I’ll tell you what was evident between who lost and who won – the girls who like to run and were used to exercising won. You could tell some of these girls hate running and never do it.

If you’re going to play sports at all then it’s important to learn to run faster and try harder. That’s the whole point – to improve.

I’m fine with Ainsley losing every game. She tried harder and ran faster every game because she hated the losing.

In this case, it’s more important to teach them that they didn’t win because they’re inherently better people, but because they learned certain skills, tried hard, worked together, etc. And you can teach them how to win/lose gracefully.

On the other hand there are some great cooperative games kids can play that were devised so that there really are no winners and losers. When I was teaching our gym teacher used them a lot. Terry Orlick wrote a book with loads of them, and many of them require lots of running. When I was in college we actually used to get together outside and play them! Now, honestly, I don’t know if I could run around quite that much!

And about keeping store – we play Rec so they “don’t keep score” either but the kids know! I was talking to Meenies coach the other day and he mentioned about how he felt bad they didn’t win a game all season (last season 1/2 the same team and they won every game – however they were one of the oldest teams in that level – they moved up a level so now they are one of the youngest teams so it makes sense). I told him not to worry as long as they were having fun (which they were).