Trophy Case

[iron_chef_bbq]

My son plays soccer at the Y. By that I mean that he is in a class for 4 to 6-year-olds that meets once a week. There are no practices, no games, no uniforms. They do drills, work on skills, play games with the soccer ball and occasionally have a “scrimmage.” They run a lot and cheer a lot. The classes run in 6 to 8 week sessions during the

Comments

post script

[iron_chef_bbq]

I wrote this essay when I was deeply saddened by the disappointment in my son’s voice as he gently curbed my enthusiasm over his “award.” The trophy was quickly pushed aside. Several days later, however, he found it in the kitchen. “Mom, the rule is that people under three (read: code for my little sister) can’t touch my trophy because I don’t want it to get broken so we have to find a good place to put it.” It turns out that while the trophy failed at its task of making him feel like he had achieved something in soccer, it did succeed at making him feel like he’s moved from one stage of his life to another. He is a “big” kid who can be trusted with delicate things like trophies while his sister is not. Evidently, we take pride in being mature enough to handle tokens of mediocrity. 

Re: post script

[viking_cat]

I'm fascinated that he understood it wasn't about achievement. If you explain that there are trophies and there are TROPHIES, and they signify different things, would that resonate with him?

[woodwardiocom]

“It was for showing team spirit and good participation.”

Technically, this is true. Showing up on the last day is "good participation", and not throwing the trophy back in their face is "team spirit".

[apintrix]

"While I believe he is learning these things in the class, it seems neither of these things got across in the presentation of the trophy."

This.

I have a problem with the idea that saying that *everyone* is special means *nobody* is, because it fails to account for the existence of different criteria-- we can all be flourish in different ways, there's no single "track" to excellence. But yeah, not only does giving every kid a trophy miss the message, it encourages feelings of entitlement divorced from accomplishment, which is actively detrimental in the long run.

I mean, the students I teach are already 17-18, but I would never praise them for something they didn't accomplish. Yet I still find a way to deservedly praise just about every student I've had (the exceptions tend to be, unsurprisingly, those with overweening senses of entitlement, who tend to be sullen and not do the work...)