If you are not making significant efforts to continually improve as a coach, the chances are that you are falling behind rather than staying the same.
Gary Curneen (The Modern Soccer Coach)
Gary Curneen (The Modern Soccer Coach)
One of the biggest challenges in any field is keeping up to date with the latest trends and ideas, being innovative and fresh and most importantly working out whether the things you are currently doing are actually working.
In the case of Soccer, with its worldwide appeal, national associations and clubs seeking produce the best players and teams, player development is in a state of perpetual evolution.
So how do you stay on top of things? How do you get better? Where do you start? Firstly, there are the coaching education courses run by National Associations. In the USA we are lucky to have not only US Soccer qualifications, but the NSCAA pathway, also. These provide insight and knowledge, feedback from those more experienced and the opportunity to learn with and from peers.
When I initially started coaching, I thought these would provided me with all the answers I required, until I felt ready to take the next course. I'd be able to reference back to my handbooks or visit the site and the solution or the insight would be there. Over time, I realized that certainly wasn't the case. Questions crop up that are just simple answered in the courses, and in most cases couldn't be. One of the major issues is that as the level of coaching courses progress, so does the age and level of player the course is targeted towards. NSCAA Technical Director Ian Barker touched on this issue recently (link to full article here courtesy of The Coaching Manual).
But if somebody, let's say a middle school teacher, really knows child development and they know how to communicate, then we can still offer them a new skill set by helping them to understand the technical and tactical elements of soccer. The 'A' licence or the Premier Diploma might be more for personal professional growth and development because you're not going to go back and apply that information with that younger age group.
For most parent coaches I would say that if you're going to stay with that age group, I would rather you find resources that remain relevant to your age group than rushing in to stuff that you don't really need.
The question this poses then, is where do you find these resources and what if you're not a middle school teacher who understands child development? This is not only related to parent coaches, there also are numerous full time coaches and club administrators seeking to create the best player development environment possible for young players.
There are some fantastic books (stay tuned for future posts on this) and videos but these can be a difficult minefield to navigate, full of sales pitches and unfulfilled promises, which leads us to the title of our blog.
Is Twitter the best coaching education tool available? The social media site has changed the face of news reporting. In its own way it doing the same for coaching education.
Granted the the majority of tweets link you to personal blogs and sites that could be found online but having a defined following list on the topics you are interested in, takes the pain away from wading through non-relevant or useless information. A bit like online shopping versus trawling through the mall, but doing it with all the people you like talking to.
3 Key reasons as to why Twitter should be an essential part of every coaches armory are:
That's all changed and more and more knowledge is being shared for the greater good, rather than retained for personal gain. Looking for a new session? Aside from the official organizations tweeting, there are numerous coaches - young, and old but mainly young - publishing their own work much of it dedicated to working with younger players. For those looking to get more insight into styles and systems of play, the phenomenon of the tactical analysis provides an exacting level of detail into the work of the top coaches and clubs. Personally, I've found pertinent scientific literature and papers to be much more easier to access, particularly since its a long time since I've been in a university library.
If you're looking to get an answer from a senior figure in the game, tweeting a question at them publicly is far more likely to give you a quick reply than via email.
How do you know if any of it is of value? Twitter has an inbuilt (but not fool proof) quality control mechanism via number of followers and like minded rewteeters. Worst case, you could always make your own mind up?
As for those Mourinho drills. You can get them here.
On occasions, your own perspectives will be validated, in other cases they will be challenged, but most of all, you'll be forced to re-evaluate and re-asses, either coming back more convinced in your own ideas or with a new perspective.
For example, have you ever indulged in pseudocoaching?
I'm currently reading (or more accurately, listening to) the book Top Dog by Ashley Merryman and Po Bronson, about the Science behind winning and losing. I ended up purchasing the book after listening to the Coach Your Best podcast series on the book, hosted by Jeremy Boone. I subscribed to the podcast after an episode on Skill Acquisition in which Jeremy interviewed Mark Upton. I first followed Mark after he was retweeted by the author and Coaching expert Lynn Kidman and so on and so forth.
Try following all the people mentioned or linked in this blog and see where it takes you.
Conclusion
Coaches at all levels, but particularly the younger ages, have an obligation to continuous professional development, a duty to learn the best ways to get children to learn the best way. You give yourself a much greater chance of doing so by supplementing your existing knowledge and education, with the information and advice and insight available online and specifically the community via Twitter.
Just don't ask me how you find the time to read it all.
Still not sure you need to? Watch this video and ask yourself how often you see the face pulled at 0.49 in your practices? Courtesy of Ministry of Football.
In the case of Soccer, with its worldwide appeal, national associations and clubs seeking produce the best players and teams, player development is in a state of perpetual evolution.
So how do you stay on top of things? How do you get better? Where do you start? Firstly, there are the coaching education courses run by National Associations. In the USA we are lucky to have not only US Soccer qualifications, but the NSCAA pathway, also. These provide insight and knowledge, feedback from those more experienced and the opportunity to learn with and from peers.
When I initially started coaching, I thought these would provided me with all the answers I required, until I felt ready to take the next course. I'd be able to reference back to my handbooks or visit the site and the solution or the insight would be there. Over time, I realized that certainly wasn't the case. Questions crop up that are just simple answered in the courses, and in most cases couldn't be. One of the major issues is that as the level of coaching courses progress, so does the age and level of player the course is targeted towards. NSCAA Technical Director Ian Barker touched on this issue recently (link to full article here courtesy of The Coaching Manual).
But if somebody, let's say a middle school teacher, really knows child development and they know how to communicate, then we can still offer them a new skill set by helping them to understand the technical and tactical elements of soccer. The 'A' licence or the Premier Diploma might be more for personal professional growth and development because you're not going to go back and apply that information with that younger age group.
For most parent coaches I would say that if you're going to stay with that age group, I would rather you find resources that remain relevant to your age group than rushing in to stuff that you don't really need.
The question this poses then, is where do you find these resources and what if you're not a middle school teacher who understands child development? This is not only related to parent coaches, there also are numerous full time coaches and club administrators seeking to create the best player development environment possible for young players.
There are some fantastic books (stay tuned for future posts on this) and videos but these can be a difficult minefield to navigate, full of sales pitches and unfulfilled promises, which leads us to the title of our blog.
Is Twitter the best coaching education tool available? The social media site has changed the face of news reporting. In its own way it doing the same for coaching education.
Granted the the majority of tweets link you to personal blogs and sites that could be found online but having a defined following list on the topics you are interested in, takes the pain away from wading through non-relevant or useless information. A bit like online shopping versus trawling through the mall, but doing it with all the people you like talking to.
3 Key reasons as to why Twitter should be an essential part of every coaches armory are:
- Open Sharing
That's all changed and more and more knowledge is being shared for the greater good, rather than retained for personal gain. Looking for a new session? Aside from the official organizations tweeting, there are numerous coaches - young, and old but mainly young - publishing their own work much of it dedicated to working with younger players. For those looking to get more insight into styles and systems of play, the phenomenon of the tactical analysis provides an exacting level of detail into the work of the top coaches and clubs. Personally, I've found pertinent scientific literature and papers to be much more easier to access, particularly since its a long time since I've been in a university library.
If you're looking to get an answer from a senior figure in the game, tweeting a question at them publicly is far more likely to give you a quick reply than via email.
How do you know if any of it is of value? Twitter has an inbuilt (but not fool proof) quality control mechanism via number of followers and like minded rewteeters. Worst case, you could always make your own mind up?
As for those Mourinho drills. You can get them here.
- Challenging Accepted Norms
On occasions, your own perspectives will be validated, in other cases they will be challenged, but most of all, you'll be forced to re-evaluate and re-asses, either coming back more convinced in your own ideas or with a new perspective.
For example, have you ever indulged in pseudocoaching?
- The Following Cycle
I'm currently reading (or more accurately, listening to) the book Top Dog by Ashley Merryman and Po Bronson, about the Science behind winning and losing. I ended up purchasing the book after listening to the Coach Your Best podcast series on the book, hosted by Jeremy Boone. I subscribed to the podcast after an episode on Skill Acquisition in which Jeremy interviewed Mark Upton. I first followed Mark after he was retweeted by the author and Coaching expert Lynn Kidman and so on and so forth.
Try following all the people mentioned or linked in this blog and see where it takes you.
Conclusion
Coaches at all levels, but particularly the younger ages, have an obligation to continuous professional development, a duty to learn the best ways to get children to learn the best way. You give yourself a much greater chance of doing so by supplementing your existing knowledge and education, with the information and advice and insight available online and specifically the community via Twitter.
Just don't ask me how you find the time to read it all.
Still not sure you need to? Watch this video and ask yourself how often you see the face pulled at 0.49 in your practices? Courtesy of Ministry of Football.