Parents Young Gymnast - TOPS Elite track

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I realize I am being defensive, so I want to apologize. I am appreciative of everyone that has taken the time to offer a response. The implication that homeschool practices are setting our daughter up for failure were specifically frustrating. Our decision to homeschool is extremely personal and has nothing to do with gymnastics. We are grateful that we are able to take advantage of day time practice and free up our evenings for family time. Without knowing us personally or our gym environment, I realize it would be a fair assumption that maybe this is not a set up conductive to a long, happy career in gymnastics. I recognize that most of you are speaking from your own experiences, so that is valuable. Thanks again!
The judginess on this board can be quite strong at times. Dont fret, it's just how it goes on a message board :) I probably fall into it sometimes too. But I always try and remind myself that everyone's (or every family) journey is unique and while OPINIONS can help provide context and different paradigms to consider in trying to make the best choices, you know your situation better than anyone on a pseudo-anonymous message board.
 
They already homeschool nothing to do with gymnastics.
I didnt comment in relation to gymnastic. A 4 yr old doesnt need to be “schooled“ formally at all, gymnastics or otherwise. They are 4.

And they don’t need a rigorous gymnastics program at that age either. It’s their time to be a kid.
 
I didnt comment in relation to gymnastic. A 4 yr old doesnt need to be “schooled“ formally at all, gymnastics or otherwise. They are 4.

And they don’t need a rigorous gymnastics program at that age either. It’s their time to be a kid.
I have older children that I homeschool, so we as a family homeschool. I didn’t find it necessary to include the ins and outs of our educational decisions. I have an older gymnast that participates in daytime practice as well and actually homeschools.

My daughter is 5.5 now, so she certainly needs formal homeschooling. It’s called kindergarten.
 
I have older children that I homeschool, so we as a family homeschool. I didn’t find it necessary to include the ins and outs of our educational decisions. I have an older gymnast that participates in daytime practice as well and actually homeschools.

My daughter is 5.5 now, so she certainly needs formal homeschooling. It’s called kindergarten.
Again, my comment is not about homeschooling in general. It was specifically about such a young age. My personal opinion on home schooling is the beauty of it is there is great latitude on the how of the schooling and the age. Young kids don’t need “formal” schooling. Moving on now.
 
I realize I am being defensive, so I want to apologize. I am appreciative of everyone that has taken the time to offer a response. The implication that homeschool practices are setting our daughter up for failure were specifically frustrating. Our decision to homeschool is extremely personal and has nothing to do with gymnastics. We are grateful that we are able to take advantage of day time practice and free up our evenings for family time. Without knowing us personally or our gym environment, I realize it would be a fair assumption that maybe this is not a set up conductive to a long, happy career in gymnastics. I recognize that most of you are speaking from your own experiences, so that is valuable. Thanks again!
I meant a homeschool gymnastics training group and not homeschooling itself. Homeschooling is a totally personal decision. I am expressing my opinion based only off of our personal experience and what I observed. I got similar feedback years ago, and it really ended up being pretty accurate. In our situation, they placed a few kindergarten aged children in the "homeschool" or "day program," and regardless of talent, it just did not end well. It is so hard to balance having a talented, enthusiastic child with not doing too much too soon. I really do understand that!
 
I meant a homeschool gymnastics training group and not homeschooling itself. Homeschooling is a totally personal decision. I am expressing my opinion based only off of our personal experience and what I observed. I got similar feedback years ago, and it really ended up being pretty accurate. In our situation, they placed a few kindergarten aged children in the "homeschool" or "day program," and regardless of talent, it just did not end well. It is so hard to balance having a talented, enthusiastic child with not doing too much too soon. I really do understand that!
This is something I will definitely keep in mind. Thank you very much for sharing your valuable experience!
 
So here is the thing you need realize with gymnastics. There is no need for “more” at 5 years old cause gymnastics is all about more. There will be more hours as she progresses 3 hrs becomes 6 hrs which turns into 12 hours and suddenly they are at 20 hours. The skills become more each building on the one before it and then there are those dangling ahead.

Talent at 5 years old does not necessarily turn into greater talent at 10 years old. There are so many factors beyond talent, some that you can control but far more that you can’t. It is a long journey and pushing too early just causes burn out..

Take a step back enjoy the beginning of your journey.
 
Just remember the middle school phase. Of course, they still love it, but they sit on class not wanting to go to gym. the more gymnastics they do early on, the more chance that when this pahse hits, it'll be more than just a phase. I understand why you would go for homeschooling, though, as a personal family choice.
 
My opinion although y’all may not like it: I support you for homeschooling you daughter when gymnastics is where she thrives best. A kid at that age needs to be in environment with others her age to develop socially, and from what I understand she gets that at the gym. Most kids get their social life in school. It sounds like you have experience with home-schooling and have made the right the decision. School is not made for every kid.
However, I would try to get her into some other activities to develop other interests. Maybe an after-school club, where she mixes with other kids. Try art, music, dance - develop other interests at this age.
I have experience as I enrolled one of my DD’s in gymnastics at 3.5. She only went a few hours a week but showed a lot of talent. We resisted calls to put her on the elite path and are happy with our decision - she is now a top level 10 in our competitive state! As I wrote on another post she has now began competitive climbing for the next season - I just wished I had given her that opportunity earlier before her hours in gymnastics reached so many.
 
So here is the thing you need realize with gymnastics. There is no need for “more” at 5 years old cause gymnastics is all about more. There will be more hours as she progresses 3 hrs becomes 6 hrs which turns into 12 hours and suddenly they are at 20 hours. The skills become more each building on the one before it and then there are those dangling ahead.

Talent at 5 years old does not necessarily turn into greater talent at 10 years old. There are so many factors beyond talent, some that you can control but far more that you can’t. It is a long journey and pushing too early just causes burn out..

Take a step back enjoy the beginning of your journey.
Thank you for sharing. These are very good points!
 
My opinion although y’all may not like it: I support you for homeschooling you daughter when gymnastics is where she thrives best. A kid at that age needs to be in environment with others her age to develop socially, and from what I understand she gets that at the gym. Most kids get their social life in school. It sounds like you have experience with home-schooling and have made the right the decision. School is not made for every kid.
However, I would try to get her into some other activities to develop other interests. Maybe an after-school club, where she mixes with other kids. Try art, music, dance - develop other interests at this age.
I have experience as I enrolled one of my DD’s in gymnastics at 3.5. She only went a few hours a week but showed a lot of talent. We resisted calls to put her on the elite path and are happy with our decision - she is now a top level 10 in our competitive state! As I wrote on another post she has now began competitive climbing for the next season - I just wished I had given her that opportunity earlier before her hours in gymnastics reached so many.
Thank you for your response! This is very encouraging to hear. I love that your daughter is able to pursue another passion and talent of hers at such a high level of gymnastics!
My daughter has participated in a few different team sports already, and we are planning to have her continue to try new things. The beauty of having our evenings free is that we have the time to allow her and our other kids to try many different activities! I really like the idea of a ballet class as suggested above. We’ll be sure to support her in exploring any interests she may have outside of gymnastics.
And yes, the socialization at the gym is wonderful!
 
Having another outlet is super important. My gymnasts can come to the gym and relax and be with great friends when things aren’t going so well at school. But if they are having issues at the gym, school can also be that escape. Having them both together, means thee is not the same outlet when they need it.
 
My kid is a perfect example of why you do not need to worry anytime soon :) It's long, but please just bare with me....I promise it has a point ;-)

We were living in Alabama, I had been told my daughter was talented and shrugged it off since she was 2. I mean, she's in Texarkana(2-4yrs), then Alabama(4-6y), how much does "talented" really mean? It's a pretty small pool(sounds similar to your situation), I also didnt realize the significance of college gymnastics, so the fact that her AL coach was sending several girls to college programs every year-meant nothing, that he wasnt good enough to send them to world/olympics-lol(im not kidding, this was my mentality). It was in the back of my mind that "some day" we may have to move for her training-or split the family-or do SOMETHING. But ultimately, I have 5 kids(all homeschooled, btw), so it was something I would dive into later....I wasn't even on chalkbucket at the time-nor did i go in the gym much(and I still dont).

Well, when she was 6 my husband was transferred to California. We ended up having the move from HECK!! It literally ended up taking almost a year to move-the date was pushed back twice, then our house was packed & the contents moved to storage 6mos ahead of our actual move, our house ended up selling 2mos before we left. Since the move was scheduled and our lives in turmoil, we did not go back for fall gym-would have been first year of teams for her.

Then, to make matters worse, we arrived in CA 2/27/2020. Just in time to meet the pandemic!! With no gym set up-due to the constant change in arrival date(plus i just didnt think much of it), she was off almost another year.

So the move had my daughter off from gymnastics for almost 2yrs(21/22mos). Now at this point you would think that's it, I'm a horrible parent and my daughter(now 8-1/2) has lost her opportunity, right?

Nope. She was accepted to an amazing gymnastics program-our first choice(they have produced Olympians, are former olympians, but most of all-they love the sport and the girls they train), she loves her coaches and teammates as her second family-which is a darn good thing since she trains ~30hrs/wk(L4, L6 this spring, but successfully doing L8/9 & some L10 skills in the gym...like she can do a yurchenko full & yurchenko single back vault in the gym-she can successfully perform bar releases, has several cool beam mounts, etc...didnt realize ANY of it was a big deal before coming here to CB-lol-i am TRULY the definition of clueless gymmom, i just know practice is more fun to watch then competition)...and she is on an elite track....as a 'favorite'-we are told often how far she will go in the sport-and we try hard not to let it go to our heads-for all we know, she will want to quit next year(doubtful-she remembers life without gym for an extended period of time & didnt like it)-or be injured, missing her opportunity, so we dont stress about it much beyond her happiness. Her coaches talk of her being the hardest working & most talented gymnast they've worked with(she's mildly autistic, so she doesn't fall into the 'traps' most kids her age do...because of her early training, she thinks of conditioning as a 5th apparatus-which I guess changes the game somewhat...but mostly, she just won the genetic lottery for gymnastics-shes naturally short(she had a great grandmother that was literally 3'11" and a grandmother on the other side that barely made 5'(after 50 she was under 5', that type of barely)...so despite my 5'7" self, she has been predicted to be under 5' long before gymnastics...yet has big, long hands for bars(i can palm a basketball with ease)-she needed custom grips, but small feet-for beam), naturally flexible/hypermobile(great grandfather that could & would sit with feet behind his head at 92yo), and autistic so no fear with crazy body control-like corrections are only ever given once type control-I still cant figure that one out-but regardless, new skills come fast because of it...as an idea of how she is, she was recently learning to do a back layout combo, she was working on tumble track, her coach & i were texting & she told me she realized just how different she was when EVERY coach in the gym(5 of them)were all frustrated with her because it had been 12days(the day she got it), yet because of how she is with most skills, those 12days seemed so long & uncharacteristic for her-enough for all of them to be frustrated-but that is how skills come for her and I guess that isnt exactly normal-i dont know, this is the only gymnast i have-so to me, this is the only way it is).

So you see, if it is meant to be, it will be. I have been quite a lackadaisical gymmom, we were not focused on it AT ALL, yet here we are...the same 30+hr week as anyone else her age, with the same aspirations. She will never have the pleasure of being a multi-year L10, but she also didnt have years of pushing to face burnout, so she will forge her own path and be ok.

Basically, if your kid has the talent, it will find its way-and so will you. If it is meant to be, it will be.

With my lackadaisical attitude comes my desire to take vacation time...we take 2days with every out of town competition(with natural days off, this gives us 5-6days, 3-4x/yr), 2-3 weeks in the summer(1 at a time), last year we even took 1wk at Thanksgiving and then 2-1/2wks at Christmas. So I guess I STILL don't take it as seriously as many other parents-yet here we are.

She also has coaches who caution us on burnout & are VERY careful about it. My kid would have daily privates if they would let her, but her coaches won't let her-yet(they tell her she will be doing that in 2yrs). She wants to come 6d/wk, again, her coaches won't let her. So between me and them, she takes more breaks and has more time off than most.

Good luck on your journey!! In & out of the gym!!

P.S. what I WOULD caution you on, bad habits!! From what I am told, coaches here are grateful that my daughter never really learned many skills at her previous gym because she didnt come with bad habits(she conditioned ALOT-and different conditioning to protect the hypermobile aspects of her-i was told once she joined the team, the skills would come fast, but base muscles were most important, so in AL she spent most of her time conditioning-then again her coach was a TOPs guy, so my understanding is that is likely normal since TOPs focuses so much on conditioning, dunno). According to her coaches, they can work YEARS to get rid of bad habits vs weeks/months to teach a new skill properly.

So just make sure that your daughter's gym isn't teaching bad habits and the rest will work itself out :)
 
This is a thread I need to come back and read... no time now. The only thing I can add right now is that the world of Elite / HOPES / TOPS parenting only has one way to view... from the FUTURE.

Hindsight GIF by Wine & Crime Podcast


Looking Back Do It GIF by Rosanna Pansino


And for me... I'd do it all again. Fun journey.
 
I appreciate your honest feedback and will take it to heart. I have been pleased to hear from everyone that any possible elite aspirations do not need to be on our radar at this time. And I will continue to stay vigilant to avoid a burnout situation.

To clarify, she was not evaluated and moved to the homeschool group until she was 4. At 4 she could kip, had powerful tap swings, had a robhs, back tuck and loads of confidence on beam. She was the most intense kid out of her group and really wanted to learn. The afternoon classes were chaotic with inexperienced coaches, so we all thought she could benefit from the daytime practice. Tops testing starts as early as 7 years old. That kind of strength takes time to build up, so the coach thought it was a perfect time to begin introducing the tops conditioning at that time. He was very adamant about making it fun to keep the littles interested. She started only going 2 days a week. She now goes 3 days. The homeschool group seems a lot more enjoyable too. She gets to really spend time with her friends, the older girls are like big sisters, and they are more self paced, which she thrives on. She is very happy and legitimately enjoys the conditioning, especially presses, because it’s what the big girls do!
I have to say, I’m a bit jealous of homeschool families who can take advantage of the day program. We have one at our gym and my daughter was invited to it but we both work full time and the online schooling she did back in 20-21 nearly did us all in, grandparents included! If we are still doing this when she hits middle school it will honestly be a consideration because of exactly what you said - evening practices are chaotic and busy, daytime has much fewer girls, extra attention, a more chillaxed environment. That’s a big IF because I want out so badly, can’t wait til we are done with gymnastics. But, it’s her journey not mine.
 
Talent at 5 years old does not necessarily turn into greater talent at 10 years old. There are so many factors beyond talent, some that you can control but far more that you can’t. It is a long journey
I fully agree with this. My gym mom friend reminds me frequently that “gymnastics is a marathon, not a sprint.”
 
I have to say, I’m a bit jealous of homeschool families who can take advantage of the day program. We have one at our gym and my daughter was invited to it but we both work full time and the online schooling she did back in 20-21 nearly did us all in, grandparents included! If we are still doing this when she hits middle school it will honestly be a consideration because of exactly what you said - evening practices are chaotic and busy, daytime has much fewer girls, extra attention, a more chillaxed environment. That’s a big IF because I want out so badly, can’t wait til we are done with gymnastics. But, it’s her journey not mine.

Homeschooling is a unique journey all its own. Somewhat like gymnastics, there are positives and there are negatives. My oldest will be 22 in December, so we've been doing this a minute. Our journey is more laid back than most as we kinda unschool(not fully, my kids are "forced" to read & math, but the rest of it follows an unschooling model, they learn and explore their interests).

I cannot even imagine your life, it sounds so hectic and crazy!! I don't envy one moment of it!! I think that is our biggest advantage.

My older kids attended regular school for a bit(charter, private, year round magnet, and public), however it was not what they wanted. They wanted more freedom and a better life.

So if you are able to do it, go for it!! Even if your daughter is not still in gymnastics, it's an amazing experience!! My oldest interned for the governor-at 16. She was able to go on multiple professional archeology and paleontology expeditions(14-20). All of my children volunteered with an animal shelter. It's a fun way to explore the world around you while learning :)

We've had a ton of fun and truly have enjoyed our experiences together!! Life is good :)

Good luck in your future endeavors-with or without gym!
 
Homeschooling is a unique journey all its own. Somewhat like gymnastics, there are positives and there are negatives
Thank you!! Come what may, right? Who knows how long she will be in the sport or how long I’ll be able to afford it. But she also excels at school and has a lot of friends there as well, and she enjoys showing them all up in gym class lol! Not sure where will be a year from now but maybe I’ll hate it a little less or maybe she will become interested in other things. Que ser a ser a.
 
Thank you!! Come what may, right? Who knows how long she will be in the sport or how long I’ll be able to afford it. But she also excels at school and has a lot of friends there as well, and she enjoys showing them all up in gym class lol! Not sure where will be a year from now but maybe I’ll hate it a little less or maybe she will become interested in other things. Que ser a ser a.
It sounds like you definitely have the right attitude!!

My oldest was a super talented softball catcher, she had college recruiters coming to games at 12-the age when she could meet all but one of the D1 scholarship requirements.

Then she developed severe Osgood Schlatters disease(her xrays are now in a textbook), needed 3 surgeries in less than a year. And that was it. At the ripe old age of 14, she was done.

So I have learned that there is more to life than the sport our children are involved with. To take everything in life with a grain of salt.

Never worry about next year or what will happen in 3yrs-it will either work itself out-or it won't. Either way, you will go on and find a way through it!!

For now it sounds as if your daughter loves school, loves gymnastics, and loves her life...this is what is most important, above all else, she's happy!! You are doing a good job, mom!!
 
It sounds like you definitely have the right attitude!!

My oldest was a super talented softball catcher, she had college recruiters coming to games at 12-the age when she could meet all but one of the D1 scholarship requirements.

Then she developed severe Osgood Schlatters disease(her xrays are now in a textbook), needed 3 surgeries in less than a year. And that was it. At the ripe old age of 14, she was done.
I’m so sorry to hear about that! Has she moved on to new things? Found a new passion? I hope she has recovered!

I frequently wonder what dd would do instead of gymnastics if she had to or wanted to quit. And I have a friend who was going to get a sport scholarship to college, she blew out her knee and it was all gone like that, her senior year.
 

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