How to Coach a Great Group Lesson

This is all about how to run an engaging group tennis lesson. As a coach this is how you can expand your clientele by showcasing how great a tennis session with you can be. 

I cover how’s it’s ok to have a different coaching style and you should lean into your strengths. A poor lesson though is found on the extremes, from far too boring and technical to full of nothing but ‘hoo haha’, full of enthusiasm but ineffective.

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Cheers

Rick

Transcript

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The art of tennis. The art of tennis. Coaches, Rick from the Art of Tennis here. Welcome to episode six. So today we're gonna have a a look at the group lesson. So as tennis coaches who the group lesson is that's the first opportunity we get normally to prove ourselves as a coach. We may have a group of kids. We'll look at kids' lessons. Now all of this does apply to adults, but the majority of your lessons will be kids. So that is what I'll focus on. So if we've got a group lesson, let's say four kids, four, maybe six kids, where I coach at Scarborough Tennis Academy, we do four kids for the younger, younger classes. So for under pretty much under tens, we only keep four per class. Now we've done six before, we've even done seven. After COVID, we had to change to four to keep up with the crazy rules, and we ended up keeping it because it worked really well. So we charged a little bit more per kid, but kept it at four per per class, which which means that you've got four squares on a court, just works really nicely. So if we're looking at four, maybe six in a class. Now, if the coach is just meeting the kids for the first time, it's really important to gain their gain their trust and gain their respect. So to gain their trust and to gain their respect, you will need to talk to them and ask them about themselves. So, like any adult, kids love being asked a question about themselves. Um, now that question might be what school do you go to? Um, I will definitely throw in random questions like what's your favorite fruit or what's your favorite sandwich. I find that little bit of random randomness works because after all, we're talking about kids. So you can you can throw things like that in. But once you've gained their their trust, the trust is also about using their name. So when they hear their name, little Johnny or uh you know little little uh little Rachel. Alright, I'm not can't think of names at the moment, but if we're using their names, then they are immediately giving you their trust. And so the respect will come, the respect side comes a little bit differently. So the respect side is you keeping control, keeping control of the lesson, all right. You want to show them what they are expected to do, where your boundaries are as far as behavior and listening and what you're meant to do, and they need to know that you're their leader, all right? You're not you're not their friend. Now, coaches make the mistake of wanting the kids to like them so much that they might say, Oh, so what game do you want to play? Now, kids are not really gonna know, maybe then they don't know one game or two games, but you are six of them, you'll get six different responses, and then you're gonna have to vote for it, and it gets very tricky. So, I don't recommend that you take the tact of, in an effort to make them like you, that you say, Oh, what do you want to play? What do you want to do? That's not how it works, that's not how a school teacher works, and it's certainly not how tennis teacher or tennis coach should work. So, we should be controlling what we're doing. Uh, if we get to a situation where that you've covered what you wanted to cover in the lesson, and maybe you want to play a game, you could say, Oh, do you want to play this game or do you want to play this game? The two choices is easier for their little minds to go, oh, this, and maybe you vote on that. But to give them an unlimited choice and ask them to come up with it's a really bad idea. It's like walking into a candy store and asking them, okay, so what do you want? And they're like, just everything, okay. So that's the first thing, and that's how respect is respect is earned from the kids by showing leadership, all right, and them knowing what those boundaries are. And so we've we've got that trust, we've built that respect. Now, here's the deal: different coaches have different styles of of coaching or different styles of teaching. Now, you can have uh you can have a very loud, direct, military style coach, um, and that is just their style. Now, we don't want them to be ordering 40 push-ups and things like that to be inappropriate for a mini class, but that that more directive cell coach is actually coming from their personality, and they're gonna have a very upbeat with firm boundary type session. Now that's fine, that's fine if that's their natural coaching style. Um, what they call in the disc model D-I-S-C, which is a type of personality test, um, and also can apply to your coaching style. So D is I think it's called direct directive. Uh, I may have that wrong, but it's directive, so you know, no betting around the bush. This is what we got to do, normally quite loud. Uh, and so that's a certain coaching style, so directive. Now, there's the the I and the disc model is inspiring, and so inspiring is also normally quite enthusiastic and upbeat, enthusiastic, um, but a little bit less on the the military style and more on the come on, we can do this, let's have a go. So, you're inspiring them through. Now, the other two in the disc, there's uh the S is uh steady and C is compliant. Now, these are a little bit more nuanced to explain, but the the steady is the coach who who they don't have as much up and down, like a directive or a or an inspirer. There's not as much maybe enthusiasm. They they're just a bit they're just that they kind of go through the motions and they can be fantastic coaches because they're the calm, the the players know what to expect, uh almost predictable in the in what they do, though they will repeat the activities that the kids like, they'll repeat them a bit, which is good, and so that's just steady, and then your compliant is often the compliant type coaches they they really want to get a plan, right? They're the they're concerned about making sure they're ticking off the the right boxes to cover for that lesson. So the the compliance style coaches often will write down little lessons, lesson plans. Um, I'm not an expert in that in the disc model of coaching, but it's something that you could look up further. Um, there is a gentleman, Bo Hanson, who is a former Olympian who has a I do forget what it's called, but it is uh runs off that disc model, and you can find out what your natural style of coaching is. Alright, so you've got that style. Now I'm an I, so I'm naturally an inspiring style coach, um which is which is fine because that suits me, but the next coach is gonna have a different style. So I guess my point of this is that there is no one exact personality or exact coaching style that is the only one that works. Alright, they can all work, but what you've got to be careful of is I'll talk about the two extremes, all right. Two two extremes of the spectrum. So we might have a coach who's highly technical, they really want to get their technique taught. Uh, maybe they're a little bit on the compliance side, so they're wanting to make sure that they got this and that and this and that. Now that's fantastic if you can communicate that in simple bite-sized pieces for the kids to take in, then that's great. You can achieve a lot by going through that. The issue with this extreme, if you're someone really technical and you're talking to a bunch of five or six-year-olds, is that their attention span is maybe a minute while they're listening to you, and maybe five minutes while they're doing the activity. So you've got to be really careful not to get too technical and get bogged down in detail that doesn't need to be delivered from the get-go. So you might just be focusing on maybe turning shoulders, alright? Turning the shoulders and then let them have a go. Um, you don't need to turn shoulders, push on the legs, rotate the hip, internally rotate. This this sort of stuff is just it's a bit silly to go into that level of detail for the kids. So that's the extreme one end, alright. Highly technical, detail oriented, but the problem is, as you can probably guess, could be really boring, right? So this is going to be really boring for the kids, and often there's a lot of talking from the coaches going over this. And the kids are standing there, they're listening, they get to that one minute, they've tuned out, they get to two minutes, they might be hitting the tennis ball when they shouldn't. Three minutes, maybe they're hitting their little mates' shoes, four minutes, they're making stupid noises, it's all over. Game, set, match kids. So you you you've got to be really careful with that if you are getting too technical and on the boring side of things. Now, what also happens with that style coach is they don't really want the kids to try anything until they've learned that step, that step, that step, that step. And so then the kids are in sort of an old school style of lineup, right? And you don't want lines, okay. Back in the day, even when I was learning tennis, we had a lot of lines, maybe we weren't in the line long. We play a shot, we run to the other side, and this sort of stuff. Now, for many years, 20 years or so, lines out, lines are out. You don't want lines, okay. Reason is lines can cause problems because the kids are bored, they're sitting there, they're not engaged, there's one person hitting, and maybe there's three to five if we're taking that size group four to six. We've got three to five kids waiting in line, all right. So that's no good, they're not doing anything. And so you you've got to be careful of that style of coaching. Lines should never happen. Never happen. Line this way, even the line this way, if they're doing one at a time and you're feeding a ball, feeding a ball, you're not covering enough. All right, you're not getting them hitting. Now, for example, they could be starting their own shot by dropping their own ball and practicing. That could get everybody hitting at the same time. Or even better, we go down to the we've got a hitter and we've got a receiver. Okay, so in tennis, there's always a hitter, a striker, and there's always a receiver. Okay, so if we take that from a boxing point of view, all right, you're trying to evade the the punches and you're trying to punch. Okay, so there's two, and that's exactly what tennis is. So a good way to avoid those lines is actually talk to them about okay, you two are the receivers, and this is your job. You're gonna start in this position, ready position, strong legs, ready racket, and you're gonna watch their ball come. All right, if they're the hitter, maybe we've started them where they would turn their shoulders and they've dropped and they're playing their first forehand. And if you do it that way, the receivers are learning the receiving skills, which is absolutely essential in tennis, and then you've got people starting the rally. The coach is not even involved at that point. The coach demonstrates how to do it and then allows the kids to practice. So that's one way to turn that line uh that line detailed coaching and turn it into something a bit more engaging. So the detailed coaching, I mean, in a way, it's good to get technical. You do want to cover technique because on the other end of the extreme is what I'll call the really enthusiastic coach who doesn't teach anything. So now that really enthusiastic coach, they might be shouting out, Oh, great job, great hit there, Johnny! And they might go carry on with all of this hoo-ha, which again can be great, but their hoo-ha might not actually have any teaching points. So they might be letting the kids rally, or maybe they're just playing some knockout game. A lot of times, this extreme side of coaching, they'll be doing a knockout game. One shot, oh yup you come, you're a catcher. Um, you know, this sort of stuff. Now, again, for five minutes is fine, but if you're not actually helping them get better at what they're doing, then you're not doing your job. So that's that highly enthusiastic coach. The they're not boring, maybe the kids really enjoy it, but they're not going to improve enough, okay, because they're not getting any technical feedback and instruction. They're just getting the the hoo-ha, the enthusiastic, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, good job. So the key is is not one extreme and not the other extreme, but you need to teach a little bit of technique, bite-sized pieces of technique, and do it in an engaging way. So rather than trying to tackle six parts of the forehand, all right, maybe you look at one part and let them rally it out, receivers and hitters. And then that's a much better way to be teaching them something, but at the same time, the the learning how to do rally skills. Many years ago, uh, I don't know what year, I was in England in 2005 working in in Cambridge at a next generation there, and mini tennis was massive. All right, mini tennis had come in. The UK were early adopters of mini tennis. So, mini tennis was about modified balls, modified courts, uh, obviously modified rackets, and the whole idea was the balls bounce lower, the courts a bit shorter, and it's all relative to their size. Um, I think it's great. I'm I'm a fan of mini tennis or hot shots tennis in Australia. Uh, you got red ball for the young kids, orange ball, green ball, and then you go to yellow, yellow ball. Um, I'm all for it. Alright, there are some coaches, old school coaches, like, oh, why don't they just start on a yellow ball? Look, that's fine. The odd kid, one in 20, who's extremely talented, can probably go to that yellow ball uh quickly. Um, but for the majority of kids, it is much smarter and more fun for them to be using these these balls, these modified balls, so they bounce lower, they move slower through the air, and the players are gonna get longer rallies because of it. And that's that's that's fantastic, that's what you want. So, one of the rules we have at Scarborough Tennis Academy is 50% of the 50% of the kids need to be active. So, if you're doing you've got four kids, you've got two, one hitting, how are you gonna involve at least one more? Hopefully, all of them, but a minimum one more. So, if you've got that long line with one hitter, you're involving one of the four, or maybe one of the six if you're doing a bigger group lesson. All right, and that's failing the 50% rule. So you you need to have maybe it's one hitter, maybe it's one catcher, maybe it's one person behind them shadow swinging, maybe it's two kids behind them doing star jumps at the same time, right? Not exactly tennis, but at least they're engaged and they're doing something. Right? So think about how you can meet that 50% kids active at all times. For me, I'm more like 100% kids active at all times, and you can do that by using the receivers, rotating them around quickly, etc. etc. So that's gonna be really important. Um, as a tennis coach, you've got to be careful not to get stuck again, not to get stuck on just one thing because you're you're more like a conductor uh where you've got kids doing something over here and kids doing something over there. And once you start applying this 50% uh kids active all the time, you do need to think and you may need to explain to them all right, if you're at this end, your job is to split step and be like this. Or if you're the hitter, your job might be to do a half serve and you're gonna call one, two, three, right? You're explaining to them, and then you're getting it started, and you're watching it like a like you're conducting it, you're not just one person, you're you're conducting what's going on. Maybe you've got the receivers, you've got the hitters, and you've got someone doing star jumps. Again, I'm just using the star jump as a as an example. It's not not the hitter or a receiver, but you're looking and you're constantly looking across and you're conducting. All right, okay, switch, you're here, you're here, you're here. So that's really important. Um for me, when I got up to Darwin, okay, dropped out of university, um, my lessons as a kid, my before I got to squad level, where you're playing a lot of points and stuff out, I do remember pretty much hitting three forehands, going to the other side, hitting three backhands, going to the other side, playing skeleton, playing jail, that's it. All right, now that's all I knew. And then as I got to I got to Darwin first time, and I saw the coaches there were more about lots of rotation. Okay, it was it was still a little bit of feeding base, but there was rotation. You go to here, you're up there, you're a volyer, you're around here. And so that was far more fast-paced, and I learned a lot from that. Another one of the coaches up at Darwin was very much about the the game-based approach. Now, the game-based approach is a philosophy that kids learn through doing, through playing. Okay, through playing points and perceiving a high ball, perceiving a low ball, and and adjusting to there rather than getting fed a ball that's perfect. Now that's great. I love the game-based approach. Uh, I think over time, well, I think the game-based approach maybe has been abused a little bit and gone down to the extreme end of the enthusiastic hoo-ha coach who's like, Yeah, good job, well done, Sally, well done, Jimmy, good job, well done, but no feedback, no feedback, no, no, Jimmy. You've got to just try to get your split step there, Jimmy. Or Jimmy, let's let's let's try to uh let's try to track the ball a little bit earlier, Jimmy. All right, well, maybe we follow through and get our torch shining down the court, Jimmy. So the Who Ha enthusiastic coach has maybe taken game-based. Um, you know, that's a that's a negative stereotype of game base, is just letting them play but not giving them any feedback. But I do believe in game base because that's going with the engagement that I believe in as well. Um, so you've got you really need to be combined combining game-based, all right, as in letting them rally with technical instruction. Okay, so that first hitter, they may be your focus technically, and then the receiver is is rallying and using their perception skills to try to build the point. But you need this this engagement is how you're gonna keep kids. Now, this is this channel is actually gonna be more about how you build your tennis business. But the truth is to build your tennis business, you need to get it's going to be better for the kids. So if you're a better coach, then it's better for the kids, and more kids are gonna come and they're gonna come back, they're gonna stay longer. So if you if you can build their engagement in the session, then your business is going to do better, you're gonna get a better reputation, and it's better for the kids because they're gonna build their skill base. So that's the that's the key is engagement. Think about 50% kids active at all times, use the modified balls, all right? Uh with the with the absolute exception of the odd kid who transitions really fast. Um, and use your natural style of coaching, but make sure that you're teaching both technique and you're teaching rally skills. Okay, and finally, it's bite-sized pieces of information. Don't try to get everything into their little minds at once. It's a mistake I used to make once I did a did a couple of coaching courses. I thought I knew a whole lot of stuff, and I thought I needed to communicate that, right? The truth is you need to communicate one bite-sized piece even per lesson, or two bite-sized pieces per lesson. Keep reinforcing that. Add little games and drills that help that particular bite-sized piece, all right. So there's something called constraints-based coaching, which I really believe in, which means you can modify the game or the rally to help you achieve what you're trying to achieve. All right, so maybe you get a kid stand close to the net, the other kid is learning how to go low to high more, and so they are trying to lob them. You don't even need to say lob them. You might need to say, All right, there's a kid there, you've got to get it over them to win. Suddenly, they're going up a lot more than they were before. That's a constraint that helps them achieve their goal. So, group lessons, very important. It's where you're gonna build your program, okay? And you're gonna hopefully be training other coaches as well on how to build their how to how to get more out of their group lessons, and it's where you're going to get private lessons come from. So, group lessons, you can get private lessons for the both the really keen kids, um, and sometimes you might get it for the kids who are struggling, but they really enjoy it and they want to kind of lift their level a little bit more. Uh, that's it, group lesson. Thanks very much. Uh cheers, we'll see you next time. The art of tenant, art of tenant.