Teaching Kids to Be Good Sports

I'm going to just be honest here. My little family of mine is made up of some very competitive individuals. I know that my husband and I lead the way on this. We enjoy healthy competition. We regularly play competitive games and we do keep score. I particularly love playing cards and strategy games with my husband because they are one of the few kinds of games I actually have a chance at beating him at. And Oh! how I love to beat my husband! Because my husband loves to win, too and he's really good at games of all kinds. He is not one of those "I'll ease up to let you have a chance" kind of individuals. And so when you beat him at a game, you feel a sense of accomplishment and want to bask in the moment.



When we first got our Wii, my daughter, then six, had this amazing natural ability with the Wii sports games, especially tennis. The first day, my daughter won almost every single game she played against her dad, complete with these killer serves that resulted in ace after ace. Like me, my daughter seized the opportunity to relish in the fact that she had "dominated" her daddy. True to his nature, my husband stayed up past midnight playing Wii tennis over and over so he would be sure not to be so "dominated" by his six-year-old the next morning. When my daughter discovered that Daddy had gained some skills overnight, she was driven to practice practice practice so as not to lose her ability to hold her own with her dad.


There was recently this wide-spread trend in childhood education circles that we should shelter our children from competition. No longer were there winners and losers. Everyone got rewarded with ribbons for effort. Soccer games were about the joy of playing soccer and no score was officially kept. The problem was, it didn't work. In fact, in some ways it had a negative impact on children. Psychologist and sociologists witnessed children who lost motivation to really put their full effort into activities. After all, what's the point if we're all going to get praised just for showing up? And kids really weren't being fooled by the new game playing strategy set by adults. While there was no official score kept, most of the kids on the soccer team knew how many goals each team had scored and who really was the winner. Kids were left wondering why adults were lying to them and were suspicious of the motivations for why games were being played if not to see who would win.


The truth that most human development experts have known for some time is that competition is an important part of human development. It drives the survival of the species. It encourages goal setting. It motivates learning. And it teaches an undeniable aspect of life, that it is full of experiences of competition. We compete against our peers for the next promotion at our jobs. We compete against other bidders for that house on the corner we want. We compete against thousands of other fans to claim the limited number of tickets available for the U2 concert. And sometimes we win. And lots of times we lose.


All this aside, playing games is fun. Yes, losing is disappointing. We all would prefer to win. But for most of us who have learned to play games for the enjoyment of the game know that it's worth the risk of losing for the sake of having fun and bonding with our friends and family. This is ultimately what we need to help our children learn as well.


Instead of sheltering our children from competition, parents should embrace it as an opportunity to help their children appropriately deal with winning and losing. I think most parents would agree that they desire for their child to be a humble winner and a gracious loser. Why? Because we hope that we would behave this way in similar situations, and we certainly hope that others would, too. After all, if we're going to go through life regularly involved in various competitions it would be nice if others would be humble winners when we lose and gracious to us when we win. Right?

So how do we help our children become good sports? Here's some quick tips to help teach your kids how to have fun competing and win and lose with dignity:

1. 
   Do not tolerate behavior that is inappropriate regardless of whether or not it's taunting or excessive celebration in times of winning or pouting and tantrums in times of losing. Clearly let your child know that you are not impressed with this behavior and will stop the activity, leave, etc. Follow through with this so your child learns that attention gets removed when they try to bring attention to themselves inappropriately.


2. Let your children lose. Be careful not to always let your child win. You don't want your child to expect to win all the time. Life does not work this way. And your child will be in for a shock when his peers don't let him win at the games they play together. Use losing in the "safe" environment of your home as an easy way to practice losing gracefully. Play games with them that they can reasonably win on their own but that it's possible they could also loose.


3. Help your child take the focus off them in winning and losing by asking them to think about what the other person or team did well. Encourage them to share their observations with the other players.


4. Before your child starts a game, remind them that we will cheer for whoever wins. This is the rule in order to play the game. Make it fun to celebrate whoever wins.


5. Watch sports games and other competitions with your child and talk about what both teams are doing well and what each could be doing better. Discuss how the winners are feeling and how the losers are feeling. Point out examples of good sportsmanship and help your child recognize when someone is not being a good sport.


6. When your child loses, help them try to process why. Was it a game of chance? If so, approach the game as something exciting. Who will win this time? Was it a game of skill? Is there something they could have done differently? Is there something they could practice or keep learning? Empower your child to learn from their experience instead of feeling helpless in their loss.


7. When your child wins, of course celebrate and be happy with your child. Talk about what your child did that contributed to their win. And if they are playing on a team, make sure your child recognizes what others contributed to the win. But remember to teach that winning isn't everything. Make sure that you are giving praise and attention outside of games and competition so that your child doesn't feel like they've let you down as well as themselves if they lose, or that they gain your approval only when they win at something.


8. Make sure that you are modeling good sportsmanship yourself. Be aware of the messages you send when you are watching sports games, other competitive shows, even political elections.
   

We have fun with our kids. We tease each other and playfully "smack talk". But I love that when my daughter wins the board game my son says, "Good job, Isabella!" and gives her a high five. I love that when my daughter's best friend won the Super Citizen Award at her school, Isabella started crying, not because she was so disappointed that she didn't win it but because she was so happy that her best friend did. I love that my kids get to witness their dad shaking the hands of the other soccer team he just played telling them, "good game" and reliving some of the great plays of the game with them even though his team just lost.

It is true that some parents do not teach their children well about about how to be a good sport. Unfortunately, experiences with these families give us all a bad taste about competition. Don't let these few bad apples spoil it for your child. With your guidance your child can be a great winner and loser and enjoy the competitions life has in store.