Welcome to my new blog,
This is the first edition of "Chapman's Chapters" which will be a weekly insight in to what I have learnt on my pathway to attainting more knowledge and insight in to how people learn skills most effectively and what great practice really looks/feels like.
This week I am going to focus on "Smart Learning Strategies" and how we can help people understand "how to learn", as this is just as important as giving people the information of "what to learn" as without the how, the what is irrelevant. On my PDP I have decided to learn a foreign language (French), and be able to conduct a golf lesson in it, so I will keep you updated on my progress with this using various learning strategies to see how affective they are and which ones I find best.
As golf coaches, or coaches in any other field for that matter, we are trained intensely on "what to coach" people in order for them to achieve. We are also taught "how to coach" in terms of explanation and demonstration BUT are we given enough information of "how people learn" and what are the most effective learning strategies?
I don't feel that I was and it has certainly been the no.1 subject that I have targeted my personal CPD on over the past 12 months. The three main sources of information have been thetalentcode.com, the99percent.com and blogs.kqed.org/mindshift along with my own experiences of learning and coaching.
We live in a society which tells us to avoid failures and that if we do fail we should hide it so no one knows we messed up.....but why? Creative failure is great for learning, sometimes we cannot move forwards without failure. For example, take the rocks above in the water. If we wanted to cross the water we would carefully work out a strategy to step on the rocks which posed the easiest path across. But what if one of the rocks is loose and we only find this out by stepping on it and falling in? We have failed but this has been a smart/creative failure as we now know not to step on that rock. It is only a "dumb" failure if we were to step on that rock again.
What are the key traits of people who learn efficiently?
- They think about thinking, to continually check that they understand the skill
- Watch videos of the skill being done correctly to build a mental image of how it looks
- Practice things over and over again until they have become automatic (deep practice & myelination - more on this next week)
- Schedule practice time in order to "master" the new skill
- Analyse the outcome (e.g. the shot) to give themselves immediate feedback on their performance
- Stores past successes and forgets failures after learning from it
What can we do as coaches to help the learning process during the lesson?
- Ask the golfer questions to help their knowledge and switch their brains on, e.g. when a student says why did the ball go over there, instead of just telling them the answer ask them questions until they find out the answer for themselves - make the golfer reach for the answer
- Get them to repeat the movement in super slo motion to fire the signals from the brain to the muscle groups being used (again myelination) - the more this happens the quicker the movement becomes automatic
"I have never failed, I've just found a 1,000 ways that won't work" Thomas Edison on inventing the lightbulb
"Don't be afraid of the person whose practiced 10,000 kicks once, be afraid of the person whose practiced one kick 10,000 times." Bruce Lee
This weeks practice tip:
Use the acronym S.I.G. for your practice:
S = Small - as in one specific skill area (e.g. putting)
I = Intense - keeps the mind switched on (The Goldilocks Rule - more on this in later blogs)
G = Games - competitive games to be precise, driving you towards your goal with emotion
Below is Novak Djokovic showing us his SIG for practicing volleying. How can this practice be translated into other sports or fields?
Golfing Example:
Set-up a hula hoop 3 paces in front of you and one on the ground a further 3 paces in front. Aim is to hit a wedge shot through one hula hoop and land in the other. Score 5 points for each hula hoop (i.e. miss the first one but score the second = 5points, hit both = 10 points). Play 10 shots and see how many you score, play this game with different clubs to work on ball flight control and aim to beat your personal best each time you practice.
Variations = different distances of the hula hoops; reverse clubs (i.e. LW for low shot and 7iron for high shot); swap clubs/target every shot
First two shots = through hoop and land in first hoop
Final shot = over hoop and land in 2nd hoop
FYI club was a PW)
Coaching educational book I am currently reading: The Talent Code by Daniel Coyle.........again
General book I am reading: One Day in September: The Full Story of the 1972 Munich Olympics Massacre
Next on my list: The Champion in All of Us: 12 Rules for Success by Steve Backley
Next week................Myelination & R.E.P.S
Any feedback, thoughts, comments etc?
ReplyDeleteAll appreciated.
Thanks
Ed
Hi Ed
ReplyDeleteYou are setting yourself quite a task to turn out one of these every week. As I have found in trying to write simple summary texts for archaeology, it is a very effective way of teaching yourself, as you soon realise how much extra you need to know to communicate even simple ideas to others.
I like the ‘pathway to attaining knowledge’, followed by the photograph of the rocks in the stream, very ‘Kung Fu’. Although you may not be familiar with the old David Carradine 'Kung Fu'; the Shaolin monk, Kwai Chang Caine, travelling through the USA righting wrongs and passing on his Buddhist philosophy of life, the universe and everything. ‘He who crosses stream twice and falls on same lose rock - will be wet for life’. Need to work on that punch line.
Dad
Hello Ed, that is rather interesting. How people learn is important but not something that is usually considered, which is a pity given the importance of education.
ReplyDeleteThe fear of failure is crippling in our society, as failing to be successful immediately is seen as a personal deficiency, not part of the creative process. Of course, the approach of the trainer or teacher is important, as that can create a fear of failure, or of hiding the failure.
pat
As you say, practice and time discipline are very important, i try to put those into practice, not always successfully, in trying to learn french and the importance of comet strikes in prehistory and on human psychology.
Dad - I do like the Kwai Chang Caine quote, so very true. If we ignore failures and mistakes we will inevitably make them again. It is quite a task but this time of year I certainly have the time to do them during the middle of the day. The time consuming bit is doing the video for it.
ReplyDeleteMum - We are indeed crippled by fear of failure and not immediately being successful leads people (especially children) into believing they are stupid or incompetent as they are praised for results/innate ability and not the process which achieves excellence and good results.
Ed