Reply to Small/late growing kids and athletics

Forum Index » Tweens and Teens

Reply to "Small/late growing kids and athletics"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Just curious, if your son is <50th percentile still by age 7-8, why wouldn’t you pick sports (or at least one) that don’t rely so heavily on size? Seems like parents could have been a lot more proactive rather than to enroll your small for age kid in sports like football, baseball, and such with no alternative if they do end up staying small or grow very late. Seems like setting them up for failure and frustration.  I’m a big advocate for all kids, regardless of size, doing at least individual no cut sport starting young.  These tend to be the sports people participate in all their life (swimming, tennis, etc)[/quote]

I wonder this too.  My daughter who is tall liked gymnastics as a younger kid and asked to do it more seriously and I said no.  She's too tall and it wasn't going to end well.  I see OP responded to this question.  I don't know, I would be more blunt with the kid and more directive if it's going to be crushing them to the level you're writing a DCUM post about it in the end.  Basketball is pretty clearly not going to work out for a short male and the DMV is known for being an extremely competitive boys basketball environment.[/quote]

I agree with you, particularly about gymnastics and basketball. One thing I will say, though, is kids’ growth isn’t always totally predictable. My own DD was tiny (30th for height, barely on charts for weight) through elementary school. At 14, she is 5’6” and still growing- not yet mature or started period yet. Now that isn’t super tall either, but she is above average already and not done growing. She didn’t end up tiny as we would’ve predicted all through childhood.

Her brothers were both on the tall side though elementary (70th-80th percentile) and like her, were late to puberty. Falling WAY behind in size in middle school and not catching up until 9th-10th grade for the older one.  I’m sure the younger one will be the same. Many of the “big boys” in middle school haven’t grown further and are ended up on the short side. . Others have kept growing and will indeed be very big! There is no real way to know until they are all through puberty.

I think height/size can only predicted at the extremes (both parents super short or both super tall)- and even then, there are outliers. [/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics