What Parents Can Learn from Figure Skating Coaches: Failures are Opportunities

Parents often remind teens of their failures, while coaches build on those failures.

“The Difference between a Parent and a Coach,” Carter, Izumo, and Martin

Raise your hand if you’re guilty of this one. Boy, I know I am. Here’s a scenario that’s happened so often at our house, I can tell you the time and date it will take place and hand you a reasonable script for the dialogue.

Ice Girl has weekend chores that include getting her homework done for Monday, cleaning out that pit we call her room, taking laundry downstairs, and running the vacuum in the front room. On our way home from Saturday morning ice and before the clock strikes noon, she will ask, “Can I go to The Boyfriend’s house / my friend’s house / shopping / the movies / the park / the moon NOW and then come home LATER and do my chores?”

This question is closely related to “The check is in the mail.”

I love you, Ice Girl, but when you come home from wherever you’ve been, you’re not cleaning your room. You’ll have to eat first, then you’ll have to watch a movie with Ice Dad, then it’ll be time for dinner, then your friends will call, and you’ll need to catch up with everyone on Facebook, Godzilla will invade Tokyo, and then you’ll be too tired to do anything but plop in bed.

If you give a mouse a cookie…he’s going to ask for a glass of milk…then he’ll probably ask you for a straw…

Our rule is: Ice Girl goes nowhere on Saturday without shoveling out her room, taking laundry downstairs, and completing her homework. On Sundays, she needs to vacuum and put laundry away.

Today on Rinkformation:

IceMom.net: What Parents Can Learn from Figure Skating Coaches: Failures are Opportunities

IceCoach.net: Figure Skating-Cross Rolls vs. Cross Steps

However, every once in a while we give in. We give Ice Girl another shot, especially if something amazing is happening on a Saturday, like a party or a U.F.O. landing.

But, I can’t keep my mouth shut, can I? Nope. I always say, “Now, remember, Ice Girl. Your track record with having fun and then returning home to do your chores is lousy. You must do your chores when you get home…blah, blah, blah.”

It’s like I’m setting her up to fail, right? Instead, I should say: “I’m sure that you’ll have a good time at the Elvis sighting and I’m confident you’ll bring your blue suede shoes home at a reasonable hour so you can clean out your room. You’re a good kid. I have faith in you.”

Except, well, I don’t. Ugh. I’ve been down the road so many times that I know she’s going to avoid cleaning that room yet again. I can tell you how she’s going to do it and the excuses she’ll supply.

If I were her coach, though, I’d be brimming with optimism, even if it’s fake. After Ice Girl two-foots a jump, pulls out early, or wipes out, Ice Coach is always smiling and confident that next time Ice Girl will surely land that jump. She’s relentlessly positive, that gal, and yet I don’t have the unreasonable urge to strangle her for her constant upbeat attitude. In fact, I totally admire it.

Ice Coach also provides feedback when Ice Girl doesn’t land her jump or spin her spin or work her footwork. The feedback is just like a mirror: nice and neutral. It’s more like a here’s what I saw instead of What were you thinking? At the end of the feedback, Ice Coach encourages Ice Girl and tells her to give it another try. Me, I’m more of the I can’t believe you didn’t clean your room AGAIN! Blah, blah, blah.

Maybe if I showed Ice Girl her room and the disaster that it is then offered a positive nudge at the end of the conversation, she’d pick up the stuff on her floor and empty her trash. Maybe if I loaned her a hand for 10 minutes or so, she could get started with the rest of it. I could visit her every half hour to monitor her progress, give neutral feedback, praise what she’s done, and encourage her to do more.

Man, that sounds like good parenting, doesn’t it? It also sounds like a ton of work to pop in every 30 minutes or so.

Here’s a scenario that’s happened so often at our house, I can tell you the time and date it will take place and hand you a reasonable script for the dialogue.

On a Saturday morning before noon, Ice Mom will not allow Ice Girl to go somewhere before completing her chores. Then Ice Mom will rant about how Ice Girl has gone to The Boyfriend’s house / my friend’s house / shopping / the movies / the park / Middle Earth in the past and nothing happened at home.

Looks like Ice Girl isn’t the only one who needs to make opportunities out of failures, hey?

How about you? Are you the encouraging, nurturing kind of parent who takes a child’s failure with a grain of salt and remains relentlessly positive? Are you more like me and you anticipate your child’s shortcomings? Do you think it’s practical to coach your kid through life or is that too much hand-holding? Please share your experiences in the comments.

References:

Carter, C., Izumo, G., and Martin, J. (2004.) Stop Parenting and Start Coaching: How to Motivate, Inspire, and Connect with Your Teenager. Denver, Colo.: LifeBound. p. xii

Joffe Numeroff, L. (1985.) If You Give a Mouse a Cookie. Harper Collins.

Do you have a question for Ice Mom or a dilemma for the Advisory Board? Do you have an idea for a post you’d like to read? Send me an e-mail. I really do love e-mail. I promise I’ll be relentlessly positive when I respond. IceMom.Diane@gmail.com

***Coming up this week on Ice Mom: Gift ideas for figure skaters and figure skating coaches! Holiday shopping season’s almost here! ***

Photo credits:
Elvis! [miniature]: kevindooley / Kevin Dooley on Flickr.com Creative Commons
Under The Milky Way: Andréia / Andréia Bohner on Flickr.com Creative Commons
Planning session: WorldIslandInfo.com / www.futuristmovies.com on Flickr.com Creative Commons
UFO Fly-By (or Airplane Lights): AlphaTangoBravo / Adam Baker on Flickr.com Creative Commons
Untitled [Elvis impersonator]: Lewis Kelly on Flickr.com Creative Commons
Doorway to Adventure: Dust Storm / Jonathan Clede on Flickr.com Creative Commons
tolkien would appreciate this place: Peter Rivera on Flickr.com Creative Commons

http://www.halushki.com/ Josette at Halushki

Hmmmm….yes, yes…I’ve been burned too many times by the “I PROMISE I’ll clean my room, do my homework, practice music after I do this other AMAZING thing I REALLY want to do.” For us, it’s no friends, no screen time (tv, computer, video games) until all chores and homework are done. If friends want to come to the house to do homework together, that’s the one time I’ll budge. Or, I’ve even had friends offer to come over and help one of my kids with chores. That’s okee doke by me, too.

I’m really bad when it comes to giving “I can’t believe you didn’t blah blah blah blah” lectures and yes, absolutely, just saying what I see and staying neutral is best (although not as fulfilling .) “I see toothpaste on the counter” and letting them argue it out over who is going to clean is still a hassle, but usually is less hassle for me than when I try to guess who smeared toothpaste and then play judge, jury, and police officer.

The thing with the chores/cleaning/homework thing is that once I’ve been fooled once, kiddo has to earn back my trust again, maybe with smaller examples of “see, I said I’d do what I was going to do” throughout the week.

The thing with skating is that when kiddo jumps and falls, it only affects her and this thing she wants to do. When kiddo doesn’t clean the litter box, it’s means cat “surprises” in the house. When she doesn’t unload the dishwasher, it means I have to do it.

Now, I have in the past pulled a parenting strike and have let dishes pile up, refused to do laundry, refused to do everyone else’s chore…and sometimes, that’s what needs to be done. But oye…talk about time consuming. I stew in my own juices waiting for everyone to get the message. Even homework I’ll allow more of an opportunity to fail and fail again and reap the consequences at school than when it comes to household chores.

But in general, I’m a huge fan of Faber and Mazlish and Ginott when it comes to parenting philosophy. Using one word instead of twenty, noticing what I see instead of offering color commentary. Trying to hold off on the twenty minute lectures…or at least keeping them down to twice a month.
http://icecoach.net/2010/11/22/figure-skating-cross-rolls-vs-cross-steps/ Figure Skating-Cross Rolls vs. Cross Steps | icecoach.net

[...] IceMom.net: What Parents Can Learn from Figure Skating Coaches: Failures are Opportunities [...]
http://icemom.net Ice Mom

This is absolutely correct, Josette:

The thing with skating is that when kiddo jumps and falls, it only affects her and this thing she wants to do. When kiddo doesn’t clean the litter box, it’s means cat “surprises” in the house. When she doesn’t unload the dishwasher, it means I have to do it.

I didn’t know the Faber, Mazlish, and Ginott names, but it sounds similar to my parenting philosophy, which I learned from renowned author Patricia McConnell , who wrote books like The other End of the Leash and How to be the Leader of the Pack and Have Your Dog Love You for It.

Yup. I belong to the puppy training school of parenting. Sit. Lay down. Stay. Good kid.
http://www.halushki.com/ Josette at Halushki

LOL! Well, they wrote the “How To Talk So Kids Will Listen, and Listen So Kids Will Talk” books. I subscribe to no parenting “regimen” from A to Z, but they are about as close as it gets to coaching. Or puppy training. I actually posted once a list of rules for being a good dog owner and noted that almost all would do for being a good kid “owner” as well.

I will admit that for all my high falutin’, today I absolutely FREAKED OUT at skater child. She hadn’t skated since Friday morning, and that’s okay. However, she still doesn’t seem to get that if at the newish level she’s at with a lot of jumps, taking off three days means being a little rusty. She had a pre-teen melt down and was off the ice more than on, and I had one of those days where I saw dollar signs flying out the window. I know. This is NOT the right attitude for a skating parent. I think I yelled “Get back on the ice!” so loud that kids out in the parking lot ran in and started skating. Just being up front that this is all a big, big struggle for me.
http://www.halushki.com/ Josette at Halushki

LOL! Well, they wrote the “How To Talk So Kids Will Listen, and Listen So Kids Will Talk” books. I subscribe to no parenting “regimen” from A to Z, but they are about as close as it gets to coaching. Or puppy training. I actually posted once a list of rules for being a good dog owner and noted that almost all would do for being a good kid “owner” as well.

I will admit that for all my high falutin’, today I absolutely FREAKED OUT at skater child. She hadn’t skated since Friday morning, and that’s okay. However, she still doesn’t seem to get that if at the newish level she’s at with a lot of jumps, taking off three days means being a little rusty. She had a pre-teen melt down and was off the ice more than on, and I had one of those days where I saw dollar signs flying out the window. I know. This is NOT the right attitude for a skating parent. I think I yelled “Get back on the ice!” so loud that kids out in the parking lot ran in and started skating. Just being up front that this is all a big, big struggle for me.
http://icemom.net Ice Mom

Josette, you’re among friends here. Who hasn’t yelled at her kid to GetBackOnThatIceItCostsMeAFortune!

You know, it’s such a struggle between wanting it to be the kid’s choice to skate or not and watching your money flitter away on a 10-year-old’s whim.

Again, my cure for figure skating mom shouting: shock collars. They’re pretty silent, yet deliver a powerful message. Bonus: you never worry about the kid stealing the remote control for the TV at home!
Sierra

Allowing kids to get away with not doing chores? Nuh uh. My mom doesn’t take me skating if I don’t do my weekly chores.

So next time Ice Girl doesn’t do her chores after coming home from that must-go party.. no skating! Even though you hate wasting that club ice so much, dollar signs spin around your head.