Thursday, July 6, 2017

How do you ban winning?

Via InstapunditWinning is banned at more than half of primary school sports days: Pupils compete in teams despite 82% of parents wanting a traditional event

More than half of primary schools are holding non-competitive sports days that fail to announce ‘winners’, according to a new survey.

They host events where individual children are not singled out to compete but instead work in teams and are recognised simply for taking part.

The findings have been revealed in a poll by Families Online which warns that youngsters must learn that ‘losing is completely ok’.

However, 82 per cent wanted ‘old school’ competitive sports days back on the basis that children must realise ‘you can’t always win at everything in life and sometimes you have to lose’.

Seventy-six per cent did not approve of ‘non-competitive’ events, with parents believing that ‘healthy competition helped children individually to strive to improve and challenge themselves’.

Fifty-three per cent said they were ‘comfortable’ with their child losing, believing that it wasn’t ‘a bad thing’ because it helps build resilience and confidence.

Four in ten (43 per cent) said losing was an important life skill.

(Link to story)

5 comments:

edutcher said...

First, you can't ban winning. somebody is always going to be the best, one side will get more whatevers.

Hoc dictu, the idea "Fifty-three per cent said they were ‘comfortable’ with their child losing, believing that it wasn’t ‘a bad thing’ because it helps build resilience and confidence" because you have to know what to do when you're knocked down because grief (or grift) counselors will not always be provided.

OTOH losing is not an important life skill. How to keep going when your world ends is.

Leland said...

When my daughters were eight, they played in a soccer league that didn't keep score. I was coach and all the kids had great parents. I would scrimmage the kids against the parents, because believe it or not eight year olds are about the speed of parents especially when you have a small field and the defensive size of parents.

So we didn't keep score, but I also know no other team ever scored a goal on us, while we had no problem scoring on them. And when my kids ran circles around their competition, the competition knew they were defeated. You don't need a scoreboard to tell you someone just sped past you and kept you from touching the ball. Little girls still cried when they didn't get their way.

Chip Ahoy said...

In Japan we were told that baseball is played to a tie. The whole point of winning by competition was considered goash xxxxx goush xxxxxxx goache xxxxx in bad taste. And Barry and I were all, "What? No wait, what?" We could not comprehend it. Our host shrugged and said, "to play and to cooperate."

"But they're teams!"

"Yeah, but you don't want to actually beat them. That would be undue embarrassment and uncalled for. It's contrary to social unity."

Barry and I both were, "pfffft."

We concluded Japanese people are weird.

Then later in life at work on break and after lunch I'd whip out a NYT crossword from my pocket and give clues to the ones where I was stuck. Everyone at the table enjoyed helping get to the solution. It was fun. For all of us. It engaged everyone at the table. And with nothing at risk. Everyone trying to solve the same puzzle. They enjoyed indulging their arcane and otherwise useless knowledge. They'd ask each other, "How did you know that?" I miss those days.

Then the internet was invented and NYT crossword forum was my first social hookup. It introduced me to crossword constructors. I quickly discovered they raced competitively solving in just a few minutes the puzzles that took me a full hour. They competed down to the second. I was dismayed they turned something so cooperatively fun into steep individual competition. And they're vicious about solving down to differences of mere seconds. "I beat you by three seconds!" Day after day after day. The programs that run the puzzle files all have timers on them. That was their form of fun. Puzzles are completely individual in nature. But not mine. I'd rather solve puzzles together in project cooperation than to compete in a race. I didn't care to race through them. Racing takes away the relaxation and casual fun. Does that make me a bit unAmerican? I suppose it does.

I want to mention something else unrelated but touching on cooperation.

I wish you could see these young people today responding to me doing simple things, the tired worn out old fart.

I walk into the bottle shop for the customary 12-pack of Coca Colas. The new guys there have me pegged already. It's the only thing that I do there. Architecturally, it's a long building. I walk the distance outside before entering, then walk back the full distance for the pile of cases of coke, then the full distance back to the counter, then the full distance back outside. that's four lengths of the very long shop amounting to about half a city block.

The young guy behind the counter goes "Want me to get it?" I answer, "Sure." (but there goes part of my exercise for the day.)

He dashes from behind the counter, runs down the aisle, yells through the shop, "Do you want cold ones?" Dashes back, asks me if I want him to put it into my backpack, he does, then upon exiting he dashes in front of me to hold open the door, I walk through and he dashes in front of me again to open the second door, and another young man from outside unrelated to the store and not going in himself, takes hold of the door and both see out safely onto the street.

Where not one bit of that is necessary.

The young man buzzed around like an athletic flying insect the whole time, slathering attention on me and my simple regular purchase.

Chip Ahoy said...

Then off to the sandwich shop in the opposite direction and the young man there performed similarly. Absolutely covering me with lavish attention over my order already called in and already paid for. All he had to do was hand the prepared bag to me and off I'd go, but instead he insisted on engaging conversationally on every thin utterance I made, he rechecked each item, offered two plastic forks, (there are already two forks inside the bag and I never use those things anyway, they're all wasted) he wanted to help me re-pack the contents already bagged up and stack them into my backpack, then he sped from around his cashier station in front of me through the sandwich shop to hold open the door again. And he was a short fat little dude. The type of physical form that you might take for being lazy. But he is actually energetic.

It must be the haircut. They must think I'm an injured veteran. That's the only thing I can think of. The respect extended is undue. It's inordinate. I like it. But it is a bit embarrassing. Because I don't need any assistance at all. I'm fine. Getting these things and going through doors is easy. Not any kind of problem at all. I cannot possibly look that much a mess. But there it is. Young people behaving person to person contrary to all that I read about them online. Bless their gracious hearts for real. And I mean it. I cannot be more impressed with their observable behavior extended to me personally. I think that I live in a fantastically gracious city.

Methadras said...

When I coached my daughters soccer team, I was told expressly at coach training the youth soccer organization that shall remain nameless, for my particular chapter that winning is allowed, but to be discouraged among the teams as to not humiliate or make the other team feel bad. I ask if this was a chapter policy or a full league policy. I received no answer. I told them that this strategy is wrong and not conducive to healthy competition. I was told that if I didn't like it, I could leave. And I got up and left. Took my kid to another soccer league that has no such bullshit.

The other dads I knew and interacted with later told me that my attitude would not be tolerated in the youth group and I asked if any other dad's left and I was told not likely. All fucking pussies.