Are you worried about your child beginning to train with weights? 

There’s no need to worry!

This article will teach you why properly trained weight lifting is safe, how to know if your child is ready to begin their weightlifting journey, how to find a good coach for your child and what they look like,  and lastly, I’ll debunk some of the myths involved in weight lifting with children involved.

 

Properly Training is Safer than a Trip to the Playground

Weightlifting is generally safe, but if done improperly, can be dangerous!

This is the simple truth, but in many circles weightlifting is viewed as a dangerous activity and this is mainly due to it being done improperly.

The key to ensuring your child’s safety during their weightlifting journey is simply to make sure activities are done properly in a safe environment. 

In fact, I would be more worried with my child taking a visit to the playground than lifting weights.

Why is that? Well, it’s very simple.

Have you ever seen children play? 

Children play without any regard for their own safety. They do things like jumping off the swings when it is at its peak or sliding down a slide head-first.

They play improperly, but in the playground context, this improper play can put a much larger stress on their young muscles, bones, and joints. 

This is due to gravity. 

The forces in which a child will withstand by jumping off a swing and landing will be far larger than any weight a child will pick up off the ground (deadlift) or has placed on their back (squat) in a responsible gym setting. 

This is because gravity literally multiplies its own force times a child’s body weight as the child is falling through the air, whereas in a gym setting, if a child is performing a squat, their own body weight is simply added to the weight on the bar and the forces of gravity are reduced due to the feet remaining on the ground. 

This is the difference between 5 * 5 (forces from gravity when landing after falling through the air) and 5 + 5 (forces from weightlifting while child stays on the ground).

Reducing the forces plays on a growing child’s body is a major key to keeping them safe!

Additionally, a proper weight room environment is not a place to play. The first thing a child should be instructed on is that they need to avoid all horseplay because it is dangerous.

If your child does not understand that, that brings me to my next point. 

Maturity

How do you know when your child should start lifting weights?

When they are mature enough to handle themselves in a responsible manner within a weight room setting.

This is really the only qualification to begin weight lifting, but it’s a very important one. Children need to have an understanding of why they are in the weight room and what the consequences are of improper conduct.

If they are able to understand and demonstrate their understanding through proper conduct, they gain the right to partake in an incredible opportunity to gain strength and become healthier at a young age through weightlifting.

Now, to ensure that your child is safe, I recommend you follow my next point.

Pay For a Coach

Now, finding a coach to teach your child how to lift weights is not something you should simply throw your money at and hope for the best.

However, money is one of the easiest ways to obtain quality and safe instruction.

Pay to acquire the services of a qualified, experienced coach who has a clean record and has worked with children in the past. Make sure they are certified to train or coach by a national organization (NSCA, ACSM, ACE, etc).

Additionally, I would recommend asking the coach if you can watch at least two sessions:

1. A session before your child joins the group
2. A session when your child joins the group

This will help you ensure beforehand if this is a fun and nurturing environment and then to see if your child enjoys the fun and nurturing environment. 

This brings me to my next point.

What Does a Good Coach Look Like?

Now that you’ve narrowed down the pack by paying for proper instruction, let’s talk about what a good coach looks like. A good coach will have certain priorities when it comes teaching your child. These priorities should include:

• Technique

• Fun

• Self competition

Let’s break this down further!

Technique

A good coach will pride themselves on building your child’s technique over building their strength.

This can often be seen by a large amount of their time being spent on using lighter weights with proper form before progressing to heavier weights.

In my experience, it will take several weeks / months before your child has built up the technique to lift heavier weights. 

As a parent, you will know that your child’s technique is strong when you are impressed by the fluidity of their movements. Fluid movement only comes when movements have been practiced a fair amount.

Your child should be moving in ways that you have never seen before and without pain or discomfort.

That’s when you know you have a good coach who has built your child’s technique well!

Fun

A good coach will pride themselves on having a fun and nurturing environment to train your child in. Now, as I mentioned before, too much fun can be the enemy of safety in the weight room.

However, some fun is needed to ensure that your child wants to continue their lessons. 

Pay attention to how the coach introduces your child to the group (if it is a group setting) in his/her initial lessons, the way in the coach speaks to the child, and also the way in which the child speaks to you about the coach.

It is very important that your child likes their coach!

The format of the workout can have a large effect on how fun the workout is for your child.

A child’s workout should be fun in comparison due to an adult’s workout because each group values different things. That’s why a child’s workout should not have the same setup as an adult’s workout at all times.

There should be more variation, games, exploration, laughter, encouragement and guidance! This is because these are experiences children value more than adults.

For example, in my experiences as a coach, I have found that many kids enjoy partner exercises involving physical contact.

However, with adults, I would rarely ever program partner exercises with contact because meeting and touching a new person is a far less stressful endeavor for a child than an adult.

Your child’s workout should be tailored to their preferences to maximize their enjoyment!

Self competition

The last priority that a quality coach will pride themselves on should be competition. However, children competing with other children is a quick recipe for a poor environment and injury, so a good coach will help a child to develop the ability to compete with his or herself. 

This can be done by keeping track of the child’s former workouts and encouraging the child to break their former records.

Myths

Certain harmful myths have persisted throughout the years regarding children and weightlifting. 

• Lifting weights will stunt a child’s growth
• This has been proven wrong countless times.
• Lifting weights is dangerous and can lead to your child being injured
• There is some truth to this myth. Injuries are often a part of the training process with adults. However, as I mentioned earlier, weightlifting is less dangerous than children playing in a playground. Additionally, a knowledgeable and experienced coach will greatly reduce your child’s risk for injury.
• Lifting weights will make your child a great athlete
• Just because your child is great at weightlifting doesn’t mean they’re a good athlete or will be a good athlete. If you’re planning on having your child begin to lift weights in order to give them an athletic edge on their competition, I would recommend that you make sure your child play multiple sports in addition to weight lifting. Research has shown us that specializing in one sport early may increase risk of overuse injuries or burnouts in children. My advice is to train your child as a well-rounded athlete and not solely a weightlifter or one sport athlete. Let them try and explore multiple sports! 
• Parents who encourage their children to lift weights are bad parents
• I have seen many parents being demonized because they support their children training hard and lifting weights. Other parents claim that they are forcing their child to train. In my opinion, it all depends on the child. Your child needs to have the internal motivation to train hard. That should not come from the parent. The parents’ role is to support their children and keep them safe. 

Make sure to comment on any questions that you have about starting weightlifting for children down below and be sure to check out my upcoming social media posts, where I will go more in depth!

Peace!