I hated P.E. in elementary school. I did everything I could, just to get out of it. I would "forget" to get papers signed, just so I didn't have to go. I cleaned blackboards. I helped grade papers. I did my teacher's filing. Anything.
I was the kid that was always picked last.
I can still remember the order of kids that were picked first. Matthew, Amy, Eliot, Cindy, David, Reacie, Natalie. . . often in that order. The one guarantee was that I would be last.
I would watch the captain's eyes and could tell from their facial expressions the minute they realized they would be stuck with me. The one time I was allowed to be the captain and choose my team, kids were wanting to not be chosen by me. It was traumatizing.
Looking back, I can't blame the other kids for not wanting me on their team. I was the one picking dandelions in the outfield. I missed balls thrown directly at me. I practiced my dance routine while waiting to kick the stupid ball.
But would it have hurt the gym teacher to make them pick me third or fourth every once in a while?
Maddie loves to try to play games. But, I'm afraid she is showing all signs of inheriting my lack of athletic abilities. She gets frustrated when she doesn't catch the ball. She gets embarrassed when the bat doesn't connect with the ball. She likes to pretend she is a butterfly and flitters around the yard while we are trying to get her to play soccer. That's my girl.
And because she desperately wants to play with other kids her age, we signed her up for softball. God help us all.
I just hope that by the first game, she gets some of her daddy's athleticism. And with some practice, she won't be the kid in gym that gets picked last.
Every. Single. Time.
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4 comments:
I was in the "picked last" club also! It sucked!
My girls are the aggressive go-getters, very athletic. My sone on the other hand is awkward and not at all athletically inclined. I think he inherited that from me, poor guy!
I feel your pain, I was that girl too. I oldest son is athletic but my youngest...not so much.
My son falls into the category of never being picked. I was a victim of all the worlds and grew up seeing both sides of the coin. So, in this day and age when people should be smarter....!!! (I'm thinking gym teachers here & all the training they supposedly get)....I suggest to the teacher that HE/SHE pick the teams. None of this pick-your-own-team crap. In fact, as the teacher I would ENSURE that friends ended up on opposite teams. I would let some of the kids who get neglected be an assistant coach. There are so many OTHER ways to handle the situation so that no one gets the humiliation and disappointed of not being wanted.
In Junior High School my son got tired of the students' attitudes. So he would go off and sit on the bleachers, or against the wall and refuse to join a team. I was so proud of him for standing up for himself like that! (I let the teacher know it too)
I am 52 years old and it still haunts me being not picked last, but NOT GETTING picked at all. They would refuse to pick me! I was so uncoordinated. I would walk into door frames even.
My kids inherited my lack of coordination. My son is bright, a 4.0 but he cannot run, he runs funny with his arms out weird, his friends laugh at him, or with him as he laughs at himself. He accentuates his odd running when he runs and his friends love him!
Gym class was horrid for my kids, they had dodge ball bruises to prove it, the other kids were so cruel!
The kids in school all thought they were so cool because they were on the sports teams, everyone could be on the sport teams, the school was very very small. It also had small minds too. My daughter left the small school in her 10th grade year to go to a private school, she could not take the bigotry or the small minds of the people there anymore.
And four years later the son left in his 10th grade year to homeschool himself. (My kids are four years apart). He is in college now getting a 4.0 and loving it. He is till uncoordinated.
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