Our older daughter started at 3 and is 5 now. We ditched the edgie wedgies this year and she skied from the top of Squaw Mountain to the bottom this week (3 1/1 miles!). We also started our 2 year old on skis this week. She has been asking to ski since last year, and I thought she would probably get up and just slide around a little. But she got up and skied, and was riding on the lift by the third day, doing remarkably little falling. By the second day she was trying to persuade us to let go of the harness and saying, "I go fast, Mommy!" She's a fairly precocious kid balance physically and verbally, but the funniest thing was that she behaves like a typical two year old in terms of patience. When we came to a line at the lift she would yell, "Stuck! Too many people! I want to go again!" People were laughing. She also had horrible meltdowns when it was time to go in for lunch or at the end of the day, yelling, "I want to keep skiing!" I think she's a natural, but I wouldn't subject an instructor to her temper tantrums.
-
Women skiers, this is the place for you -- an online community without the male-orientation you'll find in conventional ski magazines and internet ski forums. At TheSkiDiva.com, you can connect with other women to talk about skiing in a way that you can relate to, about things that you find of interest. Be sure to join our community to participate (women only, please!). Registration is fast and simple. Just be sure to add [email protected] to your address book so your registration activation emails won't be routed as spam. And please give careful consideration to your user name -- it will not be changed once your registration is confirmed.
What age should your child start skiing?
- Thread starter ski diva
- Start date
haylmom
Ski Diva Extraordinaire
valli, that's amazing! My 3 and a half year old has been out 4 times now (about 20-30 mins each time)....however, she'd rather lay on the hill and eat the snow. :S I know that if I could get her to the chair lift that would be enough of an excitment to keep her going, but the bunny hill just isn't doing it for her. I know she has to get the basics down first and all...but I'm so impatient! The way our hill is set up, the lodge is in the middle, with the bunny hill up one side, then to get to the chair you must go down a green run. You have obviously had good luck with the harness....I think that would be good for my daughter also, but ppl around here don't seem to look highly upon them. Our neighbor says they're the worst things ever because it doesn't teach them how to ski, but rather be dependant on it. Thoughts?
MaineSkiLady
Angel Diva
Valli, this is the best story yet. You are in deep doo-doo already!
Most of us don't quite get there until the kids are 4-5. A 2 year old having meltdowns due to having to quit skiing for the day.....Does she nap on the chair? (My long-ago 3 year old used to start nodding!) I think you need a couple of "Future US Ski Team" shirts! Please continue telling us stories, yours rock. What kids!!!Haylmom, yours is way more normal than ^^^^ these 2!! I think once she gets a good look around Sunday River's kids, she'll want to join in the fun. Let the ski school instructors do their thing, they know the scene and will guide her appropriately. Most kids have an epiphany/"aha" moment and get it all at once: they find their edges, and that's the big breakthrough.
Hoopla hoops are great if you don't want to use a harness or can't get one. Place the child inside the hoop, you hold on to the hoop at the back. However, do not let them support themselves with the hoop. That's not going to do any good. That's why the harness is better and leave the harness loose. Use it for control. The edgeis-wedgies or ski tips are great too, but again get rid of the them as soon as possible. Kids catch on so fast.
MaineSkiLady
Angel Diva
And, DivaMoms, take endless pics and videos!
SkiNurse
Ski Diva Extraordinaire
I didn't start skiing until I was 19yo, but....
My friends that started skiing at an early age (3-4) are very natural.
One friend, her dad, would put her in ski school every year. They would then ski together in the afternoon. She says she was in ski school til she was 12! This was in Montana.Incredible, effortless skier.
Another friend, who also has been skiing since she could walk, is NOT an athlete and only skis maybe 1-2 times per year. And she only skis cuz her family or friends make her go! Funy thing, she gets on her skis and skis just fine...Keeps up on intermediate runs and has good form.
I think this is like riding a bike. The earlier you can learn, the better off you are. But, every kid is individual. The most improtant thing is to make it fun and I think this is where ski school comes in. Even though my daughter doesn't do a lot of snow sports at this time, when she was a kid she LOVED ski school.
My friends that started skiing at an early age (3-4) are very natural.
One friend, her dad, would put her in ski school every year. They would then ski together in the afternoon. She says she was in ski school til she was 12! This was in Montana.Incredible, effortless skier.
Another friend, who also has been skiing since she could walk, is NOT an athlete and only skis maybe 1-2 times per year. And she only skis cuz her family or friends make her go! Funy thing, she gets on her skis and skis just fine...Keeps up on intermediate runs and has good form.
I think this is like riding a bike. The earlier you can learn, the better off you are. But, every kid is individual. The most improtant thing is to make it fun and I think this is where ski school comes in. Even though my daughter doesn't do a lot of snow sports at this time, when she was a kid she LOVED ski school.
haylmom
Ski Diva Extraordinaire
Jilly....What an GREAT suggestion to use a hoola hoop!!! Are you sure that's safe?? I think dd would love that as she'll use it with me and other little friends to pretend she's a train....she'd do the same with skiis and probably have a blast! Awesome suggestion!!!
I think both the harness and the edgie wedgie have their place if you have younger kids (under five). We never used the harness when our older daughter started, and the main purpose with the little one is keep her from skiing off too fast and potentially getting hit by a bigger kid. She doesn't really have the sense or turning ability yet to look uphill and avoid bigger skiers. We usually keep it slack, so we are not using it to hold her up. Next year we'll ditch the harness and sign her up for the lesson program at Tahoe Donner, but they don't take them until they are three. They move them along pretty fast there if they are ready, and our older daughter was riding on the lift by her second lesson as a three year old. I read a discussion over on the epicski forum from a ski instructor that said the edgie wedgies are very useful until they hit five or so, which is when most kids get the necessary muscle development that's needed to edge a ski. That was certainly our experience, and I don't think it impaired our older daughter at all to use them as a 3 and 4 year old, since she was happy to lose them this year. I know they use them in the lesson program for the younger kids but they stop using them by the time they "graduate".
geargrrl
Angel Diva
(another patrol family here)
All our patroller have thier kids out on skis before 2, usually. It may only be for one run per day, with leashes, but that's how we do it. We are really fortunate in that our patrol has a private lodge that is very family friendly. Usually an older kid will baby sit the little ones that want to stay inside, or the non patrol parent will tag team with other non patrollers.
If you didn't have this arrangement, around five seems to be good. But we are/were up on the hill every single weekend, so not skiing was not an option
ski chick
Ski Diva Extraordinaire
Edgie Wedgie and Harness
We loved the Edgie Wedgie and it helped so much. It was definitely a huge help in teaching them to wedge. The harness was wonderful too. My oldest son wore it the longest, but he has Down syndrome and it was a godsend. He's 12 now and yesterday I watched him go through some (very little) bumps and some chutes. I silently remarked that it was 5 years ago he was wearing the edgie! He was the last one off the mountain yesterday.
So we say... edgie wedgie is great, harness is great! Lose them when their ready, and you'll know when they're ready.
We loved the Edgie Wedgie and it helped so much. It was definitely a huge help in teaching them to wedge. The harness was wonderful too. My oldest son wore it the longest, but he has Down syndrome and it was a godsend. He's 12 now and yesterday I watched him go through some (very little) bumps and some chutes. I silently remarked that it was 5 years ago he was wearing the edgie! He was the last one off the mountain yesterday.
So we say... edgie wedgie is great, harness is great! Lose them when their ready, and you'll know when they're ready.
mtnbikegirl
Ski Diva Extraordinaire
I started all my kids skiing this year. My 8 year old son is a bit afraid of it but he's skiing down greens, has good control, can stop and turn. Now if only he'd relax the Frankenstein posture.
DS #2 is 6 1/2. He's pretty fearless and had two private lessons and one group before he really took off. He's still wedging, has good control and looks pretty relaxed. He's a bit of a drama queen but once he's on the trail and not freezing on the chair, he does really well. Skiing with him is the most fun I've had ever.
DD is 4 1/2. She's tiny and has been pretty enthusiastic except for the time she flew down the hill and couldn't stop. She face-planted. She got up and had a funny story to tell her brothers. I leave it up to her if she wants to ski with me, go to ski lessons or go to daycare.
Skiing with the family is great.
DS #2 is 6 1/2. He's pretty fearless and had two private lessons and one group before he really took off. He's still wedging, has good control and looks pretty relaxed. He's a bit of a drama queen but once he's on the trail and not freezing on the chair, he does really well. Skiing with him is the most fun I've had ever.
DD is 4 1/2. She's tiny and has been pretty enthusiastic except for the time she flew down the hill and couldn't stop. She face-planted. She got up and had a funny story to tell her brothers. I leave it up to her if she wants to ski with me, go to ski lessons or go to daycare.
Skiing with the family is great.
I personally think it depends on the kid. I know a few people who started skiing when they were 4. One has stopped and one is really good and is even a ski instructor. I'd say 5 tends to be the safest age where the kids get the most out of the lessons. I think the way to judge it is to see when the kid stops tripping over their own feet. (although I still do that sometimes!) It's just really obvious with some little kids that they should still be perfecting walking. Body weight seems to be a part of it too. I also think that starting kids too early makes them learn the wrong way sometimes. It is always weird to me when there's 5 year olds just speeding down black diamonds and moguls without falling. I envy their low center of gravity.
I started when I was 10 because that was when my family bought a condo right across from a ski place. It's a relatively late ago to start, but I feel like it kept me from annoying my parents by wanting to go in every 30 minutes. 8-10 year olds seem to pick it up really quickly too. They seem to be at the age where they latch onto sports and stuff too. I am not athletic at all so I loved the fact that I could ski. Breaking my collar bone first season didn't deter me at all either. It made me even more excited the next season.
As for my kids, I hope that I can bring them with me and have someone sit in the lodge. Then they watch people skiing when they're young and start begging me. If I let them start at 5 then they're so excited about it that they won't want to go in too often...my theory/hope at least!
I should probably add that I'm only 17 so I obviously don't have kids. I feel like I might resent my parents if they pushed me into skiing when I was really young...I'd probably be at about the same skill level anyways.
oh and I have to admit that I always feel sorry for the kids on "leashes" (as I call them). After reading stuff in here, it makes sense that it helps a lot, but I would have hated it as a kid!
EDIT: ok so I'm new on here obviously. I just noticed the last post in here was in April. I'm not sure if you guys mind when people bring up older threads, so if you do, I'm sorry. I'm kind of excited to have found such a great forum like this. I feel like I'm so welcome to share my thoughts on anything.
I started when I was 10 because that was when my family bought a condo right across from a ski place. It's a relatively late ago to start, but I feel like it kept me from annoying my parents by wanting to go in every 30 minutes. 8-10 year olds seem to pick it up really quickly too. They seem to be at the age where they latch onto sports and stuff too. I am not athletic at all so I loved the fact that I could ski. Breaking my collar bone first season didn't deter me at all either. It made me even more excited the next season.
As for my kids, I hope that I can bring them with me and have someone sit in the lodge. Then they watch people skiing when they're young and start begging me. If I let them start at 5 then they're so excited about it that they won't want to go in too often...my theory/hope at least!
I should probably add that I'm only 17 so I obviously don't have kids. I feel like I might resent my parents if they pushed me into skiing when I was really young...I'd probably be at about the same skill level anyways.
oh and I have to admit that I always feel sorry for the kids on "leashes" (as I call them). After reading stuff in here, it makes sense that it helps a lot, but I would have hated it as a kid!
EDIT: ok so I'm new on here obviously. I just noticed the last post in here was in April. I'm not sure if you guys mind when people bring up older threads, so if you do, I'm sorry. I'm kind of excited to have found such a great forum like this. I feel like I'm so welcome to share my thoughts on anything.
MaineSkiLady
Angel Diva
Hmm, interesting thought.......:D
Or then again, it might have worked out quite differently, as it did for some of us, either as kids ---- or parents!
RuthB
Angel Diva
I started skiing when I was 5 going on 6 and my brother was 4 1/2. The whole family started on the same day with a planned ski week. We went with another family who had similar aged kids and we all had lessons from the first day. We were very lucky that it was a small (in terms of people) very friendly field with a great community feel (basically 90% of the adults I knew very quickly - and they were all effectively parent substitutes in terms of safety/behaviour etc). I honestly don't have any recollection of my parents skiing in those early years - I spent all of our time with other kids my own age. We were never pushed to ski, if we wanted to spend the day mucking around by the huts then that was fine. This has certainly influenced how I introduced my now 4 year old son to skiing. While we now don't have the luxury of the small, big family/club field; and we now live a long way from ski fields, meaning that we only get a weeks guaranteed skiing a year, I have carried through three things from my experience. (My husband started skiing as an adult so has an entirely different experience). First is the importance of good quality, competent instruction - although I am more than capable of teaching my son to ski it was a conscious decision as I felt that excellent instruction made a huge contribution to the skier I am today. Second was being with a group of kids the same age - I loved tearing around the mountain with others the same age. And finally, but most importantly, the emphasis is on enjoying the snow. So, here is our experience - 1st year son aged 11 months - hated the childcare centre except when a parent was there - so husband and I had one run together and then spent the rest of the week taking turns to ski or hang out in the childcare centre with son (this bit was critical). Spent time with son in sled and building snow men. Second year 23 months - son perfectly happy in childcare - stuck with the sled, making snowmen, mucking around in the snow and a couple of runs between my legs - again lots of laughs. Third year, son 35 months, moved on from the infant childcare to three and four year old centre. Had a one hour lesson daily (but talked to the instructor and made it clear that if son didn't want to ski then we were happy for that to happen - in other words we weren't hell bent on "getting our monies worth" - son spent an average of 20 minutes per day skiing and had a lot of snowball fights. Third year 3yrs 11 months, same as year before but son very engaged in skiing and moved from the magic carpet to the poma/platter/button lift and loved it. We did swap instructors as son and first instructor didn't really hit it off - ended up with a young british guy who just clicked with son. In the afternoons we did some skiing together and took son up chair lift at the end of the week which he loved. We watched sons lessons from a long way away so he didn't know we were there - and to get a sense of what we should be reinforcing. All of these lessons were one on one and we deliberately chose our mountain for their kids programme rather than terrain for us.
We are now gearing up for year four and son has been itching to go skiing for months. He is booked into a programme that is a group lesson with similar age and skill children (max 3-4 in group) that gives him two hours in the morning and one hour in the afternoon, with the back-up of childcare if he goes off the idea of skiing.
This is what has worked well for us and so far son is hooked on skiing
We are now gearing up for year four and son has been itching to go skiing for months. He is booked into a programme that is a group lesson with similar age and skill children (max 3-4 in group) that gives him two hours in the morning and one hour in the afternoon, with the back-up of childcare if he goes off the idea of skiing.
This is what has worked well for us and so far son is hooked on skiing
skimomma24
Ski Diva Extraordinaire
Like most of you, I agree that 4/5 is a good age to start. I, myself, started at 12 - and loved it immediately! Now with my kids, I had to wait. My kids were 11 and 6, and then the twins started last season when they turned 4. My oldest has not taken to it as much as the other 3 kids. My son is going to try racing this year, and the twins will just take more lessons. But they seem to really enjoy it! YAY! I also convinced my hubby to start skiing last year, and now he likes it too. But my son desperately wants to snowboard. I told him next year, but *maybe* I'll let him him rent one this year to try it on.
itri
Ski Diva Extraordinaire
DS is 2.5 and we'll probably take him up a few times this year just to get him used to being on skis, but I don't expect him to get it at all. I kind of expect him to freak out a bit when we strap skis on his feet, to be honest. But, we shall see. He's not quite old enough for ski school yet (I think they have to be 3 AND potty-trained...we're not even close on that front), but I figure we'll send him for at least a couple of lessons next year. If we do daycare up at Vail at all this year, you can pay a little extra and they'll take the kids out in the snow and just kind of get them used to the whole idea of having skis on, so we might do that. If we can afford it...it's over $100/day for daycare on the mountain now. 
