With Pride!

Marching band is in full swing! The band has a little motto for this year "With Pride!" and it came to mean so much more this past weekend. The boys had 2 performances again - a Friday night football game and a Sat. Competition. It was a pretty rough week as far as practices went. Both boys were frustrated that they were working hard to get better while other band members didn't seem to care how they did. Practice before the Friday game went exceptionally BAD! Even the band director couldn't believe their attitudes - practice ran long and the drumline didn't even make it out in time for the National Athem. Things were not looking good...we were on pins an needles before the performance. It's hard to watch your kids go out do a bad job. But teens always amaze me at how fast their attitudes change - good and bad. They actually pulled off a pretty good show and were all in good moods after the game.

Saturdays perfomance was a competition. In Iowa, all bands compete at a level that is determined by their school size which puts Xavier at 4A (just barely). That puts them up against bands that are usually 200-250 members in this area. So, when you put our 65 member band on the field, we look pretty puny. There is just no way that we can compete with the sound of a band that has 150 more musicians. The kids pulled off their BEST performance yet! It wasn't perfect but they really tried hard.

No matter how hard you try to be proud of what you have done it is hard for the kids to be excited about coming in last place. Granted, they definitely did 100 times better than their first performance, but it is hard to always come in last. How do you motivate your kids to do their best when they know they are probably already out of the competition. I am PROUD at how they did and I hope they are proud about their performance but this is a tough one. How do you keep students motivated on pride alone. It is so easy for them to only see trophies & placements. Our last competition will be in Missouri. The good thing about this is that they will competing with other marching bands their size. If they can keep that in mind.... I am anxious to see where they will be in 3 more weeks. "WITH PRIDE!"