Many coaches and parents try to teach skills and strategies that the children are not ready or able to learn. (It’s called Overcoaching) Learn what children at the age of your children can do generally and then learn about the individual readiness of each of your kids — for example, your neighbor’s daughter Fran and your Terri are the same age — Fran is able to ride a bike and Terri isn’t ready to do that yet. Terri is O.K. and should be treated that way — let’s just wait for her to catch up.
One of my favorite psychologists, James Hymes, made this situation very simple. He said, “Every child is ready to learn something relative to the situation. It’s our job as teachers and parents to determine what that child is ready to learn.”
In Child Psych 501, I learned a lot about the concept of readiness and I was impressed with the work of E. L. Thorndike. He had come up with some practical ways of looking at readiness and what we teachers should do in working with our kids and I knew they would work in my classroom. He stated his ideas in his three Laws of Readiness and I translated them to fit my teaching models. When I was coaching, I made another translation so that I could use them on my basketball court or baseball field. Anyway, here is how they look on the court or field or arena or wherever:
1. If Janet is ready to learn how to hit a ball and she is allowed to hit the ball, she will have a happy experience.
2. If Janet is ready to learn how to hit a ball and she is not allowed to hit the ball, she will be frustrated.
3. If Janet isn’t ready to learn how to hit a ball and she is forced to hit the ball, she will have a negative, perhaps even a traumatic experience.
Number 1 is the ideal situation. Janet is ready to go; you’re ready to have her go; and everyone is happy. Number 2 happens quite often. Janet is ready and able to hit that ball — she wants to hit that ball — but someone or something is standing in her way and she is feeling unhappy about the whole business.
Number 3 is the really scary one and yet you and I have seen it many times. This is the one that brings out the verbal abuse and the insults. Janet is just not able to swing that bat and her coach and/or parents are not willing for that to be O. K. They keep pushing her, abusing her. “You’re not even trying!” “What’s the matter with you!”
They’re not willing to wait until Janet has developed physically to the place that she can do the task. Janet has known those traumatic episodes in which Mom and Dad pushed and shoved her to do things and being abusive to her, making her feel guilty or an embarrassment to her family when she wasn’t able to do them. “Well, the neighbor girl is younger than you and look how well she can ride a bike.”
I’ve often wondered why Thorndike stopped after giving those three laws. In our business, this is a 2 x 2 matrix and there has to be a fourth law, so I will give you the real attitude we Parents and Coaches must have when we are dealing with a child who isn’t ready to do the task we think is required at this moment:
Pierro’s Fourth Law of Readiness — (A Variation on a Theme by E. L. Thorndike)
4. If Janet isn’t ready to learn how to hit a ball, she is not forced to hit the ball and that’s O.K. and she’s O.K.
Reasonable, intelligent, caring coaches and parents will accept each player right where she is and deal with her in terms of what she can do and what she can’t do. These parents are the ones who waited patiently for her to take her first steps, to be able to use the bathroom by herself, to learn to read at her own pace, etc. I hope you have a lot of this kind of parent in your Family Team.
Dr. Peter S. Pierro, EdD parentscoachesasteam.com