At what age should youth know how to catch with a glove? Is there an age that is best to start teaching this?

At what age should youth know how to catch with a glove? Is there an age that is best to start teaching this?

I've been trying to work with my five year old son on acquiring this skill, but he's having a difficult time with it. I have a bucket of about 100 tennis balls that I throw him a couple times a week, and while there have been subtle improvements, he's still pretty scared of the ball.

Thanks for your help!

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One thing that helped me with my younger son was this deal i made with him (with tennis balls or soft tee balls): If i hit him, he got to hit me. It really seemd to make him feel better if i hit him in the chest, i would take one in the chest. The tears would turn to laughter pretty quickly. I think after a while he started intentionally letting the ball hit him so that he could hit me back :)
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I used tennis balls at 5 and 6 yo all the time. I highly recommend them at this age.

Practice catching using a windshield wiper motion. Keep the elbow down and move the glove hand left or right.

Of course, tennis balls pop out of the glove, so don't worry if it pops out.

By the time my kids were 6, I could throw as hard as I could (I can't throw very hard) to them (this is the speed of a batted ball after all). Plus, I would stand them in front of the bushes (so they could retrieve easily) and throw to the left or right so they could work on their windshield wiper. I also threw popups with tennis balls (they dont hurt the noggin), and made them keep their glove at their shoulder - if they stopped moving their feet, we started over - if they raised their glove arm, we started over. This practice paid off years later in Jr's (ahem "open") HS tryouts - coach hit monster popups and Jr was the only one that easily glided over and caught everything.

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Early success makes it fun. Let them catch it like a bucket (glove pocket facing up) at first. You basically throw it into the glove. Then work up to the windshield wiper action, first on glove side, more advanced opposite glove side.

I find most 5 yo's that have trouble catching have a new glove that isn't broken in. It's hard to catch with a glove that is stiff and they can't close.

Lastly, some say have the kid lay down on their back and then hold the glove up (glove side). The glove will be on the ground, or near it. Drop the ball into their glove. Practice like that, they can't shy away from the glove (cause the ground is there). Just don't hit him in the face or he'll be more scared of the ball! 

Just some ideas, good luck!

PS I always found it most successful to just throw the ball into the glove at first, until they get some confidence and have fun, then advance slowly. Most 5 yo's I know don't catch well so your son is probably normal enough :)
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Don't get to worried if the kid can't catch at 5. Sometimes it takes a little longer for the light to come on and when it does they can go from not catching anything to catching everything near them. Just be patient and play catch as much as you can.
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When my kids were three or four and we started, I stumbled upon something that worked wonders. It's a set of large circular paddles covered in velcro that attach to the hand with a strap (just a loop really). The velcro holds a tennis ball tight. They just use one on their glove hand. It teaches them to catch knowing that every thrown ball will stick to the velcro as long as it's in the right spot. I later even used this with six and seven year olds to teach catching fly balls. When I've found them, they're basically sold as beach toys. Once they move from that to a glove, they have all the basic motions and are much more confident.

Link to Amazon: Velcros Paddle Ball $15.99
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The next step would be to just get one of these:

Link to Amazon: Toysmith Easy Catch Ball and Glove $9.97
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I cannot even remember what age we started at, but I remember the first thing we played catch with. It was a plastic Easter egg. I'd throw it and have my son reach out and grab it. He couldn't wait for it to get to him. It had to be in a reaching out motion or sometimes diving (more accurately falling down back then) on the bed or sofa. Gosh, we'd do that for hours and hours and hours a week. He just loved it.

Moved on to the soft baseballs. I think he was about 4 or 5 then. We'd play in the backyard. Even now when we play catch we joke around about "playing to 25." We had a goal of making 25 consecutive good throws and catches between us. Hate to say it, but a time or two dad was the one who broke the streak.

Can honestly say that I never remember him being afraid of the ball. I've done some pretty non-PC things. We laugh now and say it worked out alright, but in retrospect I'll admit that it was probably not the best parenting. What's worse though is I'm seeing getting a taste of my own medicine rapidly approaching as his strength and physical maturity increase and my better days are behind me.
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If your house bound this time of year...rolled up socks...(clean or dirty)....
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Source:

http://www.baseball-fever.com/archive/index.php/t-102326.html