“When it doesn’t feel right… Go left…”
“The one who follows the crowd will usually go no further than the crowd. The one who walks alone is likely to find himself in places no one has ever been before.” (Albert Einstein)
I feel that I should start this Weekly Blog with sharing some of my thoughts, understandings, knowledge and experiences of what Athlete/Player-centred Coaching is, as this is one of the founding pillars why I set up my website with Sharing Knowledge (my first Blog last weekend) being the other founding pillar, because there’s not many books or websites out there that actually shares thoughts, understandings, knowledge and experiences about Player-centred Coaching.
There are thousands of Drills books and websites, so I am trying to chip away, address this imbalance of knowledge and information in the internet zone and contribute to the Paradigm Shift in coaching from a Coach-centred Coaching Culture around the world to an Athlete/Player-centred Coaching Culture…
I want to make people aware of what the definition is of Player-centred Coaching. The word ‘Player’ can easily be interchanged with ‘Athlete’ if we are talking more about an individual sport or with ‘Pupil’ when we are talking about Pupil-centred Teaching in an educational context/environment in a classroom or Physical Education lesson…
Many people will say they are an “Athlete/Player-centred” coach/teacher, but when you really delve deep down in to how they teach and/or coach through Objective Analysis, observing what they do and listening to what they say in their sessions and/or lessons you will quite often find that they are actually Coach/Teacher-centred.
World Rugby shows a very good comparison between the two approaches…
This isn’t an either/or, do this and you shouldn’t do that. It is to make people aware of the differences and outcomes of using such approaches and what is actually the better way to teach/coach pupils/players based on all the knowledge and research that is out there in today’s world…
Many people coach/teach the way they do because it is quite often due to Path Dependence as to why they coach that way…
“…the phenomenon of path dependence…”
(Periodization Theory: Confronting an Inconvenient Truth in the Journal of Sports Medicine, November 2017by John Kiely)
People don’t really know why they coach their way… It is quite often the way that they were coached in sport and/or taught in school…
I have been very fortunate to learn from some of the world leading experts and researchers in Athlete/Player-centred Coaching through reading their books, meeting them face-to-face, coaching side-by-side with them or reading research articles on their environments…
I have also been very fortunate to experience and observe many different cultures and environments around the world, in both the Northern and Southern Hemispheres, which gives me an excellent perspective and understanding of the differences between Coach-centred and Athlete/Player-centred Coaching Cultures/environments and the outcomes/consequences of such approaches, both positively (Athlete/Player-centred) and negatively (Coach-centred).
Therefore, I feel I am in a very unique position to share my knowledge and experiences to help other people understand WHAT Player/Athlete-centred Coaching is… HOW to apply the Principles of Player/Athlete-centred Coaching… WHAT things to do for Player/Athlete-centred Coaching… and more importantly WHY they should adopt a Athlete/Player-centred Coaching Philosophy… with my overall aim to help others get better and teach/coach better to be the best that they can be for their athletes/players/pupils in the future…
Over the coming weeks I will go into more detail about how to “Create and Develop a Team Culture”, use “Teaching Games for Understanding” and use “Questioning”…
Feel free to get in touch with me with questions you’d like answering or a particular topic you’d like to know more about…
I plan to write a weekly article every Sunday evening…
If I don’t receive any recommendations during each week then I’ll pick a topic or an experience to write about to share with you that I hope will help you on your Coaching Journey as one person teachers, two people learn…
