Coaching Corner

Notes from the Australian Open Grand Slam Coaches Conference

Presentation number One: Mike Barrell: Planning, a key ingredient to every lesson

The tone was set with a reminder that no child ever comes to the tennis club saying, 

"When I from up I want to be a recreational player. "
Or ,
"When I grow up I want to play in the fifth team."

 -Aspire to run a programme incorporating competition, organised play and special events, not just coaching. - Use social connections to keep kids in the game.

How can we get them to come more often?

 - Report to parents. Keep speaking to parents about what they would like and how their child is getting on and how they could get better. Remember that no one gets better coming once a week to tennis. The parents can play a role in practice or encouraging their children to do more.
 - Planning well can also motivate you, the coach.

Tips for Hot Shot lessons 
(name for Mini Tennis in Australia ie tennis played on a modified court for children aged 3- 10 years)

- Don't make lessons too technical.
- Give the children game based problems to solve on the tennis court and then help them adapt their technique to solve these problems
 - 'starburst' approach: break things into small blocks and revisit them. For example have them throwing and catching or hitting, then switch to a throwing game, then back to the rally activity you were trying to achieve
- never say we're going to play a fun game at the end of the lesson and not link it to tennis. Make all the games at the end something about passing a ball over the net.

Sample lesson

Warm-ups

Larry stefanki quotation,  'Tennis is a leg sport'.


Green - white - blue cones

The children run through the cones, a colour signifying a different movement pattern eg Green = jumps, White = round the cones, Blue = split step.

 They run through in order and then the coach can mix the colours so they have to use their mental skills with physical skills.

Remember:

- This could be built up over a couple of weeks. All lines then mix up the colours
- Quality. Don't forget to make quality points eg light on split, balance on circle movement, low body position etc

Second warm-up:

Tramlines hands together focus in the space between the hands.Again focus on quality and cues to ensure steady head.

 Discipline to be encouraged too so get them to do cooperative task and reward them for working hard/ doing it well. Use clothes pegs, playing cards etc.

Example: Motivate using playing cards. Every time you do something well, you get a playing card. Player who has most cards at end is the winner of the lesson.

Set up an activity quickly and then analyse what they are doing remembering that it's not a group lesson but a number of individuals in a group that you have to coach.

Main body of lesson: can the players control the ball in pairs to different areas of the court?

Hit in different court sizes. So for example one court hitting with a quarter of court marked out, one court hitting into hoops on either side, one court having to touch a cone behind after each hit. Every court could be playing points. They rotate round, keeping it fresh for them allowing you to move round and coach them as individuals.

General coaching tips:

- Remember that they won't get bored if things are varied so you could have them rotating twice. Give  them tips like post it notes, short and snappy. (Editors note:Actually it could be an idea to write keywords or phrases on post it notes and get them to stick them on to remind themselves. Older kids could write their own notes or buzz words to commit to during a lesson. Players could swap notes as well and work on different things.)

- Don't make exercises too easy. Things have to be reasonably difficult. To be good at tennis, players need to become comfortable being uncomfortable. Children love a challenge.

- No such thing as a group lesson. There are 4 (or whatever number in your class) individuals in a group. Review and repeat what we did last week. We did serve, remember? ( you learn nothing in one lesson) so repetition is good. A-b-a- b Opposites. Extremes and opposites with good players. Hard shots, soft shots, cross/ line etc Compete- there should be an element of competition in every lesson. With younger ones, this could be more team orientated.

Comments are welcome!