Perhaps one of the most confusing roles of any goalie parent is what to say or do during the car ride home after a game.
Parents often get caught up in wondering, “what is the ‘right’ thing to say or not say?” The ultimate goal for parents in these situations should be to create an environment that allows for effective communication to take place and to share or gain insight into the experience their child had.
Outlined below are three important aspects of the car ride home that has seemed to help many goalie parents over the past few years.
The starting point of any postgame car ride discussion should be to ask permission from your child. When speaking with goalies (kids) who struggle with conversations they have with their parents after games, they often feel obligated to share things that at times they are not ready to disclose.
In fact, many kids feel bullied, misunderstood, and at times unable to meet expectations, when parents assume their kids want to talk about the game, or take their advice. In effort to avoid any animosity and feelings of frustration, simply ask your kid(s) after settling in the car, if they’d like to talk about the game.
If your goalie says “no,” then simply don’t talk about the game. Most parents quickly panic when I suggest asking permission and having the prospect of their child saying “no,” but what typically happens is within a short period of time they come back to you asking for your thoughts.
Rather than jumping into the laundry list of things you felt they should have done or giving coaching tips – make an effort to ask quality questions that will allow your child to tell their story of what happened. There are four types of questions that work very well in these moments.
Asking a question of clarification helps a parent to refine his/her knowledge of what happened, creating a shared understanding of the game. An example would be “So you’re saying you didn’t see the referee’s hand go up for the delayed penalty?”
Questions of curiosity allow parents to gain knowledge about their child’s perceptions, through asking questions that gives your child a chance to share information about their selves.
Finally, once you’ve entered into the opinion and advice giving stage, strive to give your young goalie no room for excuse making. Many parents feel their role is to alleviate any frustration or disappointment about a performance for their child and they do so by offering up excuses.
“Don’t feel bad honey, if your D would have helped you, then the score wouldn’t be that bad.” “Your forwards never backcheck!” “The referees were awful today.”
These types of phrases and others like it take away the responsibility of each goalie to stop the puck and places blame on others, those are not the type of life lessons we want to be teaching our kids. Strive to instill positive and useful life lessons and outlooks for your young goalies by avoiding these types of excuses.
In closing, when you ask permission, and offer up quality questions it will give you more clarity and understanding of your child’s experience and where your advice and feedback, if any, is needed.
Special thanks to Justin Johnson, USA Hockey’s Minnesota District associate goalie coach-in-chief, for this article. For more information, contact Justin at jjohnson@minnesotahockey.org.