Support for your child in sports is the most valuable tool available next to good coaching. I have just finished my sixth year of coaching youth soccer; my third in club, and I have seen the vast difference in a players abilities to perform better and enjoy their experience depending on the level of support they get from there families as well as team members. This is the beginning of becoming a great soccer parent.

Great soccer parents will make an effort to learn the rules of the game, cheer from the sidelines but not coach their child during a game. Parents must understand that every coach that they have throughout their child's soccer experience will have his or her own method, style and strategy in achieving balance, team chemistry and learning. A good soccer parent will respect this even if they do not understand why their child is not playing on the field at any given time.

Want to share your experiences as a great soccer parent?  If so, please send us an email with your experiences and pictures.  If your story is selected for our website or Applause enewletter, you or your player will receive adidas gear from Kentucky Youth Soccer.  Speak up and share your experiences.  Email your article and pictures to webmaster@kysoccer.net

If the world were a perfect place, talking to a youth sports coach would be as natural and stress free as talking to your child's teacher. Parents should feel free to let the coach know anything we feel will affect our child's participation, such as stress in his home life or school, the fact that he has chronic asthma, that he is grieving over the death of a family pet or has to miss a game to attend a family wedding. We also should be able to expect that the coach will share any concerns with us about our child at any time. Unfortunately, as I know all too well from my conversations with parents and coaches over the years, there is not much that worries and confuses parents more.  To read the whole article, click here.

1. Don't offer specific instruction during the game.
2. Do offer encouragement to your child during the game, but in a general way.
3. Do not talk to the referees or the other team's players, coaches or parents.
4. If you want to work directly with your child, talk with your coach about drills you can try between practices.
5. Help your child enjoy the experience of playing on a team

To read the whole article, click here.

Science Daily (June 18, 2008) — Wonder if you could be one of “those” parents who rant and rage at their kid’s soccer game? Well, you don’t have to look much farther than your car’s rearview mirror for clues.

According to a new study if you have a tendency to become upset while driving, you’re more likely to be the kind of parent who explodes in anger at your kids’ sports matches.

Research by kinesiology Ph.D student Jay Goldstein of the University of Maryland School of Public Health found that ego defensiveness, one of the triggers that ignites road rage, also kicks off parental “sideline rage,” and that a parent with a control-oriented personality is more likely to react to that trigger by becoming angry and aggressive.

By surveying parents at youth soccer games in suburban Washington, D.C., Goldstein found that parents became angry when their ego got in the way. “When they perceived something that happened during the game to be personally directed at them or their child, they got angry.” says Goldstein. “That’s consistent with findings on road rage.”  To read the whole article, click here.