Coaches What to do With Struggling Child?

[coachmolly]

I have one girl in my Xcel Bronze group who is really struggling. She's a great kid, loves gymnastics, and works really hard. She moved to this group in November from the younger pre-team group because her mom asked about her getting more hours, and with how hard she works I thought she would catch on with more hours and older girls to push her. It still hasn't happened. I think she will have enough skills to compete Bronze as the requirements are very easy, but she is still far behind the other girls and I'm conflicted abut what to do.
Adding to that, the child is a perfectionist and very self-conscious, already feeling like she lags behind the other girls. For this reason, I am hesitant to send her off with another coach to do catch up work. I try to add some side stations geared towards her and the areas where she struggles, but I am feeling pretty stuck.
She has very limited flexibility all over- but it is perhaps most pronounced in her shoulders/upper back as walkovers are a terrible struggle. Though her very limited leg flexibility contributes to her problems with kicking her back leg into handstands/cartwheels/round offs.
I thought about inviting her in 30 minutes early 1x/week (her brother comes for a class, so she is already there) to get some extra practice with the pre-team group, but another child in the Bronze group is also there with her brother- would I need to invite her to join in too? Our gym doesn't really do privates for team girls.
I am just grasping at straws as to what to do to help her because she loves gymnastics and works so hard, I want to see her be successful, even if it looks very different from the other girls. Any advice, personal experiences, words of wisdom, etc. would be greatly appreciated. I just constantly have this girl on my mind and am looking for anything that might help her out.

 

[SurpriseGymMom]

Can you give her stretching "homework"?
I would suggest having her add a class (hopefully your gym has a discount for multiple classes) in order to give her more gym time and a chance to catch up a bit to her peers. A higher level rec class is what we would do at our gym. It's never fun when one kid feels like they don't measure up, and you want to prevent this kid from letting it get to her to the extent of quitting. That has happened to two girls I've coached before I even had a chance to suggest another class, both were moved up into my group by another coach and had no business being there in the first place. its hard to not make the kids who aren't up to par be able to work on the stuff they need without sticking out to the others....
I would try to "sell" is to the parents exactly the way it is: you want to give this kid the very best chance at being successful that you can, and currently she needs a little more work to catch up and to feel more confident.

 

[coachmolly]

Thanks so much for your feedback! I could give her stretching homework, might not be a bad idea for several girls in the group. I have thought about asking if she wants to come 1x/week with the pre-team group (girls are about the same age as her) but am sort of testing the waters to see how it would go over before jumping in. Maybe just selling it as, "I think she would feel more confident with a little extra practice time."

She had a pretty good week this week, I have been working really hard at building her up and working on her confidence. She thinks through things much better than some of her more naturally talented teammates, so when we were doing cartwheel step-ins on floor and the other girls were rushing through and she did them correctly every time I had her go out in front of the other girls and demonstrate praising her in front of the group. She also showed big progress on handstands on beam which was a major fear issue. I talked with mom after practice on Wednesday about how great she is to work with, how hard she works, how much she has improved, and I'm sure mom will pass that along.

She mentioned to me while we were doing floor that she is embarrassed that she is the only one that cannot do a front or back walkover on her own and needs to be spotted and asked what she can be doing. I let her know that walkovers are just hard for some people and that we have higher level team girls who struggle with walkovers who can still compete, do front/back handsprings, and are doing just fine. I think this helped her feel a little better, but I am going to do some research this weekend to see what I can find to help with her back/shoulder flexibility to get her doing something that resembles a bwo on her own.

Thanks for the help, I just wanted to brainstorm with some other coaches to make sure I am doing everything possible to help her.

 

[Aussie_coach]

It might not hurt to have her visit a physio as well. If she is that limited in her flexibility there may be an underlying problem that needs to be addressed. The physio should also be able to provide very specific stretches that will help with her specific limitations.

 

[coachmolly]

It might not hurt to have her visit a physio as well. If she is that limited in her flexibility there may be an underlying problem that needs to be addressed. The physio should also be able to provide very specific stretches that will help with her specific limitations.

Her dad is a kinesiology professor, so I imagine if there was anything notably wrong he would have detected it. Maybe I will ask for his opinion.
I have looked at her over and over and cannot pinpoint the exact problem. If you isolate her shoulders, they look okay. I thought maybe it was upper back and have checked that out too and, isolated, looks okay. So it seems to be some kind of active flex issue or muscle groups just not quite working together with each other. So maybe her dad would be a good resource, I just hate doing that because I feel like I'm suggesting something is wrong with their child- which is absolutely not what I'm doing! And I have talked to them periodically and they seem very low key and happy to go along with my plan for her.
She had another great practice yesterday, it was a small group and she got lots of attention which was helpful. She is very detail oriented and catches on to routines and dance very well. But she's also so timid. Bars is our main struggle right now, since she can get by with ridiculously easy tumbling at Bronze. Any tips for a kid who just can't seem to get a pullover or back hip circle? She has the strength and correct body positions down, just something stopping her.
Thanks again for all the feedback!

 

[gymdog]

She probably doesn't have strong enough upper body and core based on what you're saying. She can do pull ups and leg lifts?

 

[flanny2112]

For my team girls, I told them that if everyone got two or more splits down by the end of the summer, I would bring in a treat. Since I made this deal, I have seen a lot of improvement from everybody and I might bring something in at the end of the summer if everyone gets even one split down just because they have been working so hard at it. So you could try setting a goal for her or her group and then reward them if they do it.

Also, is there a reason your gym doesn't do privates for team girls? In our gym they are very common and they help a lot if there is a kid struggling with something.

 

[coachmolly]

She is actually pretty strong, when it comes to conditioning she is very much on par with the other kids. She does struggle with leg lifts, but has good v-ups. Pull-ups need a little help getting started, but probably better than a number of other girls with much better bars. I have girls far weaker who can do pullovers. We have been doing some extra work to help with leg lifts as it is an area where several girls struggle and they are getting much better (just increased from 3-5 hrs/wk). So I expect she will continue to improve over the course of the summer.
As far as incentives, we do plenty of those! Sticker charts, conditioning charts, prizes for reaching certain strength milestones, all sorts of stuff. And she is just such a hard worker all the time, probably the hardest worker on the team, so I don't know that any other added treats would do the trick. She is the first to jump at extra turns, come back from drink breaks to get back to work, ask to take one last turn before we leave an event.
We have been working hard on building her confidence over the last few weeks and have seen a big improvement, so I am hoping that is the main key! Thanks again for all the responses and ideas!

 

[gymdog]

If she isn't naturally flexible and she doesn't have good strength (which without even one pull up or one leg lift, I would classify that as not having good strength. I am assuming she can't do press handstands) then it will be hard for her to get in a correct bridge position. The other girls who can't do the strength but can do a bridge or walkover likely have move lower back flexibility and are doing it that way. This isn't good either, but will often allow them to do a walkover. Doing correct form bridge, kickover, and walkover takes a lot of strength to push the shoulders out. Can she do a handstand completely flat against the wall with her shoulders pushed out?

Generally, I would never have a child do walkovers if they couldn't do one pull up, leg lifts, and handstand flat to the wall. But they don't need to do a back walkover right now. My preteam works on stalders/stalder rolls, straight arm backward roll, BHS drill over barrel, round offs, and bridge kickover off an elevated surface. Individual girls can add to this, but that is the base skill and those are developed for a long time.

 

[gymdog]

This link shows how to work on back walkovers and kickovers safely emphasizing shoulder push:

http://gymnasticscoaching.com/new/2015/01/handstand-to-bridge-kick-back-walkover/