“Can you shed some light on the effects of participation trophies on kids?”

Hi, welcome to Tips on Teens. This is Kent Toussaint, licensed marriage and family therapist,
coming to you every Wednesday at noon to join you for lunch to answer your parenting questions.
And we're gonna jump right in. It's a big one today, so here we go. I coach my nine -year -old twin
daughters in Little League. They are very good, and it's important to me that they understand
that hard work leads to success. I have a problem with participation trophies. I think that
it's undermining kids' ability to connect hard work with success because now everyone wants
a pat on the back for every little thing they do. I think if you don't win the championship then
you don't get a trophy. Maybe that will make kids work harder next season to achieve their goals.
I've brought this up with Little League leadership and it fell on deaf ears. Tryouts are coming
up and I want my girls to play to win. At the end of the season if they have not earned first place
I want them to not accept their participation

trophies at the team banquet my wife disagrees with me can you shed some light on the effects
of participation trophies on kids sure so participation trophies what is the effect on kids
and how they focus and how they motivated to do their sports nothing nothing at all I think that
they don't do anything I think they're nice they're fun their souvenirs is what they are it's
like if you go to Hawaii and you have this great trip with your family and you experience the waterfalls
and the hikes and the snorkeling and you get these cool little turtle souvenirs you bring them
home and you sit on the shelf that's what participation trophies are they're representations
of trying out for the team making team practicing going through the games making friendships
developing skills that's what participation trophies are so at the end of the year in the banquet
and everyone's passing out participation trophies they're not celebrating yeah we got fourth
place out of six teams that's not what the participation

trophies for is to symbolize an ending of a journey and a joint experience and so if your daughters
aren't able to experience that if they have to you know pull back and not not accept their trophies
while everyone else does what everyone else is enjoying the party while your daughters who
are nine aren't able to and that may be putting your daughters in a fight that's your fight and
not their fight if you really want your kids to try hard and play to win I get and that's fine but
I also want to make sure that they're playing to win for them and not for you and the reason why
I say that is because there's a lot of talented athletes that I've worked with who by the time
they get 14 15 16 they stop too much their parents are grin and not they're not good they're still
one of the best on the team but they're tired they're they're burnt out they don't like anymore
it's not fun and I think it's important that we recognize that especially for Little League
or whether it's you know violin or anything

else that your kid is doing that we don't sap the fun out of it to make them excel and achieve they
will get that they will find if they have a passion for softball or basketball or violin or theater
or whatever it is it's finding their own passion not taking your passion and in pushing it through
and if you want to really inspire that passion what I would say is instead of focusing on wins
and losses and how well they play and what they're doing wrong and what they should be doing better
what I would recommend is what I've talked to other athletes and I've read articles about this
too and it's been well documented that a lot of really elite athletes and college athletes what
really inspires them is something like this from their parents I I love watching you play because
what that phrase means is I accept you no matter what you do. You can go out there and have a horrible
game. I still love watching you play because you're my son or my daughter and I love watching
you enjoy what you do.

We wanna enjoy our children's enjoyment of something, not their success, because they don't
always have control of success. There's an opponent or they're sick that day or there's an injury
or there's other teammates that don't perform as well. There's a lot of things that they can't
control. But what they can control is do they focus, do they practice, do they enjoy the game?
And you giving them your unconditional positive regard and acceptance helps them accept themselves
even when they have a bad game. You know, really great athletes have short memories. You know,
Kobe Bryant, who is, you know, great, you know, one of the best basketball players ever had a
really short memory. You know, he always said, you know, he forgets his last shot, he goes to
the next shot. He's always focused on the next one. You know, if you're always focused on what
you did wrong last time, it interferes with what you're trying to do. It makes that batting slump
go longer because you're always focused on, oh,

I just missed the last one, I just missed the last one. But if you're focusing on your technique
and your love of the game, you get back into it and you find it. So I understand this dad's perspective.
I understand his concerns. I think the concern about the participation trophies, I don't think
it's a big deal. I remember as a kid I got participation trophies and I was surprised I got one
first year I'm like, oh we didn't win. We got a trophy. Okay, cool. It was a souvenir. That's all
it was I didn't do it for the trophy and no one ever does I had a conversation a while back with a
dad similar like this and He said, you know when I was kid I played for the trophy I wanted to win
and I said, are you playing for the trophy or the win? They said, well both. I said, I don't know
because if the trophy wasn't there would you still try as hard to win? I said, well, of course
I would. It's like well then the trophy is it's just a cherry on top You're playing to win because
you want to win. So

we want to inspire our kids to push themselves to win and achieve But also enjoy the game. So that's
my take on it I hope you enjoyed it If you have more questions on this feel free to comment if you
have questions that you'd like us to answer here on tips on teens every Wednesday at 12 o 'clock
please email us at tips on teens at teen therapy center calm whole archive of these are all on
our website at teen therapy center calm and I look forward to seeing you guys next week thanks
a lot bye bye