Fielding a ground ball is an essential skill in softball or baseball, making it one of the first skills every T-ball player should learn. It is a skill that should be practiced in every practice to help build muscle memory, confidence, and ability. A few minutes of your warm-up can include fielding. You can avoid the amount of time players are standing in line if you have some players out in the field catching the balls during batting practice.

Keep It Fun, Easy to Remember

Five- to seven-year-olds have very short attention spans so you will need to teach this skill quickly, easily, and in a fun way. Spend only a few minutes for each drill or game. If you feel more time should be spent on a skill, you can return to it late in your practice. Instead of long explanations of the skills, with all their parts, try giving each part of the skill a name, phrase or description that it easy for young children to both remember and visualize.

Ready Position – Sitting on a Stool

Begin first by explaining to your players how to get down into “ready position” where their knees are bent. Right away you will likely have a few players squatting down near the ground, ready to pick clovers. Explain that they should pretend there is a small, invisible stool for them to sit on. This will help them bend their knees and squat just enough to be ready for fielding but not so low they are sitting in the grass picking flowers. So when you remind them to “sit on their stools,” they will know bend their knees and get ready.

Fielding on the Ground – Alligator Hands

Now that they are ready to field a ball, have each player put her mitt down on the ground with her hands touching heel-to-heel and wide open. While showing them the skill, tell your players to “make alligator hands.” Explain that their hands are alligators lying down on the ground with their mouths wide open ready to gobble up the ball. Now all you have to do is tell them to make their “alligator hands” to field the ball when it is on the ground. Tell your players that soon as the ball rolls into their mitts, they are to close their alligator mouths quickly before the ball escapes.

Milk Jug Shovels

If you notice that your players are having a difficult time putting their mitts all the way down on the ground or they are not using both hands, you can switch to plastic gallon jugs. Cut out the bottom and part of the side just below the handle so that resembles a garden trowel. Now it looks like a shovel. Where does a shovel go? On the ground! This will entice your players to put the jug on the ground. Since they cannot squeeze the handle to close the jug around the ball, they will have to put their hand down to trap it in the jug. After a few practices with the milk jug, they will establish the habit and muscle memory for getting their mitts down on the ground and their hand ready to close down on the ball.

Build Confidence

Many T-ball players are very new to the sport so begin with whiffle balls and work them up to the soft-tee ball often used in T-ball. If some of your players remain fearful, you can use a mixture of whiffle balls and soft-tees so they will at least try to catch a few balls. This will help to build their confidence and soon they will be catching the soft-tee balls, too. If you begin by tossing or rolling the ball to your players, remember to transition them to player-to-player practice so they do not learn to rely on adults and grow fearful of the other players.

Photo credit: Chad Green