My wife and I coach U11 girls and our club has every 9v9 team run a 3-1-3-1 (11v11 teams just add the 5 & 8) and want us building out of the back. Whoever said it gives gray hairs is right, but it's a lot of fun when it starts clicking and the girls get it going. We aren't great yet but it's fun to see the growth.
We can punt but we don't unless we're getting high pressure from a clearly better team. PatAg made a good point about not only comfort on the ball and touch being important but also positioning. My daughter plays the 6 and has fantastic touch and always connects the first pass, but holy crap is she brain dead with movement off the ball. That's probably the toughest thing to get the youngsters to get.