Grouping the team together

[nettyinpa]

I have a question about how my dd's team is broken up for practices. There are 16 girls on our level 4 team. There are 3 6-year olds, a few 7 year olds and the rest are 8 & above. The older girls get grouped together because they competed Level 3 together last year and are all at about the same level. Our coaches pull the girls out into 3 groups every practice, and it never fails, my dd who is 6, is always pulled out with a group of 7 year olds that just don't want to work. My dd is very committed, works hard and I'm afraid she may begin to take on bad habits. Also, what ends up happening, is the coach will sometimes spend too much time working with one of the other girls because their skills are just sloppy (I am not exagerating). There is one girl in particular that I think should be sent down to a rec class. She doesn't seem to have the focus to be on the team. I know they're supposed to have fun but when they're out there working on the beam, there's no time for being silly. The coach usually yells at all of them for one girls mistakes. Am I just being one of 'those' mothers? Should I say something to her coach or just keep my mouth shut??

[gracefulone]

I have coached the level you're talking about, and have dealt with similar issues. Personally, if you have a concern such as this one, I want to hear about it. It's fairly easily fixed-the part about your dd, anyway.

[jasmine196]

I have a group of about 20 girls. Usually its about 12 Level 4's, 5 Level 5's and 3 Level 7's. Its very difficult to group our girls. We have 3 groups. Usually, the second year level 4's will go together, the first year 4's and then the 5-7's. I do have a really young 6 year old level 4 who on occasion will get put into the second year level 4 group because she does work really hard and has a good attention span. However, in certain cases I will move a second year level 4 down a group if she is not paying attention or is goofing off. If the situation doesn't improve, ask the coach what your daughter (and you) can do to get her into that next group.