Teaching for learners: We must move at their pace

            I have often heard coaches talking about how they have to get to work and put their mark on the team. People say you have to take what you have learned and make it your own. To that, we say coach it is not about you. You do not need to try to reinvent the wheel when it comes to principals, methods, and systems. The strengths and weakness of the participants (coach and players) will stamp the team with an identity. The team will develop part of its identity because you are the leader and teacher.  The other part should come to life as you teach at the pace of your learners. The ability to learn and perform is the most powerful forces and this is controlled by the players. For coaches the trick to getting ahead is making the best use of our time and the kids effort. 

Being on the same page with the players and presenting the player the right challenge is the key.  Here is where we start:

#1 We need to find out where they are? Stage 1, 2, 3, or 4

#2 We need to assess their ability to self-correct or do they need to earn how?

#3 We need to organize the feed backs focus and the volume of feedback; to work with the stage of learning/competency and their ability to self-correct.

To address these issue we have two testing methods and few recommendations from Ron and Tom. This is information we learned at our coaching work shop.

Our Staff Cheat Sheet:

Tom’s Method:

This is one of the fundamental challenges of coaching and the process of improvement. Because of this, the issue of “what practice activities transfer the most?” is a central question to our practice planning and training environment. We know a few things:

-          If the athlete does it right, and knows they did it right, without feedback, they have come very close to having successfully learned it.

-          If the athlete does it right, repeatedly, without feedback or even awareness, then it has been implicitly learned and is an ingrained motor pattern. This is the goal. We want our athletes to have great mechanics they can rely upon under pressure.

Through extensive work with various coaches, as well as Dr. Richard Schmidt, author of the “Schema Theory” one of the prevailing motor learning works of the past thirty years, we have created a process for this challenge of transfer.

Tutor the Task: This is a small group setting with high reps and high feedback. This is where the athlete learns and thoroughly understands the task we will be working on. The transfer rate is low at this point, but the cognitive phase of learning is being taken care of.

Evaluate the Task: Now, we are playing volleyball. We provide lots of reps and keep score. Every 3 reps, we ask the player “Did you do it?” They can reply “yes” or “no” and we record “opportunities to respond” with “successful opportunities”. We are “extending the leash” at this point. We are allowing for lots of questions, but we are making the athlete process whether or not they are performing the task, and thus increasing their own knowledge of performance within a competitive, game-like setting. The rate of transfer is becoming very high at this point.



Ron going the extra mile to explain a block move
when there was no floor space 

Ron’s Method: 

Now we are playing volleyball and providing no feedback on the task we are tutoring. We are however, recording “opportunities to respond” with “successful opportunities” and at the end of the match, we have our players tell us how they did.

Yes/No 1. Give kid a specific key 2. Have them perform a skill 3. Ask y/n (you’re tracking the progress too) There response will reflect if they understanding of the concept and their awareness in performance. I don’t know works too because it can tell us the kid is not being mindful on the actual key they were asked to focus on. Use in small group tutoring, then use in drills, eventually to games.  Decrease your feedback and increase the kids’ participation.  We are creating mindfulness and mindfulness leads to self-correction.  Change, choice, and principle are the three constants in life according to Stephen Covey

Directing Feed Back: 

Also knowing how direct a players conscious/explicit thoughts is of great importance and knowing when to step back and let them process naturally is of equal importance.

Not everyone responses to the way you would like, learn to say things that work for them.

Here are few notes that will help you work from some different angle on kids you are having a hard time getting through to. Here is the approach of Robert Nideffer

External Focus: A focus on the information that is the result of an action – e.g., the flight of the ball or top spin on the ball

Internal Focus: A focus on the information associated with the movement of the body’s movement in producing the actions – e.g., kinesthetic stimuli –how it feels to swing over the ball

Narrow Focus: Attention is focused narrow range of information sources – e.g., see the hitters shoulder or see the setters angle of release or feel the bend of your knee

Broad Focus: A wide range of information is observed and processed implicitly e.g., see the defenders shift or feel the power of a swing

For more on the work of Nideffer click here  

Teams

It’s hard to be on a team

A social action group or a "team" is constructed when individual’s form a group to achieve a result that could not be accomplished alone. Individual membership in the action group creates several paradoxical situations for the individual.

3 Common Issues:

Often immediate sacrifice is required by the individual to benefit the group.The benefit to the individual is delayed and the benefit is proportionate to the sum benefit of the group. The rising tide lifts all the boats". The cost to the individuals is not bore equally and the benefit to the individual is not always immediately proportionate to the level of individual sacrifice, yet any benefit requires membership in the group.

Individuals can also experience the benefits of the group without making a full contribution or baring the required sacrifices. When individuals try to reduce their sacrifice there is friction with coaches and teammates. 

There may be an immediate incentive to the individual who acts in manner that this is detrimental to the collective good. Individuals can gain a benefit from actions that come with an immediate or delayed expense to the group.

Figure1. Individual agenda’s compete with the good of the group, and these actions are caused by rejecting the sacrfices required (this occures from time to time with indivduals, but is often the same people) 

Figure 2.The manner in which individuals are required to participate to achieve the greatest collective good (how we manage the team and expect individuals to participate)

Figure 3. The reality of being on a team, the common good requires something from everyone and the strain of sacrifice is an under lying current, but this is not a static sistuation the group moves forward on the sacrfices made by the individuals.

Ultimately on a competitive team the coaches will have to make choices that they believe will benefit the greater good. There is natural friction for the individual but players and parents can not let emotions or short term thinking prevail. The logical action in  the game of volleyball dictates that to achieve the maximum benefit you must willingly sacrifice with your team. Ask question in a productive manner when you don't understand the sacrifices being made. You will catch more bee's with honey than vinegar