I think I need to help my DD find a sport for her self esteem

[BerylStreep]

Sorry, this is quite long. DD is 8. She had until recently, always done sports and activities with school.

She did hockey and swimming during school (which she endured), and for afterschool she did gymnastics, irish dancing and french (which she enjoyed). I had never really wanted to overload her, so we don't do any other organised activities outside of school, other than Brownies.

She broke her ankle in 3 places just after New Year, and as a result, she stopped doing all of the activities other than Brownies, however she has been very tired, and hasn't even gone to Brownies every week. She only got out of her cast about 4 weeks ago, and has been slowly building up her activity since then. We got the trampoline out last week, and she has been doing well on it.

So she spoke to DH yesterday, very tearfully, about not being good at sport. Other girls in her class have been doing show and tell about their achievements - medals for hockey, swimming galas etc and she is feeling quite left out.

I spoke with her tonight, and she was very tearful again. I tried to explain to her that there would be plenty of time to get back to sport, and that she has had a hard year so far, but was doing really well. She just seems to have had the stuffing knocked out of her. She does really well academically and is very arty, and I tried to explain that some people might feel bad because they wanted to be better at those things.

I would love her to do tennis, but she just doesn't even want to try (we tried it about 3 years ago and she wasn't fussed).

The Easter holidays are just starting, and I was thinking of sitting down with DD and DS (6) to try to plan our break. I was thinking of getting them to come up with ideas under 3 headings -

Things I am good at
Things I would like to get better at
Things I would like to try

I was hoping to encourage her to go out cycling and do more swimming.

Any ideas on how I can manage this? I don't want her to get fixed ideas about not being good at stuff.

All of the 'expert' advice you read now seems to be that it's a bad idea to over-schedule children. Doing family activities together is IMO much better all round than packing kids off to all sorts of coaching sessions. In fact very much as you describe your own childhood.

If you're thinking long term, its things like walking, cycling, sea swimming, squash, tennis, watersports which people really can participate in for their whole lives, not school team games or gala swimming.

But if you can find some activity (maybe one which is a bit different from the run-of-the mill school stuff so she's not competing) which she really enjoys, then that's all to the good. If it's something you can all do together, even better.

Reading with interest.

I quite fancy trying climbing and am keen to get my non-sporty, slightly dyspraxic dd to find something she enjoys.

Can you do it as a family when you're beginners?

Ooh, I recognise some of this. Although OP's family sound crazy-active at sport already and we certainly are not.
DD is very competitive at sport (or maybe full stop about everything).
DD can be very put off when she's not the best at something (insecurity).
I humbly submit that it would be good for OP's DD to learn to do activity just for fun again. Easier said than done, obviously. But fun would be my prime target.

Climbing is very expensive.

I too think it's odd this attitude, at the moment. At this age, people would bring things into assembly but generally for having 'taken part' in things.

That said, if I were looking for a sport, I would be trying swimming.
a) It;s a great life skill - literally, could save a life one day
b) it is great to build up strength again in her leg after the break, without putting any stress on it
c) it is all about improving your own performance so she won't need to feel she is 'competing'
d) it will give the the skills she needs, if, in the future she wants to do anyone of dozens of water based activities, from competitive swimming, water polo, triathlon, kayaking, rowing, windsurfing, standup paddle boarding, surfing, powerboating, dragon boating, canoeing, synchro swimming, rafting, diving, etc..
e) it's a great skill, socially - something 10 yr olds can go off and do without their parents in tow in the school holidays, to looking cool on holidays as a teen, by the pool or beach
f) Can develop into a way to earn money as a teen, with lifesaving skills

Hmm. Sounds like your dp you need to be working on, OP, not your daughter!

Thank you for all the ideas and comments.

HolidayCriminal trust me, we are not really crazy active, just talk a good story!

We sat down as a family to plan what we wanted to do over Easter.

DD wants to go cycling with me more, and we went out on Saturday and did a 5k cycle with a picnic. It was lovely to see her so excited, and that is by far the furthest she has ever cycled. She did really well.

I-pads, computers, PS3s and TV are not allowed until after 4pm over the holidays. The upside to this is that DS is getting practice at telling the time.

DS has committed to practising his cycling over the holidays so he can cycle without stabilisers.

DS also wanted to improve his swimming, so DH brought him swimming the other day, just the 2 of them.

Me & DC are going to clip n climb on Wednesday! At £10 a head, it's not cheap, but the DC will enjoy it.

They both quite liked the idea of jujitsu. I will see what I can find in the way of classes.

The damned table tennis table is, apparently, en route.

Another to suggest Judo hugely biased . Fantastic sport for both boys and girls