life.

Yes I will watch and enjoy seeing my child battle it out with her teammates in drills and scrimmages, watching her learn, watching her interact with authority figures, teammates, and friends. Watching her grow from winning battles and losing battles. I will enjoy watching her make mistakes, because if you are not making mistakes, then you are not trying anything and growing. I will enjoy watching her progress.

I will enjoy her knowing that I am there as an observer and confidant, not as someone judging the work in progres

Your question says "watch" but the content seems to suggest "participate".

No I will not get involved in practice by being vocal or in any way intrusive. I will sit and watch and if she wants to talk about anything later, I am a seasoned veterean with experience she can tap into.

My father played basketball for Illinois and there was nothing he'd rather due than sit in the stands or on the sidelines and watch us play, no matter if it was game or practice. He coached us in basketball and baseball when we were younger and then easily made the transition to observer in our later years. When my brother had problems with a high school coach, my father was able to help my brother understand his coaches motivations. He could not have been able to do that if he were not watching the practices.

Now my father is doing the same with my brother's 13 yr old daughter. Because he watches her volley ball practice, he was able to pick up the finer points of the over hand serve that my niece missed. It's too much information for a 13 yr old to take in, but easy to remember for a retired exec with background in training and management, not to mention a college athlete and coach. When my niece asked my father to help her practice after hours, he was able to continue with the technique the coach had tried to teach in limited practice time and correct her mistakes. Now she is one of the top two servers on a team that has 27 wins and 3 losses.

Daddy Clay, unless I am missing your point completley, I am going to have to disagree with you on this one.

@T.Low There is no question about your eloquence. Great post. There is also no doubt about your love and enthusiasm (and your father's). Let me try and explain my take on the subject. There are basically two issues: one practical and one philosophical.

On the practical side, with three kids (mine are 12,9,6) all athletes, some playing more than one sport a season, attending practices would leave me little or no time to hang with my wife, and would diminish the amount of time that I get to spend with my (non-practicing) kids working on homework or relaxing. A huge portion of my "quality time" would be spent observing practice. So a lot of my second point may just be a justification of the fact that I don't have the stomach for watching that many hours of gym time.

On to the philosophy. I think there is a great art to leaving kids alone. As a parent, I encourage my kids to participate in sports, all activities really, as a way to develop internal resources more than any physical attribute. I want my kids to discover an internal sturdiness, independence and resilience -- a vision of their own competent "agency" in the world. This is very different from "self-esteem" which I think is crap. Sports are a great way for a child to explore his or her capability, and to stretch his or her capacity. But also find culpability, obligation and responsibility.

Here is my real point. When children are under our watchful gaze, they are not only supported and affirmed, but also circumscribed. Kids experience the world in an entirely different way when their parents aren't around. When you watch practice, they are both athlete and child. I would assert that they subtly understand that they have that support to fall back on and that doesn't challenge them to develop those internal resources.

We want them to stand on their own two feet and be responsible for themselves, to not look for excuses or external alternatives. This is what makes people capable of leadership and independence of thought (think teens and peer pressure), in my opinion. It may seem counterintuitive but I don’t want my kids to need permission, support and affirmation in order to make a move.

Additionally, the presence of a parent creates a subtle pressure simultaneously supportive and dampening. This pressure of observation is consistent with the objectives and terms of a game setting, where the outcome has significance, but is in conflict with a practice environment when experimentation and failure are important.

This is a lot of intellectualizing to freight a bunch of nine-year-old girls playing basketball with, but there you have it. Thanks for helping me to think this through a bit more.

DC, you had me at,

"I want my kids to discover an internal sturdiness, independence and resilience -- a vision of their own competent "agency" in the world. This is very different from "self-esteem" which I think is crap".

I can see your point plain as day and agree very much with it. So much so, that I now plan to limit the amount of practices I watch in the future to "once in a while".

Philosophy like this will keep me coming back to this forum.