That's a Wrap

Well, this is the final post from me as part of the Sport Coaching Pedagogy unit for 2012.

And what a fitting topic presented by Keith to wrap up this experience in personal development pathways. Throughout this assessment I think I have, like a lot of my classmates, had their eyes opened to the benefits of blogging and  the advantages to be had by engaging in this self directed (but still helpfully guided by Keith) type of learning environment.

I think the video below addresses exactly the kind of thing Keith talked about a lot throughout the duration of the course. The focus is shifting from lecturers 'lecturing' students to an environment where students and teachers are working together and becoming produsers.

With all this information out there now, there is sure to some that can't be definitively proven (I'm sure there is plenty in my own blog's!), but the fact that someone has put forward a new idea that can be accessed by anyone who wishes to I think is the key point. After all, as I discussed in my previous blogs, coaches and players are never a finished products, so whatever information they can get, no matter how obscure, as long as it helps, is beneficial.

Thanks again for reading, I hope you enjoyed.

Cheers, Leigh.

Coaching Ceiling

Following on from last weeks blog surrounding the topic of the expert pedagogue, this week I got thinking about the same idea but from the perspective of an athlete. Could an athlete ever be considered an expert? And if so wouldn't that mean that coaches got their athlete to a level of expertise that essentially made them redundant?

I came to the conclusion that like coaches, athletes (no matter how talented) could not ever be considered 'complete' or an 'expert'. So by default, if there is always room for improvement, then there will always be a place for a coach to work and develop that room, it's just that as the level of athlete skill increases so does the margin for improvement (the law of diminishing returns).

Even if the coaching role is not filled in a traditional sense (where the focus lies on the technical aspects), there are numerous sources of research within the field of sports psychology suggesting that the psychological side of an athletes performance is as important as physical prowess involved.

While on that point, interestingly enough both Roger Federer and tiger Woods have gone long periods of time in their respective careers without a dedicated coach. I suppose there are always exceptions. But maybe if Federer and Woods had coaches (maybe even operating in a more unconventional sense) Federer may have broken that Grand Slam record already and Woods might still be in the #1 ranking. Who knows, sometimes its interesting to speculate.

I think the best example of the how important a coach can be is the appointment of Jake White to the ACT Brumbies (also discussed in Ben Mudie's blog). At the beginning of this season the Brumbies were widely tipped to finish last by quite a margin, due to their apparently weak playing list, but currently find themselves sitting atop of the Australian conference table. His coaching methods have obviously clicked with the team and his ability to think outside the box has most recently seen him suggest bringing Stephen Larkham out of retirement at 37yrs of age and 5 years since he last played for the Brumbies in an effort to cover an injury crisis.

Personally, having decided that that neither the athlete nor coach could ever be considered experts nor complete I think shows that the role of a coach is open ended. It is a role that is, I guess, in a way limitless and unrestricted in where it can go.

I think that looking at the role of a coach and athlete as something that is is a continual state of change and never finished highlights the interesting dynamic between coaches and athletes. Assuming that neither can ever be considered a finished product, one of them will always be presenting the other with new and unique challenges thus promoting a perpetual relationship.

Expert Pedagogue: A Myth?

My apologies for the delay between my blogs, other university subjects have been taking up a lot of my time of late.

Recently, as part of the assessment for this unit, I (along with 3 of my classmates) made a coaching video looking at the 4 key skills in the sport of AFL. These were kicking, hand passing, bouncing and marking. I was the one responsible for the coaching of kicking, specifically the drop punt.

For me, I find I'm able to do the skill pretty well. In my mind I can go through the steps in a way that makes sense to me and then do it. When it came to coaching the skill, I found I really had to think hard about how I went about it. Our athlete didn't have an AFL background so the skill needed to be learnt by him and coached by us, from scratch. To combat this we used coaching methods mentioned in our research such as the SPIR method:
S: Show - name the skill, demonstrate three times and provide three coaching points.
P: Practice - Have players practice the skill immediately.
I: Instruct - Give feedback on their performance based on what they have been taught.

R: Reward - Encourage and reward effort and achievement.

Although this method was very helpful, I still couldn't help but feel a little bit lost and looking back I think the biggest thing I found, which in hindsight makes complete sense, is that there are glaring differences between coaching and telling an athlete through a skill.

Overall I think as a group we did well to have a bit of fun but still make a useful coaching tool. Also, those interested in seeing a short clip and reading a bit more about our coaching video should head over to Aidan's blog, it's well worth a read.

As I mentioned, we used several resources in the development of out coaching video, some of the ones we came across were quite dated. Looking at the difference in not only the technique of a skill but also the coaching method, it's easy to say just coach it, but the process is tricky.
It made me think about the term expert pedagogue; is it even possible? Or is it just an oxymoron?

John Wooden was an amazing coach, without question. But was he an expert pedagogue?

I think now more than ever, coaches will always be playing catch up with innovation and technology, they will always be students to their profession. The prime example of this came from the discussion within the tutorial sessions in week 13. iPhones, live video feed and the endless information capture/sharing platforms are continually opening new pathways for coaches to diversify their methods and because of this I think the term 'expert pedagogue' contradicts itself. There can certainly be excellent pedagogues (John Wooden for example), but I think its impossible for one to become an expert pedagogue purely because the coaching world never stands still for long enough for an individual to completely master it before it changes again.

Something Interesting...

This caught my eye while browsing through some photos I took while I was in America last year and I thought I might share it on here with everyone to have a think about. This was taken in a Nike store a few blocks off Santa Monica  Beach in LA. The quote is from Bill Bowerman, the co-founder of Nike.

Technology in the Sporting Realm

First off, my apologies for the lack of posts over the last few weeks, I've been buried by other classes lately.

This post will be focusing on Keith's presentation in week 7 about the ever increasing role of technology (like social media) in today's sporting industry.

Firstly I think the biggest advantage and the most obvious thing is its ability to provide a sharing medium for an unlimited amount of coaches, athletes, support staff etc. Open blogs, like this one, provide an endless source of information on basically anything and the way we share information is only going to improve and evolve, so I think sport (and everyone involved with it) is one of the industries that should be able to benefit most from this.

One thing that I did want to mention is the idea that technology could also present some new problems for sport that haven't been an issue in the past because the technology has not been around. Something that caught my eye was the recent legal battle between the telco Optus and the AFL/NRL. Having just done an excruciating assignment on sport and the law, its an interesting problem to consider given the age we live in of limitless sharing but also copyrights, trademarks and patents. It will be interesting too see how sport copes with the affect of technological sharing and law, both of which have very relevent applications withing the world of sport.

Anyway that's it for this week, hope you enjoyed it.

Leigh.

Past Success = Coaching Greatness?

The week 5 lecture and tutorial material focused on the concepts of observation and augmented information. During the course of Keith's presentations he addressed the idea of  whether having played at the highest level in a given sport gives you some sort of predisposition to coaching at an elite level in that sport. 

Some of my fellow class mates including Sarah Taylor and Trent Hopkinson have addressed this in their blogs which are well worth reading as they give some interesting insights and personal experiences.

What got me thinking was that Keith noted that Tiger Woods, Roger Federer and the number one women's canoe slalom paddler (I'm unsure of her name) are all self coached. Having read his recommended link, Spectrum of Teaching Styles and browsed over their spectrum of 7 coaching concepts, it becomes hard to imagine how these may be implemented considering that the role of "teachers and learners" becomes blurred when an athlete takes coaching upon themselves.

Perhaps another limitation lies in what Keith referred to as memory decay, where what you are thinking the movement (golf swing, tennis serve etc) may differ from what you recall when looking back on performances. This, to me, is one of the greatest advantages of having your own coach who's job it is to provide information for you, rather than relying on yourself to produce firstly a quality action and the secondly critique your own movement. Which could essentially create an environment where the athlete becomes their own worst enemy. After all, athletes and coaches often say that the best performances come from when there is little thought and they 'just do it' rather than over thinking it.

On the other hand, its hard to argue with the results of Woods and Federer, they are some of the greatest athletes ever, and after all the Spectrum of Teaching concept #4 also states that "no one teaching style is universally good or bad". And I think that is the single most important thing, the relationship between coach and athlete is better when its unique and is working best for them. I think it's something that is discovered rather than taught and perhaps the reason that players make good coaches is that they can relate to their athlete. I think a prime example of this is Andy Murray employing Ivan Lendl, who found himself in a similar position to Murray having not won any of the four major tournaments at a similar point in his career, despite having the ability to do so.


Anyway, those are my thoughts for this week, feel free to comment!

Cheers,
Leigh

At the Coal Face

After a solid session of study procrastination, I stumbled across this article. I know this is something that I focused on in my last post, but this got me thinking again about how dynamic coaches need to be in their methods.

Particularly now more than ever technology is changing the way sports are played and thus coached. With these new sources of information available to coaches, they are effectively at the coal face in that they are the ones first exposed and responsible for how this new source of data is utilised to the benefit of their team.

It will be interesting to see how this application of GPS (already used for tracking players) in the AFL will be used, if at all.

Cheers,
Leigh.