Traditional Approach to Sports Coaching

Traditional Approach to Coaching

Traditional approaches to sports coaching focus on the technique of particular skills within a sporting scenario. This approach involves direct instructions from the coach when using drills that involve repetition in order to achieve higher levels of skill.

The major key to the traditional approach to sports coaching is ensuring the participants gain the basic level of skill, which then eases them into the sporting scenario with further development and progression to enhance their skills. In a nut shell, the traditional approach can be started by practising simple techniques over and over again until the technique is perfect which then the skill set will be developed and repetition will begin again.

From the coach’s side of thing the traditional approach hinders their creativity and stamp on the drills and sessions. This is because the participants will have to act out certain techniques within the specific sport that can’t be altered if the skill is to be learned. However this then makes the planning and setting up of those drills easier for the coach, as they will be following a technique which is available within coaching books or online. This then makes this particular approach very instruction heavy, as the participants must follow a set technique or skill set that has been previously studied by the coach themselves.

This approach however can then also be tedious for the participants. Because they are repeating the same manoeuvre’s over and over again, they can be seen as to become bored and restless with the drills. This is especially seen in people who have previous experience in the specific sport being coached during that session. As well this means that the instructions hinder the participants freedom, which disables them from trying new skills or adapting philosophies or styles of their own within that particular sport.