Journal 23, Week 8

What is one topic from class that you teach your employees? Why?

When I teach tennis, I attempt to let the student sink and swim. I have players from a wide variety of athletic backgrounds and a wide variety of educational standing.

Ideally, I like to work with the smartest and most athletic kids. However, there are only a few that I work with that have both a high athletic ability and a high intellect. My job is easy with them. I can simply show them or tell them how to change something and it usually works.

With a player that lacks athletic ability, but has a high intelect I still show them or tell them how to do something technical. I will let them do the skill to the best of their ability. However, when it is apparant that they cannot accomplish the skill it is important to break down the skill to something smaller. It is what I consider the whole-part-whole teaching concept. I will let them fail at the technical skill and then involve them in a more focused smaller teaching aspect. After they have a grasp of this finer skill, I will put them back into the original drill to see if they developed muscle memory. If they did, then I will finish the drill. If they did not, then I will often stop them and tell them that they need to spend some time over the next few days practicing the smaller skill so we can finish the drill next time. I then move on to a new drill involving something totally different that they may do better.

It is easier to teach an athletic kid that may lack a little intellectual ability. Even though they will not learn as quickly, they are usually able to be taught by associating a tennis skill with a skill that they naturally possess. In doing whole-part-whole teaching, I usually have them go through the part drill while I talk to them in sport terms that they are more familiar with - hitting a baseball or golf ball for example. Once I can get them thinking in comfortable terms I try to make a minor adjustment or two that will adapt their ability into a tennis skill.

With a player that lacks both athletic ability and intellectual capacity, it is much harder to get skills accomplished. But, as John Wooden teaches us, some kids will be C students while their peers are A students. I still attempt the whole-part-whole philosophy with these kids, but I tell myself not to expect perfection, since perfection is likely impossible. I encourage these kids to study themselves and watch good players. I advise them to try to imitate a good players stroke in the mirror at home and maybe even to videotape themselves and compare it. I find that a lot of times, these kids just need to try to copy someone or to see themselves play how they want to look like in order to get results. Regardless, I always encourage these players to work as hard as they possibly can, knowing in my mind that they will never be of an elite caliber. But if they see improvements within themselves, that is all I can ask for.