keepcoaching-blog

[keepcoaching-blog]

Video Recording as an Aid

There's been a few times across my sporting life when video recording has been used to help me & my teammates with skills we were working on. The first time I can remember using it was at a netball carnival in Wollongong when I was fourteen. I think the main use we got out of it then was getting closure on that 'stupid Goal Defence' who purposely knocked down one of our girls. 

The second time I encountered the use of videoing as a resource was a year later in 15s. Our coach at the time was a psychologist and had all her own little ways of coaching. Which included not training and lots of one on one chats which led us to not being ready to play championships and not making the grandfinal for the first time.. ever.. yeah I'm apparently still bitter about it. 

The one benefit I've noticed with using video recording when teaching skills is you're able to show the learner EXACTLY what they're doing, and it makes it much easier to point out places where they need to fix. 

This year I'm planning on utilising videoing to help me with my coaching and my final decision to split my squad of 20 to two teams of 10. I'm also hoping I'll get permission from the girls & their parents to video them for my assignment! Fingers crossed :)

[keepcoaching-blog]

Co-Coaching or Coaching with an Assistant

First, I've had a slight hiatus with posting because a) uni was stressing me too much and b) I got a new puppy! :)

But this one topic has been on my mind with the trials for Junior Rep starting on Sunday just gone. Within the ACT Junior Representative program there's 5 associations - Arawang, Belconnen, Canberra, South Canberra and Tuggeranong Netball Association - each of which have age groups u11-15, with two or three teams in each age group. I'm not sure how it goes in other associations, but in mine, (Canberra) the coaches for each age group have a few things to do together.

The first call of duty is trials and selections. The coaches from the Maroon and Skye (1st & 2nd) teams are on the selection panel along with either the coaching convenor or our State League Div 1 coach, and this is the beginning of the coaches needing to work together. We collaborate on which girls we think have the suitable skill level to be selected into the initial squad of 20, after 3 weeks worth of watching match play for 2ish hours.

After this initial selection process, coaches must then 'co-coach' for 5 weeks, after which selections are made for the two teams. I, for one, am not a fan of co-coaching. I am the kind of person who likes to do their own thing in their own way, and luckily enough, this year I am the head coach for the age group, therefore I should be in charge of running each of the sessions. But then the problem arises of clashing personalities, or those who are similar and struggle to let someone else take control. 

So for about 9 weeks, the two coaches must work together in all areas and after this are expected to make use of eachother for resources, and match play.

I can deal with this (only just) depending on who I coach with, but I don't think that now, after coaching by myself for 4 years, I'd be able to co-coach for a whole season. Maybe an assistant coach, maybe.. not likely though haha.

[keepcoaching-blog]

Drugs in sport vs healthy eating.

So lately the whole drugs in sport controversy is huge all over the world, sparked from the admission of Lance Armstrong that he used performance enhancing drugs to help him win his Tour de Frances. Since then multiple athletes have come out and said that they too have used performance enhancing drugs, Australians included. It's branched down from the Australian Representative Sport - the Olympic Squads (e.g the mens 4x4 relay team had a press conference today about it) to our NRL League where Canberra's own Raiders have been named in the scandal. 

Throughout all of this it's got me thinking about how this affects all of our lives. First, Australians (well majority of us) are all about sports. Some of our greatest hero's are sports stars! And this stems from a young age. So what are these young'uns thinking now? They won't understand the full extent of what is so wrong about Performance Enhancing drugs, but they see it as 'hey I can do better than this, if I take this!'. I remember watching a video about an AFL player who had been accused of Drug Abuse in 2011 (Jason Akermanis maybe? I can't remember) and all the boys didn't care, they just thought, 'well look at what he did!'

I bring this back to relevance by reiterating the children. These little souls don't see anything apart from 'this will make me bigger and better'. So how can we stop this? Obviously it is different between each sport and code of football, but I feel instilling a sense of healthiness when they're young could do wonders.

For example, my girls I coach. In the last 3 years I've coached 30 different girls, and each year is a new learning journey. As an association, our netball club goes away to carnivals - a Sunday devoted to netball. The girls will play 5-10 half games of netball against other associations during the day therefore it is so, so important that the foods and drinks they are putting in their body during that day are all beneficial.

The first year I solo-coached I had the 11's development team. This is the first age group we offer, and the development team is the 3rd division team. So this was the first year of representative netball for these girls therefore it was up to me to instill a sense of health into them.

Lollies. Junk food. Coke. Canteen foods. These are all things that every 11 year old loves. And sadly, parents will do anything, if not everything, to make their child happy. Within our association, we have a rule. No junk food is to be brought or purchased while at a carnival - the girls should have home made sandwiches, wraps, salads etc. 

But then the question of, 'how do we keep the girls going throughout the day?' pops up. First thought is SUGAR! Gatorade, Powerade, all those sorts of things. I don't know much about those 'energy drinks' as i don't drink them, but I remember learning that for every one Powerade, you should drink two bottles of water. Don't know how correct that its, but sounds legit to me. 

So lesson one I learned: Tell the girls they may have these drinks if they like, but only one per day and they must drink water with it!

Second was the lolly debate, and it came down to this. I would bring a tub of lollies to the carnival and only if the girls succeeded in their goal for the game, (win by 5, keep the opposing team to 4, do x amount of double plays, etc.) would they be allowed to have one or two lollies each. And surprisingly, it worked! Never have I seen a packet of lollies at a carnival, in my teams tent, apart from with me. (win for me, yay!)

And lastly, healthy foods. I still have problems with mothers. I know, I know, I shouldn't be saying this but seriously, you should NOT be buying your daughter Macdonalds! I think no matter how much I try to tell mums and dads that their child's food for the day should be healthy, I'm still going to find some sort of 'junk' food in their lunchbox.

With each new season comes a new set of girls and new parents to deal with (which can be a burden or a load off) and new lessons to learn. Which is one of the reasons I love to coach - I'll never know everything, but I sure can try!

[keepcoaching-blog]

Frustration everywhere at the moment

As a player:

Was supposed to have a fitness session last night for preseason. Had just arrived in the carpark here at UC when I saw a girl in my squad who informed me training had been cancelled because of the rain. The non-existent rain. You can imagine my frustration when I found out the cancellation had been posted on facebook 15 minutes before.. right when i'd left my house.

As a coach:

Dates for trials for our juniors have been changed.. again.. and as the Head Coach for the age group, it's all up to me to organise the playing lists.

As a pre-service teacher:

UC Education has been nothing more than a problem this last week.. Confusion with my prac classes and now a revelation that NO SUBJECTS WILL BE OFFERED IN WINTER TERM. so i'm one subject behind due to a fail in maths.. which means I need to do winter term to ensure I can course complete by the end of next year... not happy jan.

[keepcoaching-blog]

Just do your best! : )

[keepcoaching-blog]

Update!

Firstly, a bit about my weekend!

The Canberra Netball Association Coaching Team for 2013 went away to Jindabyne Sport and Rec Centre for a planning/introduction/bonding weekend. We basically spent the weekend going through the important dates for the season, the Associations policies on certain things (uniform, court time, parents, etc) and there were a few sessions run about planning your trainings and season, and how to coach different learners.

The session run by one of our fellow coaches was the one based around different learning styles and I found it to be very beneficial for everyone! Although through college and uni I've done multiple classes where I learnt about the different learning styles (cognitive, kinaesthetic, etc) so most of the things she was saying I already knew, not everybody knows these sorts of things and as both a teacher and a coach, no matter what you are doing, I believe it can negatively impact your learners and their learning experiences. So great session in my eyes! 

We also had our umpiring convenor give a talk about how imperative it is for our girls to know the rules outside of a playing sense, so that they can understand where the umpire is pulling 'this weird rule from' (I've heard many a negative thing said about an umpire's calls!), and also to instill a sense of respect. As a club, the committee have voiced that they would like us as coaches to re-enforce sportsmanship within our association, which includes the ways we treat the umpires, even if we do not necessarily believe the call was correct.

As well as lots of sitting and listening, we had a workshop session with each other where we, in groups of 3, got given a skill (shooters rotating, clear and drive, 1 v 1 defending, double play,  transition from attack to defence, and also from defence to attack) and had to compile a session based on our framework we'd been given. After planning, we demonstrated a short 15-20 minute version of our skill and the ways we would progress it to the group; I got many ideas out of the different sessions!

All in all, a great weekend. 

Second, MAN I'VE HAD A STRESSFUL FEW DAYS, THANKS UC! I've been trying to sort out my classes (particularly Curriculum, Pedagogy and Practice 2 & 3) and the pracs that go with it, and everything is different, everyone is saying different things! 

Managed to figure it out after a bit of a chat with the education office, thank gosh, but I wish that it wasn't this difficult. It wouldn't be if they hadn't decided to cut P.E Teaching!! So I've fixed it, but have to wait 24 hours before I can re-submit my request for allocation, so that I get a prac, :(

Finally,I've had a bit of a html play with my blog and changed things around a little. So here is a mini tutorial on how to navigate my blog:

each post will appear newest - oldest as you scroll down.

a small explanation is on the 'about' page

if you have any questions or wish to comment on a post, click 'questions?' and ask away in my cbox. make sure you reference which post you're commenting on! 

If you're on any page and wish to return to the home page, simply click the heading, 'keeping coaching simple, hopefully'

And finally, just to keep track of your visits, I have two html codes in my description, a total visits, and how many times you've visited. I cannot see how many times you've visited, that is just for you :)

If you would like to know anything about how I did what I did, or you would like some codes, let me know and I can hopefully help you out :)

[keepcoaching-blog]

Week 2 Tutorial

First blog post for this class and I have no idea about what I should be writing so I'm planning on winging it for now. 

The first thing that comes to mind when speaking about coaching and the ways that we coach are my experiences with netball when both coaching and being coached. Below is a photo from my grand final last year at approximately half time with my coach and assistant coach giving us advice for things we must focus on for the rest of the game. 

This weekend I will be attending a whole weekend away at a coaching development camp for the upcoming season with Canberra Netball Association, so I'll most likely post about that when I'm back!