Throughout my life, my mom has exposed me to many different pastimes and raised me to love what I do and do what I love. As a result, I’ve taken my time to decide which pastimes I’d like to dedicate my time to. One thing I came to enjoy was the atmosphere during sporting events. I played basketball for three years before realizing that I prefer to cheer the players on rather than run alongside them. Entering high school, I concluded that becoming a cheerleader would allow me to experience the competitive atmosphere I love without having to compete. Having dedicated myself to cheerleading, I am a better cheerleader as the years go by. Being a cheerleader is somewhat of a tradition on my mom’s side of the family. My great grandma, great aunt, …show more content…
I originally felt that cheering was just a way for me to enjoy myself. It wasn’t long until I realized that cheerleading meant much more to me. According to Webster’s Dictionary for Students, “cheer” is defined as “to urge on especially with shouts or cheers” (71). While this may be true, I see cheer as an opportunity to encourage athletes and students alike. Cheerleading became something I wanted to excel in. Whether it was painting a sign for the football team to run through, or filling a basket with goodies for an athlete to take home, I began to put more care into the work I did as a cheerleader hoping that each time I did something I did it better than the last. I wanted to make sure every player for every sport at my school knew I appreciated the effort that was put in for all the games or duals. By achieving some of the goals I set, I became an example for the incoming cheerleaders at my …show more content…
Cheering requires a crowd and considering that I’m in my third year of cheer, I’ve been in front of plenty. Because I’ve gotten used to interacting with big groups of people, I feel secure enough to start a conversation with a classmate I don’t know that well. Some of the friendships I have now started out as a simple discussion about a game or sport. By interacting with some of the athletes at my school, others started to approach me as well. Soon enough I knew almost all the students in my high school. The influence I had didn’t end with my fellow classmates, I became a well-known person in the community too. Members of the community began approaching me to talk about cheer. I know some of the fans that attend games and duals, but other fans are people that I hardly recognize. Familiar faces along with strangers occasionally approach my mom whenever she’s out to tell her how they enjoy watching me cheer. Fans in the crowd have complimented me before, during, and after games. Though the recognition isn’t necessary, it always feels good to know that the crowd thinks I’m good at what I love to do. In the future, I’d like to continue my progress as a
When I arrived at my new and enormous high school, I got lost. It was June, and since classes had just ended for the day, large crowds of kids filled up the hallways, and I got bumped around like I did not exist. Thankfully, a cheerleader saw me and figured that I had come there for tryouts since I wore shorts, cheer shoes and a big bow in my hair. She took me to the gym where at least sixty girls had shown up for the competition. The first things I saw were cheerleaders doing high level tumbling on the gym floor with no fear. The upperclassmen led us in warm-ups, and they seemed nice. A lot of the girls I met had been cheering since they were five and six years old. I saw a lot of talent in the room, so I knew it would not be easy to
Ever experienced cheer camp a famous college? Surround by its famous color orange and blue? Well, I did! A tremendous amount of people have their different ideas an exciting experience in their life. Although out of all of the exciting experiences I’ve ever experienced , I would have to say my favorite is when I visited The University of Florida for cheer camp my sophomore year. I was overly excited about spending four days at The University of Florida; I stayed up all night the night before packing and getting ready to finally stay at a college for four days with my fellow cheer sisters. From that experience I learned a lot about sticking together as a team, and friendship! But, most importantly, I learned that bonding together as a team is what got us to finish strong at the end. Those four days really opened my eyes to a lot of different things and I’m glad I can say that I really enjoyed myself.
Cheerleading is a big part of high school and community culture. For many young girls, and sometimes boys, cheer is a way of life. Often pursued as a profession, cheerleading is a very serious sport. Like most sports cheerleading has different types and divisions. Scholastic cheerleading and All-Star cheerleading have many similarities and differences. Cheerleading similarities and differences include what they do, coaches, and appearance.
“They’re snobs.” “They’re ditzy.” “They are just brats.” Cheerleaders. There are many problems with stereotyping, and cheerleaders are no strangers to it. Every cheerleader could probably tell you a time when someone stereotyped them, whether that be them as a person or an athlete. While on some occasions cheerleaders really do fit the stereotypical vision of a cheerleader off of a movie, most are not your typical “cheerleader”; intelligent, polite, and athletic are all characteristics of these individuals. Making judgements about a person based on what sport they played is not deserved. Most people in high school would say they knew, or thought they knew how cheerleaders were, but if taking the time to get to know the kind of people they are, then people’s opinion would change.
From being tossed into the air in stunts, to bouncing off the mats when tumbling, cheerleading is everything I love and enjoying doing. At the University of Alberta, I hope to join the team and become one of the liveliest supporters of the U of A’s Bears and Pandas. By joining the cheer team, I can make many new friends, stay in good shape, and partake in my favourite sport, all while cheering on and supporting my fellow students. Not only do I plan on joining the team for the strengthening practices and invigorating competitions, but I am also looking forward to helping out around the campus organizing fundraisers and such to support the team and
Cheerleading is fun! Of course we cheerlead because it’s fun! From cheer camp to laughing on the sidelines, cheerleading is always a good time, especially with your friends. The memories made my cheerleaders whether they be from practices, games, or spirit activities (like decorating for senior night or baking treats for football players) are memories that will be cherished for a cheerleaders lifetime. Cheering is such a positive and happy experience because we are always doing something fun or accomplishing something new, like learning our new pyramid or mastering our routine. I get to get dressed up in my uniform with my bow in my hair and my white, red-track stained cheer shoes and not only cheer on my favorite football team but run around and cheer and stunt with a team of fun-loving girls and bring my community
Every minute of the day we are doing something, whether we recognize it or not. How we spend our time can determine where we go. If I waste my time I will look back and wonder where it all went. Through all the practices, games, and extra events, it seems I am wasting my valuable time on something not worthy of my time or making a bad investment of my time. If you asked me if cheerleading was my life my answer would be no, but I spend a lot of time going to practices, games, and events that it is difficult to believe otherwise. Many people, including my sister, would say I should be spending my time doing something more productive than wearing short skirts and throwing girls in the air. However, I believe that I continue to cheer because it is worthwhile in my life.
I believe that cheerleaders provide hope and gleam when it’s required the most. Cheerleaders are kind-hearted and continuously display it without hesitation. If you think about it, cheerleading is the only sport where it’s mandatory to smile; Whether it’s scorching hot or freezing cold. When on duty as a cheerleader, there is no time to slack off. The games would never be as enjoyable without the cheerleader executing their full
Throughout the years I have been cheering, all of my family and friends have supported me. Cheering may not be the most traditional sport that my parents may have wanted me to be a part of, but it is the sport that has brought many good memories to me. Making new friends that have he...
The average cheerleader dedicates 6-20 hours a week of their time to their training and conditioning. Cheerleaders are definitely considered athletes and deserve to be recognized for their hard work as an individual and as a team (Smith). A cheerleaders hard work emerges from their goals that are set in the beginning of each season. Competitive cheerleading is a sport that possesses multiple goals throughout the season. Goals are a set of things that you and your team are determined to reach throughout that period of time together. Behavioral expectations and skill accomplishments are just a few of the goals that can be set by a cheerleader in order to be successful. Goals are extremely important, because they help grow the structure of a team in a positive way (“Goal
...for my first cheerleading squad, in the seventh grade, I had no idea what I was getting myself into. In fact, the try outs were so hard and so demanding I did not make the cut. This did not discourage me at all; it only gave me motive to try harder. Next season I came back with a bang; I made the cheerleading squad. Cheerleading is an experience that I would never give up for anything in the world. I learned more lessons on teamwork here than any other sport I played, because in cheerleading I mainly had to communicate with the other cheerleaders. Cheerleading involved much work and effort from me and my team mates. When I first started cheering I was a fairly fat cheerleader; by the end of the season my body was perfect enough for a show all bikini, and this is the one change that made me genuinely realize, “yes, I am an athlete; cheerleading is a sport.”
Cheerleading is an important tool for promoting both genders’ self-esteem. In an article by Lee Purvey in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Giannia Kustra expressed how cheerleading helped her as a person to “become more outgoing” (Purvey). In high school, cheerleading gives students an opportunity to support their teams proudly, build teamwork, and improve character and work ethic (Bernstein). This new “business” helps to improve the spirit and morals of athletes and fans alike.
Cheerleading has been a big part of my life. As my senior year winds down, it is one of the things that I will miss the most. If my best friend had not encouraged me to join, I don't know if I would have the confidence and self-assurance that I do today. Cheerleading has influenced my decision to join other activities and be active in school as much as I possibly can. Cheerleading has helped me grow from an awkward seventh grader to a well-rounded
That was my favorite part of cheerleading because a bunch of squads from different schools come to compete against each other to see who’s the best. We would put up flyers around the school so people might come to watch us but they never did and some were even taken down. Now as far as our cheer squad went, we weren’t that good still because we had an inexperienced coach who did not know how to choreograph dances or cheers. So we continued to be made fun of and not taken seriously by our classmates, which was extremely annoying because we just wanted some respect for the work that we put it. When sophomore year came around we were starting to get a little sick of never placing at competitions and to our luck, we got a new coach the next
The New York Times states that cheerleading is the fastest growing girls’ sport, yet more than half of Americans do not believe it is a sport. A sport is defined as “an athletic activity requiring skill or physical prowess and often of a competitive nature” (dictionary.com). Cheerleading at a competitive level is physically demanding and requires team work to be the best. The misconception of cheerleaders being weak, nonathletic crowd entertainers makes people believe cheerleaders are not athletes and that cheerleading is just a hobby but cheerleaders that compete at a competitive level are in fact athletes because it meets the standards of what a sport is, which includes rules and regulations, and overcoming air resistance.