To be upset that I wasn't sporty at school?

[poshsinglemum]

And to hope that dd is going to be more sporty than I am/was?

Ironically I went to a sport school but it put me off.
I was never the fastest runner and I always hated the way that netball and hockey were taken so seriously. They seemed to bring out the worst in girls; bitchy team picking (we don't want the slow one's on our team, pass it to me - not her why didn't you score that goal? etc, etc), obsession with body image and as I was a slow runner I didn't stand a chance.

I regret being put off now as i can see theadvantages with being sporty; popularity, fun, fitness and health and life long hobbies.

I always liked sports such as hill-walking,salsa, swimming, yoga and marshal arts eg Thai Chi where I wasn't in direct competition with people. I want to get back into it as I feel like a blob but dd is so young that I can only push prams etc.

I just feel like I have missed out on such a large part of life by being so bad a sport and I hope that dd is a lot better than me.

People say ''it's the taking part that counts and not the winning'' but try telling taht to a school netball team who desperately want to make it through to the regional finals.

Sometimes I feel like a freak/lazy for not being sporty or into competetiv sports but I just can't take it seriously.

I was/am rubbish at sport, partly because I am too nice and don't have the killer instinct to trample over others' feelings to be the winner. I hate losing and assume that everyone else feels the same way so I can't inflict it on them.

However, both the DC enjoy their sport and are quite good at it so don't fret PSM - rubbishness is not heriditary. Just find something out-of-school that your DD can do.

PS: You do realise that you will be back here in ten years' time complaining about the lack of playing fields at her school.

You are crazy! Why should you be upset about it? I was always the one bending down and standing at the back behind others hoping I wouldn't get picked for anything. I regularly forged letters from my mother saying I was too sick to do PE.

Dh was a star athlete in his school days and has loads of trophies and old newspaper cuttings from his glory days. But looking at us now no one would think it, he's the fatso and I'm a size 10/12 . So I don't see any advantages to being sporty .

"At the age of 32, I still wake up every morning silently thanking fuck I don't have PE today."

I am so with you on that tethersend.

I still get upset about it too. I was chubby, uncoordinated and generally useless. Luckily I was fairly popular (due to being quite nice and having talents in other areas), but PE was twice-weekly torture for me. In fact I did Art GCSE for the sole reason that somebody told me you could get out of PE while you were working on projects (turned out not to be true, bah).

Last year my work had a 'sports day' as a team-building, fun event. It brought it all rushing back and I hated every minute of it - I was a complete miserable cow all day, and point-blank refused to play competitive five-aside football (I did win the egg and spoon race though).

While I think that team sports are a fabulous learning experience and great for health for those who are physically gifted, they are horrific for those who aren't good at sport. And people who aren't really good at sport still need to learn how to be physically active, within the limits of their own skills/talents, and to be a team player.

I was that girl, too, at school. Last to be picked, the butt of every bitchy comment. I had bulimia from the age of 15 and I think it was partly a response to all of that. Secondary school was grim for me.

Fate has rewarded me with a sporty daughter: currently a country champion thrower! My son isn't as gifted but is pretty good at football and hockey.

I derive a lot of vicarious pleasure from this. Actually I have to be careful not to push the children too hard to make up for my own deficiencies.

Incidentally at 46 I am fit and fairly slim. Some of the sports goddesses are not in such good shape and haven't kept fit.

I don't think it follows that your DCs will be the same. I loathed team sports and all school games and PE. I have 2 DSs who loved it all and one DS who liked some but not team sports. DS who wasn't picked for teams was probably the most popular of the 3, and managed to be friends with the avid footballers-I really wouldn't worry. I think it good to be part of a team-it gets them out in the fresh air and gives plenty of exercise but it isn't the end of the world if they are not interested. Try and encourage other activities. I like ones that aren't part of a team and I run, walk, ski,swim, dance and do aerobics. I have done it all since leaving school.
The problem with school PE teachers is that they have no understanding that people hate PE and games! If they could understand that point I am sure they could be more encouraging.

"The problem with school PE teachers is that they have no understanding that people hate PE and games!"

Yes, I agree, and they are really bad at helping children who are not team sports oriented/competitive to develop strategies for keeping fit.

i am rubbish at sport, always have been, always will be. i was last to be picked for anything at school. didn't care about it back then, certainly don't care about it now!

I can see the benefits of enjoying team or competitive sports because they do tend to be more sociable. I have wished on a number of occasions that I'd persevered with them into adulthood as netball and hockey in particular do make it easy to meet people (which is important if you move a lot). You don't just meet people in the same way going to yoga/ the gym/ going running/swimming etc. I like doing these, but they dont have the nice social aspect.

I think the problem is that school experience of competitive sports puts a lot of people off- my sister hated PE at school (for all the reasons outlined in this thread), then started playing hockey at a town club after Uni and loved it.

OP- if you want to start playing now, do. Most clubs have teams for all levels. You dont have to be amazing. I started playing netball again in a corporate team aged 30 having not played since school. Took a couple of games to get back into it but had a briliant time.

No other teacher expects every DC to like the lessons! I remember our PE teacher once saying that if we were too noisy getting changed we would have to go and do maths!! I had this wonderful picture of sitting in a warm room with books (my favourite subject at the time)but I knew she didn't really mean it.
However if you have the mind set that all DCs would prefer to be on a hockey field, on a wet February afternoon, rather than working through maths problems you have no hope of reaching any but the natural games players.

I too hated school sports. In our "academic" school it was important to be good at sport (if you weren't but were clever you were a swot, if you were and clever you were great). With an impaired sense of balance after being dunked at swimming and losing an eardrum, and double vision meaning it was hard to figure out where balls were going, fat and slow, I was never going to get on! Though I remember with glee winning the house matches by 1/3 point - last to bat at rounders, left handed, and three no balls because the bowler kept bowling to my right later... I was popular for all of 30 seconds.
I can remember being sent off at hockey for using the wrong side of my stick - it was a lefty stick, and I went to check if the teacher knew that - nearly got detention for cheek (except my form teacher wouldn't sign off on it as she knew it wasn't my style)!

I think that exercise encouraged at school should be varied so everyone is likely to find something they enjoy, that it should be easy to access later in life and that bullying and discrimination should be shown to be wrong to avoid putting off the people who aren't naturally sporty (and therefore, based on my own experience, less likely to continue).

lol trillian

sport is now so uncompetitive at school (primary school) - wait until you go to a sports day. Many schools don't even have winners now!

if you have a child who is sporty, you will inevitably end up joining a sports club

you can't make a child good at sport, just as you can't make a child the best in maths or best in english

Posh, have you heard of buggyfit?
They have a directory of trainers all over the country and are geared up for mums pushing prams who want to get fit.
I'm with you on the PE thing - I was tall, slim and a reasonable runner but could never catch, throw, or hit a ball (since realized possibly due to a lazy eye), so team sports were nothing more than ritual humiliation.
My DCs, however, all seem to have that ability (we practised throwing and catching with them from a young age, which no one ever did with me), and are in teams for rugby and hockey.
I'm pleased about this, mainly because, as you say, it will hopefully set them up in the habit of exercising, and hopefully avoid the back problems I now suffer.
I think schools now are a bit more pro-active in actually teching the skills required of individual sports, as well as the rules of the game (in my day it seemed to be assumed you'd learn these through a process of osmosis - memories of being told off at 7 because I didn't know how to play rounders as I'd never played before - sob).
If you make a habit of occasionally playing gentle, non-competitive ball games with your DD she'll learn useful skills and maybe avoid that 'feeling like a clot' situation.

I actually wake up in the morning and think I can go for a bike ride on my own and not have to do team sports I hate. Or I can go to the gym and do what I want to do.

As for pram pushing - you can get running rams, so that you can train whilst baby come to. You can get seats on the back of a bike and go for a ride.

You can do a few solo sports with a baby but team sports would be a different matter.

I have realised that my genes have been passed on and solo sports are much more our thing and have encouraged this from the start rather than waited for school PE to put dd's of sport for life ehich it can do if you don't reaslie there are others sports out there that you can enjoy against your own Personel Best, better to come last than not try at all.

foxinsocks, yes, you can't make a child good at sport, but you can teach them techniques and give them lots of practice. It is also about giving them the opportunity to try different sports so that they can find one they enjoy and can do well enough.

Sadly PE lessons, particularly at Primary School, aren't anything like as good as taking them to a specialised club.
DD is not particularly good at ball-sports, but excels at gymnastics, swimming, ice-skating and running. The school has no idea about these skills.
DS takes after his father and is a natural (and very competetive) sportsman, but finds PE lessons boring.

I think we all want our DC to excel at everything -- and especially the stuff we ourselves were crap at. But we take for granted what we were good at, too.

I was always one of the very atheletic children in class, but then as an adult I kept working at improving my stamina and strength (damnit) and am now very much fitter than most of my 40+ peer group (to my immense amusement).

Meanwhile, DS1 is naturally quite adept at several sports but has NO Self-Discipline he will never achieve his potential because he can't be arsed. Meanwhile, DD and DS2 not as naturally talented as DS1 -- have heaps of self-discipline like me. Guess who I think will go furthest? .

Like others, my memories of school sport are pretty grim and I now do no exercise of any kind (but really need to). I always enjoyed netball but of course at school, you were weeded out as soon as they realised you weren't very good. It's this whole "winning is everything" mentality - until we can get schools past that and couple it with more sports that are geared towards fitness rather than winning, most children will fall away in their teenage years.

To whoever recommended out of school sports clubs - DS (11) is being dropped from his football team because he's not quite good enough, having played for the club since he was 6. I talked to him about finding another team but he's said he'll probably give it up completely as, to him, football is all about playing the game with his mates. He's also been moved away from his mates at running club, so doesn't want to carry on with that either. It makes me want to weep tbh. And the really sad thing is he's not actually a bad player, he's just not one of the very best. If people like him are being put off sport at 11, no wonder we're a nation of couch potatoes.

Talking to a friend with a DS at private school, she said that teams are run for whoever wants to play, so you might end up with 5 or 6 football or rugby teams in a year group. But no-one is turned away if they're keen. No surprise then that privately educated pupils are disproportinately represented in our projected team for 2012.

You need to look forward rather than back posh. I have said this to you before!

I still often wake up in the morning and think. Oh no its a Thursday ! and then I realise it is not a double PE day anymore because I am a grown up

I think these days it is a bit better as there is a larger variety of sports available to girls at our secondary you can do yoga trampolining swimming dance etc so it is not all hideous hockey in short skirts, while your legs turn purple with cold [brrrrrr]

I was rubbish at sport of all kinds at school but was never bothered by it or bullied for it (despite being very overweight with red hair and glasses).I dont feel I missed out on much really I cant think what?

Hah - you wusses! Try being crap at sports growing up in Australia!

"If you were crap at PE, it was your own bloody fault and you had to put up with utter misery."

I SO second that.

My school did stacks of PE, including things like rowing which I would have loved, but I was forbidden to even try it as they had a height requirement. It only counts if you could be a winner. And now Oz has obesity levels approaching those of the US.

Don't call me a wuss! Have you tried to play hockey in a gym slip, in driving sleet, in the Highlands? Hard as nails me, but still crap at sport.

wuss! wuss! wuss! (in very crap manner)

I would chase you but i can't keep up.