- Connect with your child and your community
The top reason parents volunteer to coach soccer is to connect with their child in a new way. As the backbone of the soccer team, coaches are highly influential mentors and teachers in the lives of their players. Team bonding events can provide an opportunity to become closer to your own child. By showing your child a commitment to volunteering and to their passion for soccer, you will help motivate them to be generous and supportive in their own lives.
In addition, coaching soccer puts you at the forefront of building relationships with other coaches and parents with kids of similar age and gender. As part of your role as coach, you are in consistent contact with many of the parents throughout the season. Many times, lifetime friendships grow between the families on a team.
- Teach (and re-learn!) valuable life lessons
Every player’s individual development is our top priority as an organization. Yes, development includes the technical, tactical, and physical soccer skills a player learns, but it also includes the psycho-social life lessons that make our players strong leaders and teammates. From quick and correct decision making to a hard-working attitude, these attributes will extend from the soccer field into a child’s life. As a coach, you’ll be expected to display these characteristics in your coaching and mentorship as well. The good sportsmanship and respect a coach shows will resonate with each player, helping shape the way they respond to situations in their future.
The Shaler Soccer Club continues to develop our coaching support model for at every level of our Club. Each program, from 4-years-old to teenagers, provides coaches with program-specific resources to help successfully engage and develop players to reach their full potential.
- Find a sense of pride in your accomplishments
Coaching youth soccer is not all that different than running a race or working on a project at work. As you lead a group of children to success, you’ll find yourself feeling pride in their growth and accomplishments. As a coach, you’ll see firsthand as players conquer individual development objectives, from specific soccer techniques to psycho-social growth. And yes, you’ll have an extra reason to celebrate on the days your team wins games.
- Refreshing fun and exercise
It is no secret that running around outside is good for our health. While coaching soccer, you often don’t even notice how much exercise you are getting because you’ll be engaged with the children. This type of exercise is so refreshing after a long day of work and gives you the opportunity to not only connect with the kids, but with yourself. On top of everything, coaching soccer is FUN, which is sometimes exactly what we need.