Reply to Can you tell me the pros and cons of playing “up”?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]My kid played up from 2nd grade till middle school. She had a great time, was a leader on the team. Middle school years were tricky on the social side. Moved her to her age group (stronger team)  as high school started. No regrets![/quote]

This is my concern. My 8 year old played up last year, so some kids were already 10. We joined soccer for the social aspect of a team sport and she didn’t really get that playing up because all her school friends played at age level.

Our teams haven’t been solidified this year yet and I’m leaning towards a decline if asked to play up again. We aren’t in it for scholarship and college teams, we are in it to build friendships with kids in our town/grades.

Fwiw - she was asked to play up to push her skill development. She is a head or more talker than kids her age and significantly faster than them. The coach didn’t want her simply relying on her size and speed, but wanted her to be more challenged on skill. I agree with this approach if we had a focus on being the best player on the best team, but we aren’t. [/quote]

Teams don't stay together. Developing a social network can be a very positive outcome of soccer but it should not be the reason to pursue it or other similar activities.

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Why not?[/quote]

If you are in travel soccer it is a competitive environment and not a social club. Players come and go and they do so mostly based on soccer reasons as they get older.

Yes when kids are young, like yours, having friends on the team certainly makes a world of difference. They like playing with their friends but overtime some kids get better, some stay the same and some never improve. Some kids move up to a better team or different club. Some chose another sport some kids don't make the same team and some do.

I'm not trying to tell you what to do. By all means any sport is a great way to get kids out of the house and meet new people. That is all good but it obviously works best if the kid really wants to do the activity in question. At 8 they really don't know what they like so providing them with as many options as possible is the best course of action. Just try to prioritize the enjoyment of the actual activity over the social network.

Kids absolutely make friends but soccer should be the primary motivation for playing soccer not looking for friends. [/quote]

I disagree.  The motivation should be up to the kid.  They should play for whatever reason they wish to play.  My kids are not young by the way - I'm just about finished with this game :-).  All my kids played various sports to different degrees of competitiveness and for different reasons.  The ones that played primarily for social reasons got just as much out of the activity as the ones that played for the sake of the sport - it's just that what they got was different - not better, not worse - just different.[/quote]

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