Do your players all make the same mistake?

If you are a teacher, put your teaching hat on for a moment.  If you are not, put yourself back in that high school desk.  A test is given and the scores are typical.  A couple students didn’t study and did horribly.  A few rock stars got close

to 100% and everyone else fell somewhere in between.  However, when you go over the test, you notice that there was one question that every single student got wrong.  

When this happens, a red flag should go up because through experience you know that it was probably one or more of these four things:

1. The answer key is incorrect.
2. The wording of the question was very poor and confused everyone.
3. The method(s) you used to teach that information were flawed.
4. You never taught that information at all.

What do all four have in common?  That’s right, none of those things were the fault of the students.  

How many times have we as coaches complained that our players as a whole are less than ideal when performing a particular task?  How many times do you then ask yourself … “what did I do wrong?”  

Hmm.  That’s tough to do.  It’s always easier just to vent and complain.

Now, I’ll be the first to say that too many young people look for the path of least resistance when it comes to school work and studying.  So I’m not saying it’s always the fault of the coaches.  However …

Good coaching involves constantly assessing the progress of your players.  It should also involve a constant assessment of yourself and your methods too.

Tomorrow’s post:  Adrenaline dumps