Recently, a friend of mine told me about her son who just started high school and was on the football team. With their coach watching during the practices, the older players bullied and harassed the younger players, pushing them around and calling them names, the least offensive of which was “wimp.” And, as my friend watched the first game, she saw several parents losing control and screaming insults at the other team and at the coaches.
What do kids learn about character, discipline, and teamwork when they see adults acting this way? What do they learn about commitment to stopping bullying when their coaches don’t make rude remarks and threatening behavior on the part of all the players against the rules? – or even participate by shouting insults and making snide remarks themselves?
What would kids learn instead if they saw their coaches modeling powerful, respectful leadership by stopping inappropriate behavior with the same commitment that they would stop someone from breaking the rules of the game? What would they learn if their parents were supportive to them no matter how they played and acted respectfully to everyone? In other words, what if everyone acted like “good sports” instead of “bad sports?”
One excellent resource for stopping bullying in sports is the Positive Coaching Alliance, a nonprofit organization that provides training for coaches and parents in how to make character-building the primary goal of participation in sports, along with learning to play well. Their Parent’s Pledge is a useful way to create a common agreement for the role of the parents.
Clear agreements and understanding about expectations are essential to changing a culture of bullying to one of respect, caring, and safety for everyone. However, adults also need to follow through on setting boundaries to uphold these rules.
In one workshop, a volunteer coach asked me for advice on how to deal with bullying parents who were screaming at coaches, including some young teens, even after signing the pledge. We worked on practices for how to what to say and how to say it. Here’s the full article:
http://www.kidpower.org/resources/articles/bullying-coaches.html
Kidpower Bullying book provides a number of tools on how to address bullying effectively. is now on Amazon in print and Kindle! http://www.amazon.com/Bullying-What-Adults-Need-Know/dp/0979619165/ref=tmm_pap_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1307878577&sr=8-1-fkmr2 E-book is on our website at Bullying -What Adults Need to Know and Do to Keep Kids Safe,
