How to strongly motivate and encourage?

Oooh, I really understand and sympathize.

I've had talks with with friends who are coaches about how boys are coached vs. how girls are coached. Most coaches were men, and were coached by yelly, you're doing that wrong types, and yet that worked for them. They lived for that one pat on the back or the one "not bad," as opposed to the countless "what the hell were you thinking out there?!!"s that they got.

So, that's default mode for a lot of male coaches. (Some female ones too.)

Meanwhile, girls especially tend to do better with the carrot AND the stick. That was good, you need to work on this.

A friend had the exact and I mean exact situation going on with her daughter, who plays goalie for our soccer team. The dad is a coach, and he's a yeller. Daughter was getting upset and spiraling downward instead of getting better. The mom said she'd pay her a dollar for every stopped goal, and that totally worked.

By the way, another exact parallel, and forgive me if I'm overstepping here, but this coach/dad was laid off a while ago and I think that has an affect on his coaching. I think his self-worth gets caught up in it a bit -- it's not just coaching and getting the best performances out of the girls, it's reflecting on him, ya know? If his daughter does well, he's a good coach, and since he's not working (and feels terrible about it), that's more important to him than usual.

For sozlet, when she's lagging, I tend to give detailed praise on what she did well -- not just "good game" but "that pass to Anna was perfectly executed" or "I was impressed with your speed when everyone was trying to get to the ball [at one specific point]," stuff like that. It seems to get her back on an even keel when she's had a less-than-stellar game (there's always SOMETHING to praise) and also she tends to do more of that good thing next game.

I think you have it - hubby has confined at times he's felt depressed because of being laid off - I mean who wouldn't be. His time is now spent with the kids more so yeah the frustration and patience can as a result wear a bit more.

On the positive side he did calm down after a bit of me talking with him and he agrees he has to change his tactic. I explained right or wrong it isn't working. It has the opposite effect so we need to find something else that pushes her.

I think also added to that, is my younger one has a thicker skin and seems to take critism differently.

In addition, although I like my daughter's coach, I do not think she is the right coach for her. My daughter needs some one to push her a bit more - maybe not by yelling - although she probably would respond differently with a coach yelling at her than her dad. But some one that stops them and corrects them more. And tells them to push harder. She ain't a pushy type.

One funny thing though - when she was playing softball, my husband once told her if she hits the ball into the out field then he'd buy her a lobster - you know what she damn well did. I told him next time bribe her with something less expensive.

Good for him for listening and calming down.

Yeah, every kid is different for sure re: what motivates them and what DEmotivates 'em.



Ha!

So I talk with my husband and he said today - to get them to do jump rope (supposed to be one of the best training techniques to increase speed) - he said he'd have a contest. That if she can do x number of jumpropes against his and if she has less mistakes then she will get $3. So she does 1,000 jump ropes and doesn't mess up once.

Great post, soz.
I'm a long time sports writing reader, and off and on tennis, golf, swimming, running (well, jogging) person, and nobody on earth would call me an athlete, especially lately. Never ever a coach of any sort.

All my instincts say you're right on this. I don't know if it breaks down in some straight line break re coaching males and females - in fact I doubt it, but as a generalization, your take makes sense.

ACtually she is right on about this - at the same time I talked about the competition with my husband he went and did some research on this. According to what he found - girls need to be coached differently - yelling like for boys doesn't work effectively for girls - you need to coach differently.

One thing is he is trying to learn a different tactic. He realizes his way/what he is used to from playing sports is different than how he needs to coach girls.

The funny thing is when he coaches other girls - not his daughters he uses these type of techniques - where he completments them on something they are doing well and then shows them how to improve - I don't know if he even realizes he does know how to coach girls and does well in it. He just doesn't use those same techniques on his daughters.

That makes sense too. The good news is that he is open to self observe.

So my daughter has her first game today for the fall season. I am home as my younger daughter has a birthday party to go to. Before they left, I asked my husband in front of my daughter how many points she should be expected to make in this game. He said she should make at least ten. I told her if she made 12, I'd give her something. I said how about an ice cream - didn't seem to do anyting. So I said $3, her face lit up and said ok! Seems like money is a motivator for her.