Power Question #16: What did you do that helped a teammate?

The pair to question 15. Same lens, turned inward.

Why is this a power question?

Most young players don't think about the parts of their game that help other people. They think about goals, assists, minutes — visible things, individual things. The pass that let a teammate take a touch in space, the recovery run that saved a 1v1, the "next ball" called out after a miss — none of those show up in a stat sheet, but they're some of the highest-value things a player can do.

Asking "what did you do that helped a teammate?" makes your child notice the part of their game that isn't about them — which is, paradoxically, the part of their game that makes them more valuable to a team.

It also pushes back against the highlight-reel mentality. The most useful players on most teams are not the most spectacular. They're the ones whose teammates play better because they're on the field. That's a self-image worth nurturing.

What to do if you are uncomfortable asking the question

The risk is that this lands as a humble-brag prompt. "What did you do that helped a teammate?" can feel like "tell me how great you were" if asked wrong.

Tone fixes it. Ask casually. "Anything you did that helped someone else out there?" is lighter than the headline version.

If your child can't name anything, accept it. The habit of looking for these moments takes time to install. Just by asking, you've planted the seed.

If they offer a small thing — "I just told her to chill when she got mad" — take it seriously. That's exactly the kind of small thing the question is meant to surface.

What you might learn

The answers tell you what your child considers helping.

"I made the pass that set up her goal." "I covered for him when he was caught upfield." "I told her she did great after she missed." "I called for the ball when no one else would so the keeper had an option."

That last category — the unglamorous helping — is the most important. A player who notices that being available is helpful is a player who's developing a sophisticated understanding of team play.

How you can probe for more if your player is interested

"Did they notice?" — opens up the question of whether help is being received and acknowledged.

"Is that something you usually do?" — pulls it into self-image.

"Want to try to do it more next session?" — turns the reflection into intention.

A takeaway

The players coaches keep are the players whose teammates play better because they're around. "What did you do that helped a teammate?" is the question that builds that self-image, one small noticing at a time.