This blog is a 5 minute read where I talk about reflections from 2018, some questions to answer about Mentoring our Youth Today, and what topics the blogging team will explore in 2019. Please submit a comment at the end of the blog if you like something your read. Thanks
This time of year usually provides some reflection for people before the next year begins. You can ask my wife Cathy and she’ll tell you I fit well into this category:-) I’m interested in growing personally, and positively influencing those I get to engage and coach. It’s been a great journey this past year with new speaking opportunities and new groups to coach. It’s also been a long time since I blogged so I feel a little out of touch with you. I will say I think I’ve grown more this year than any other in my coaching career! Last January I attended the NSCA Coaches Conference in Charlotte for 3 days where professional, college, and high school coaches talked about our youth fitness development. In March, we did our 1st Life + Movement Skills camps at a local middle school and created our system and curriculum. In June & July I directed 2 Cardinal Gibbons summer camps for Co-Ed. Speed, Strength, and Agility for middle school youth where they did a “boot camp” of our strength and conditioning and 5 fundamental movements. When the fall semester arrived I was able to work again with small groups of 9th Grade students along with teaching my two strength and conditioning classes, and coaching the sport teams at Cardinal Gibbons. In October, I attended an Original STRENGTH Pro RESET workshop to learn the 5 resets (breathing, head control, rolling, rocking, and crawling) and eventually received my certification to implement the OSSA (Original Strength Screen & Assessment). In December, the year finished strong by going to a two-day conference at the Coaches College in East Tennessee State University where I heard one of the best line-ups of Strength and Conditioning/Sport Scientists present on Long-term Athletic Development Movement. Along the way this year I was able to mentor 5 young professional strength coaches and sponsor our first professional athlete through Morland STRENGTH.
The process of growing into a better teacher has taught me the power of a well-formed question. If there was a better way to guide your young athlete into a successful experience in sports would you be interested? This year I will be blogging weekly for parents, coaches, and athletes who believe youth movement can still thrive with a collaborative approach and leadership from the stakeholders. I’d like to invite you on a this year-long journey to explore long-term development of our youth sports programs. Could this be the year that parents, coaches, and youth take more ownership of their programs for their youth?
If there was a better way to guide your young athlete into a successful experience in sports would you be interested?
- How will the landscape of youth sport development change in 2019?
- How will the increased injury rates among youth sport influence the decisions in the medicine world?
- Can the new movement of long-term youth development curb overuse injuries happening in some sports?
- Will the new statistics pricing out parents and youth athletes continue in 2019?
- Can parents work together to manage the demands of youth travel teams?
- Can there be a universal language for correct fundamental movement patterns?
- How will sport coaches and youth strength coaches respond to the way schools handle their sport programs?
- What will happen to shaky Health and Physical Education programs seeking to teach students health and better movement habits?
- Will private clubs and organizations bridge the gap for young athletes who want to participate?
- Can stakeholders around your city take ownership in the long-term development and mentor our youth today?
Two short stories can illustrate how I hope to answer these questions and give hope to the stakeholders in youth sports programs.
Story #1: A few months back I revived a call from a parent who was concerned about their freshman athlete doing team sports. This young athlete had been diagnosed with an overuse injury for their hip and the doctor was recommending surgery. One of the sport coaches had recommended me as someone who might be able to help. In this 30 minute conversation I had my assistant coach listen in as I mostly listened and asked questions about what sports and the level of participation this young athlete. They had moved from another region of the US where there they did 3 sports and active in practices most of the year and competition. I asked how much physical training their young athlete did outside practices and competitions? The parents asked me what I meant? I said what is the “training age” or how much foundational development has the young athlete had to support demands of the sport. She said, “I guess I’d have to say zero.: This story showed me how important it is to listen carefully and how import it is to start with engagement with parents.
Story #2: Attending a conference about a month ago I heard a very good presentation on the new developments of US Lacrosse. The director of education did a very good job presenting this is a sport that is developing fast and these are things they are doing with younger lacrosse players to prepare their skills for success later in their development. At the end of the presentation I asked if they had explored using RPE (Rate of Perceived Exertion)? He said they had not done much with monitoring load using this metric but was interested in how I was applying it to our lacrosse programs (if the presenter is reading this let’s connect soon!) In addition, one of the neatest and most proactive things the national organization had done was develop an app for youth coaches complete with practice plans. I shared this app with one of my sport coaches when I returned. This long-term youth development model is to new the head lacrosse coach who also runs of a large club in town had not heard of it! This story taught me how fast the LATD is movement is traveling and how important it is to predict and share the things I’m learning with key stakeholders.
Every day I engage many coach youth, coaches, and parents at a large high school with 1000 students in 26 sports and 70 different groups. Over the last 5 years I have lived and breathed youth training and serviced as many needs as I can with a growing strength and conditioning program including mentoring 15 young coaches. I believe 2019 is the year we can begin to engage parents to take more ownership of their youth’s experience in sports development programs. As a father of two youth ages 11 and 7 who have participated in two different sports the last few years, I’m more than ready to influence the sport training culture for my kids. I”m hoping other youth coaches and professionals will join me in the effort to make it a better world of less injuries through healthy habits and better movement progressions.
This year I’m going to begin blogging for parents in the areas of: injury prevention, prepared to play, how is your PE, how to get tooled in sport science, and wrap-up of what we learned. After that I’ll seek to cover the same topics for coaches and then directly to the youth perspective. I hope you’ll read along and comment where you agree and even where you disagree. At the end of this year if the saying is true and I believe it is, “if it takes a village to raise a child” then “it will take a team to turn the tide of mentoring our youth today.”
Chris Morland, MS, RSCC *D
MorlandSTRENGTH
Mentor and Coach | Visionary in High School Strength and Conditioning
Director of Strength and Conditioning at Cardinal Gibbons High School | Teacher
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