Assessing Talent in a child

[TheGreenTBer]

I know this post is a couple years old but just saw it again with the thread being bumped and yes, this is true.

My oldest kid is 2010 playing second year U13 (peewee), and yes the effects of puberty are massive. My kid has hit puberty, and he's like a head taller and just visibly more mature than a bunch of kids on his team (other than a couple others who have also hit growth spurts). On the one hand it's kind of cool to see him be so physical out there on the ice (within the rules, he gets few penalties) against kids he is noticeably bigger.

But I can remember growing up - around his age I suddenly sprouted up, was one of the biggest kids in the class - until everyone else caught up or even passed me. I'm now a very average 5'8".

So we'll see. His game doesn't just rely on being bigger - he had a dominant year last year before puberty - but size certainly helps. Nothing set in stone for sure.

Puberty is such a wild thing.

Exiting 6th grade, I was 5'1'' and 74 lbs. Exiting 7th grade, I was 5'9".

I could barely sleep that year so skating was out of the question. I think I went through 4 shoe sizes in a year or something. The growing pains were horrible and I can't imagine the idea of a kid attempting to improve his hockey abilities while going through what I did.