On the initial point - it didn't help me that the Level One course I did was full of parents of JPL kids who had put their hand up to ref without knowing the Laws of the Game at all. Meant we spent lots of time in the course discussing things like whether a handball needs to be intentional or not (spoiler alert: it does) rather than the man management stuff that I would have found much more useful.
I had to learn on the job, so to speak, about how to manage different game situations without simply pulling out the yellow card. Simple shark like having a quiet talk with a player, next by a big "no more" with hand action, and then if they keep doing it, a yellow card.
This isn't a fault of the course, there were about 20 parents at the course and only two of us intending to become referee for the senior leagues so it makes sense that it was targeted at them. Perhaps extra online resources would be the way to go, teaching the things about referee that aren't just the 17 Laws?
