The Four Teaching Methods Coaches Can Use to Develop Athletes
To maximize the potential of an athlete, coaches must learn to nurture the athlete’s nature. In other words, coach’s must know their athlete’s strengths and use that information to tap into what innately makes them tick. Applying this “nurture nature” thinking is imperative for maximizing the potential of an athlete. Particularly when it comes to practice.
With that said, there are four basic teaching methods coaches can use in practice to develop athletes:
- Repetitive Drills – for disciplined athletes who can focus for long time periods.
- Video Review -for athletes with good memoires who are visual learners or who need to see something to believe it.
- Structured Play – for extremally competitive athletes who get bored when not competing and need to gamify learning.
- Action / Reaction Training – for athletes who like to problem solve and can think and react quickly.
Firstly, depending on the sport, coaches must be “detectives and discover” which one of these methods works best for an athlete. All methods don’t work for all sports. Moreover, some methods work better for certain sports and less for others. Secondly, multiple methods of teaching are better than one. So, athletes may have primary, secondary, and tertiary learning methods.
Finally, all coaches are not fit to teach with each of these methods. It’s best to match the right coach to the right practice method or methods so a coach is using their strengths as well. The reality is that a coach’s strengths won’t match the strengths of every athlete. Therefore, having a coaching staff with different teaching strengths will create the best possible outcome for a team.