Parents Yes, you CAN let your children practice gymnastics at home!

[Sharon Reed]

This article xxxxxxxxxxxxx is quite in tune with how I've dealt with my kids practicing some of their skills at home. I understand the dangers of letting them practice higher skill levels at home, which is exactly why I've never let them, only ever low skill levels, strength, and flexibility exercises.

Anyone else feel similar?


Admin note - edited out the website name. Advertising is not allowed on the CB, unless you pay that is.

 

[MILgymFAM]

This article doesn't address a huge component of why many parents here don't allow gymnastics at home- bad habits. Even if your child never gets hurt practicing at home there is no way they are getting the same thing out of it as at gym. My DDs' coach always tells them that they can practice all they want, but everyone needs someone to see the corrections that are needed.

 

[Sharon Reed]

This article doesn't address a huge component of why many parents here don't allow gymnastics at home- bad habits. Even if your child never gets hurt practicing at home there is no way they are getting the same thing out of it as at gym. My DDs' coach always tells them that they can practice all they want, but everyone needs someone to see the corrections that are needed.

I understand that they need someone to see their faults, but typically faults usually are more often when learning new skills, which was not encouraged to practice at home in the article.

 

[skschlag]

IMO, the hard part is knowing what is new and what is "established" enough to practice at home. Kids love to show off, and it can be a fine line to draw. At my son's level, cartwheels, roundoffs, and even back tucks are not a big deal to him. He will do them, against advice. however, bad habits can form at any time. Doing something on grass or concrete is different than in the gym, and kids can develop weird habits. Even home tramps have different bounce than gym floors or tramps. And home floors are different.

my son does basics only at home. Stretching, handstands, conditioning. He is in the gym 18-20 hours a week and needs to be allowed down time.

 

[raenndrops]

I understand that they need someone to see their faults, but typically faults usually are more often when learning new skills, which was not encouraged to practice at home in the article.

Faults can be seen in kips that are over a year old… and kips were on the list of acceptable to practice at home.
Stretching and conditioning and VERY basic skills that are well established and done with great form at the gym are the only ones I think are appropriate for at home.

 

[SurpriseGymMom]

I would go as far as to say that (in general) by the time the gymnast is able to know what skills should or should NOT be practiced outside gym, they are in the gym so many hours/wk that they have no desire, nor proper equipment, to practice inappropriate skills at home. There's no way my DD can practice bails on bars or RO/BLO off beam at home..! I would be thrilled if she would want to condition or stretch, but that's rare and after 20+hrs/wk in the gym, I can't blame her.
Now my little pre-team kids who practice 5-7hrs/wk..? I DO have to remind them what skills they can and cannot do out of gym. We ask them every so often as a group and they still get the answers wrong pretty often, lol! They honestly just don't realize why at age 6, even though we tell them it's for safety and for them to not work things incorrectly.

 

[gymisforeveryone]

I may be in the minority, but I let my gymnasts practice at home. They only get 7-9,5 hours of training in the gym, which is not enough for most of them. I have written down a list of exercises that they can practice at home and they have little notebooks where they write the dates that they have completed home training and they get stickers for doing it. The list has mostly beam line skills and conditioning stuff. I try to choose skills that need more practice and that are hard to do "wrong" at home. They put a tape on the floor to make it a beam line and practice their basic skills like full turns, handstands, cartwheels, acro-dance connections, jumps and leaps and connections. Other skills in the list are conditioning and flexibility skills like press handstands, handstand holds, scales etc.

We had a parents meeting at the beginning of the season and I explained the parents specifically which skills are okay to practice at home and which aren't. Many of the girls have a bar outside on the back yard (metal bar where they can use their straps) and if they have made sure that the bar is steady I let them practice kips on straps. That has helped many of them to get the kip. I forbid any swinging without straps. No flight skills on floor and on the trampoline remember to be careful and don't practice new skills on your own. No more than 10 walkovers or other bridging skills in a day and not on the gym days. These are the rules and the parents promised to supervise them.

 

[profmom]

Wrist exercises are a wonderful thing to do at home.

 

[Pineapple_Lump]

No author listed -no merit. Nice of you to come her and promote your website. Perhaps you will stick around and join some of the other conversations.

xxxxxxxxxxxxx is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com. Certain content that appears on this website comes from Amazon.com. This content is provided ‘as is’ and is subject to change or removal at any time without prior notice.'

 

[bogwoppit]

This article xxxxxxxxxxxx is quite in tune with how I've dealt with my kids practicing some of their skills at home. I understand the dangers of letting them practice higher skill levels at home, which is exactly why I've never let them, only ever low skill levels, strength, and flexibility exercises.

Anyone else feel similar?

When you come to the CB to primarily promote your own website, it is a bit rude not to ask first. You benefit from our paid advertisers, you benefit from our many, many members, you benefit from our thousands of lurkers. Basically you put your link in to push traffic to your website, so making money off our backs. Not very nice at all.

I edited out your website link. You can try to argue your point with actual peer reviewed articles.

 

[bookworm]

I wondered what article "xxxxxxxxxxxxx" was that prior posters were commenting on...I'm not very tech savvy so I thought I just couldn't figure it out...that said, and to the OP, never in our 17+ years of gymnastics did it occur to my girls to practice at home. We may be in the minority but they were in the gym enough and home was for home stuff, period.

 

[NutterButter]

I was just getting ready to comment about it being a self-promotion article but didn't make the connection to Amazon. I just kept thinking that the assemblage of articles was...odd...and also odd how the authors promote themselves as Level 1 - Elite 'coaches'. Who really identifies as Level 1 - Elite? Not someone who truly is in the know.

 

[profmom]

An additional bit of feedback -- if you want to be successful at this, you should edit and proofread your content much more carefully. The linked post contained many grammatical and syntax errors, and in part for that reason, I had no interest in exploring anything else on the site. As I tell my students, your writing will be less persuasive if the reader is distracted by such problems and concludes implicitly or explicitly that you're not very professional.

 

[Deleted member 18037]

Glad they xxxxxs have been explained.

 

[e'smum]

when my dd was younger, doing lower level skills, i was ok with her doing things at home. she wasn't in the gym that much (12hrs/wk) and could easily practice safely on mats and a beam outside. we even bought her a really nice bar set for kip practice.

now? she needs down time and there's no way i want her practicing her skills at home! we are a conditioning gym so i don't even think that is very helpful. she's in the gym 5d/wk and next year it will be 6d/wk. my kid needs a BREAK! there's nothing she can do at home that is going to help anyway. and no more tumbling on the lawn. great way to break an ankle doing a BT or BLO.