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Working full-time in Youth Soccer over the past 10 years has been an amazing and rewarding experience. I truly enjoy working with the kids and I truly enjoy the relationships with the families. It’s so exciting to see the kids improve and just love to play the game of soccer. And it’s so exciting to see most parents supporting their kids in the right manner.

Unfortunately, some parents don’t have the proper expectations, and therefore have a tendency to ruin the experience for their child, other families,  coaches and administrators.

While I am by no means an expert in Parenting 101, my coaching peers and I consistently see the results (both positive and negative) of parenting  in youth soccer. We hope we can provide some positive, negative and sometimes humorous examples to learn from over the next few months! This month’s lesson is simple: let the kids play and have fun!

Out of curiosity, I once asked one of the 8-year-old boys in our Youth Academy program what he would do if his mom and dad were always yelling during his games, screaming “Go! Shoot! You need to boot it! Go over there! Don’t do that!” He responded, “I’d yell, ‘Security! I don’t know those people!’”

Read more on page 40 in the January 2011 Issue