Building Confidence In Young Athletes1

Mark Greenburg, a youth sports coach, former physical education teacher and author of "Elevated Leadership, a Pitch-By-Pitch Guide to Business, Life, and Baseball' describes how parents can help their kids develop emotional intelligence and empathy through sports. He gives tips for helping kids communicate with coaches.

Elizabeth Pecsok, a coach for Oregon Gymnastics Academy, says she coaches special needs kids by helping them overcome fears and feel successful.

The words parents and coaches choose when communicating with young athletes can boost kids’ confidence or deflate it, says Ganon Baker, a sports development coach who has worked with teams internationally and also played basketball in Iceland. He gives tips for communicating with sports kids.

Ultimate Sports Parent Radio interviews Nancy Lough, professor at University of Nevada Las Vegas (UNLV), who focuses on gender equity in sports, explains why more girls drop out of sports than boys. It's due, in part, to stereotypes about what boys and girls should be doing.She also describes how girls are becoming more actively involved in pushing for equal pay in professional sports.

Caroline Maguire, author of "Why Will No One Play with Me?" and a professional certified coach who has worked with Olympic and other athletes, gives tips for helping young athletes read others' cues. Being better able to respond to social cues improves players' experience, helps them avoid getting into trouble and allows them to listen to direction, she says. She addresses other mental game topics, including fear of failure and perfectionism.

The pressures of modern youth sports are creating stress related mental health issues in young athletes. But there’s a non-traditional way of addressing this stress. That’s what we learned during our interview with Bradley Donohue, a psychology professor at University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV), and director of The Optimum Performance Program in Sports (TOPPS), a mental health program for athletes.

Ultimate Sports Parent Radio interviews Alex Molden, former NFL player, motivational speaker, high school football coach and sports parent. He says the biggest challenge for parents is being patient and letting kids develop at their own pace.

Tricia Roos, Bishop Lynch High School’s head women’s volleyball coach, talks about how social media in youth sports affects communication--and what she does about it on her high school teams.

Brooks Elms, a youth sports coach and former Division 3 player for NYU, says he's spent countless hours thinking about whether winning is important in sports. He brings that background to his coaching, helping kids focus on staying in the moment. In this interview, he gives tips for coaching and communicating with kids.

Mohammed Almarzouq, 27, from Saudi Arabia, a recent ninja coach for kids at Skyhook Ninja Fitness, has appeared on American Ninja Warrior twice. The "Grownup Child" talks about the benefits of playfulness in sports, and how he encourages playfulness in youth sports. Follow him on instagram @grownupchild

Mary Nhin, co-author, along with her son, Kobe, of "How to Win Wimbledon in Pajamas," describes how learning about mental toughness helped her son overcome a cold streak in tennis. She provides mental toughness tips.

Richard Burke, a coach for numerous youth sports teams, explains how our "Ultimate Sports Parent" program helped a 10-year-old athlete address perfectionism in baseball.

Ultimate Sports Parent Radio interviews Kaig Lightner, founder of Portland Community Football Club, a soccer club that aims to provide low-income kids affordable access to sports. Team members, many of them hispanic, often must grapple with bullying from other teams, he says.

Bob Katz, a journalist, former sports dad and coach and author of the kids' book "EZ and the Intangibles," discusses why it's important for sports parents to drop the sports fan mindset when watching their kids perform.

New studies show that 14% of soccer and other players age 6-12 drop out of sports. Until now, the focus has been on older kids--the fact that more than 50% of kids drop out of sports by age 13. In this Ultimate Sports Parent Radio interview with Ben Benjamin Dudley, executive director of Positive Coaching Alliance, Portland, and Mark Lawton, a longtime coach and volunteer PCA impact coach, we learn what the problem is, and get suggestions for helping solve it. Visit https://devzone.positivecoach.org/ to get more tips from PCA.

Greg Winkler, longtime coach, and author of "Coaching a Season of Significance," describes what parents should say and do after a game. He gives tips about the best ways to communicate with young athletes.

Kimberly Lackey, founder of Empath Coaching, discusses how nutrition affects kids' mental game and performance in youth sports. She gives tips about nutrition choices before games and practice.

Part Two of our interview with Mark Lawton, a longtime teacher and coach who has taken teams to the championship level. How do kids react when they feel as if they're not being treated fairly? And what can coaches and parents do about it?

Mark Lawton, a longtime teacher and coach who has led many teams to championships, describes how to create a confidence-boosting team culture--and why it's important to kids' confidence.

Mark Lawton, a longtime teacher and coach who has led many teams to championships, says kids and parents with a strong sense of fairness often get upset by perceived issues of fairness. He provides tips for addressing fairness issues and ensuring kids stay confident in youth sports. He also addresses differences between boys and girls.