Growing up, my husband and I were both involved in sports. We encouraged our children to try a bunch of activities. Both kids love soccer and my daughter also loves gymnastics. My husband and I feel that there are so many benefits to participating in organized sports. The kids learn coordination, team spirit, physical strength, and interpersonal skills. They learned to deal with loss and frustration too.
Here are some tips I’ve learned along the way to help raise my little athletes. I hope you’ll find a few takeaways within this list for your kids too.
Tips for Raising Young Athletes
Feed Them Well
To prevent hunger and maintain energy levels, plan a pre-exercise meal. About 2 hours before exercise, focus on carbs, some protein and low fat like pasta with chicken, cereal, yogurt, etc. You can help muscles recover with a high protein snack about 30 minutes after too.
Keep Them Hydrated
Give your kids a sports drink to prevent fatigue and dehydration. These drinks do a better job at preventing dehydration than plain water. These drinks are ideal for activities that are longer than an hour. My kids recently tried BODYARMOR and really love it.
BODYARMOR is a sports drink with electrolytes, vitamins and coconut water. It is low in sodium and contains no artificial ingredients. BODYARMOR comes in 7-great tasting flavors: fruit punch, orange mango, strawberry banana, tropical punch, lemon lime, mixed berry and grape. My daughter LOVES the orange-mango and my son’s favorite it tropical punch.
Get involved
Your involvement plays a key role in the success of your children in any activity. You don’t necessarily need to be the coach. Attend their games as much as possible. Practice with them at home. Other ways to get involved are staffing the snack bar, or being a volunteer scorekeeper. Take pictures at the games and send them around to the families. Staying involved is a great way to keep an eye on possible issues like bullying or skills issues too.
Stay Positive
Your child’s attitude in sports is strongly affected by your behavior. Supporting your child through both wins and losses are equally important. You want your child to love and enjoy playing their sport whether they win or lose.
Boost Your Child’s Confidence
You want to do everything you can to develop your child’s confidence in their sport. This confidence will likely transfer into other areas of their lives. Help your child focus on what they are good at and what makes them successful. Help them practice the skills where they might need improvement. Share your own stories about how practice helped you improve too.
If you want to find BODYARMOR near you, check out the store locator on their website. Here you can also find out where to purchase online. In addition, the folks at BODYARMOR have a coupon here on Facebook.
I think you can add, be a role model. That surely helps.
Great additional tip. It’s important to be healthy and fit to be a role model for your kids.
All of my nieces and nephews are involved in at least one sport. It makes my head spin sometimes to keep track of 10 kids and all of their sports. These are great tips for parents. I’m glad I’m just the bystander!
My son is very picky when it comes to food, but I am happy makes good drinking choices. Bodyarmor could be something she would appreciate
Definitely give it a try. My entire family loves it!
Athletics are so important for kids. Even though my daughter had Cerebral Palsy we found ways for her to participate in sports. It wasn’t easy but we managed and she was happy to be able to do physical activity with other kids. My son was always into multiple sports but was an excellent swimmer!
Some good tips. I was a swimmer growing up, as well.