Planning an Effective Practice

1. Planning an Effective Practice Sue Doering Colfax School District sued@csd300.com Suedoering @gmail.com

2. Philosophy • Daily Plan • Elements of a good practice • Create a Season Plan • Create unity • Create adversity Overview

3. My Philosophy Don’t have to win every match just have to win the one that counts. Be Competitive—never give up, fight to the end What will make us competitive? Skills Knowledge –strategies Strengths and Weaknesses minimize our weaknesses and take advantage of our opponent’s Winning attitudes Out work every team (starts in practice) Play your role—no matter how great or small Want to make the big play Willing to be aggressive and take a risk Want every ball What are you about?

4. Be Consistent (we are not perfect) Practice makes permanent. Perfect practice makes perfect. Expect improvement over the season—consistency, not perfection. Mistakes are a part of the game— good teams play through them. The most consistent team usually wins. Addressing mistakes Volleyball-- Every play ends on a mistake How can you limit yours? How can you make your opponent make more mistakes? Teach kids to play through their mistakes. Make it a positive experience. Players treat each other in a positive way. Coaching with love and support vs. coaching with fear End on a positive. (they’ll want to come back) Even at the end of a very frustrating practice, we will either play a fun game or come together and process what is happening. Try to position them for a championship—skills, strategy, scouting, etc. They have to win it. I’ll help them, support them, coach them regardless of their performance---no fear, no pressure.

5. Put my best athletes in a system that benefits our strengths. Then train them in their position. First Part of the season: 75% time spent on skills and strategy, 25% on mental toughness and team strategy As the season progresses: more time is spent on drills that develop mental toughness and team strategy and less on individual skill and strategy. (the adversity piece) Questions I am constantly asking— Who’s my personnel? What system will work best for my personnel– offensively and defensively. What are their strengths? What are their weaknesses? What needs to be done for the season? What can I do for the future? (ex.: Playing time 3rd game) Know your competition. What will it take to win Never be afraid to change. constantly asking— Who’s my personnel? What system will work

6. Head Coach— Create a program Skills and strategies at each level (teach kids the game) “ If you had control of everything what would it look like? “ • Assistant Coach---JV, C, Frosh, Jr. High, lower Be a team player—support your head coach. Find out what is run at the high school. Skills and strategy Don’t make the head coach reteach.

7. BASIC PRACTICE Warm-up and Stretch team talk, goals for practice Skills and Conditioning- timed, try to stay on schedule Team or individual play usually end with scoring: There is a winner and loser Teach kids to compete! If we have competed all practice, we will end with a fun game. The Daily Plan

8. Time • Start on time, stay on time, finish on time, don’t drag over. If it doesn’t get done, work on it tomorrow. Organize plans on time, try and stick to amount of minutes given. Having everything on a time keeps things moving • Timed water breaks (1-2 min) • Drills--10-15 minute then change. Helps them stay focused and mentally engaged If you need to work longer on a skill, change drills to work the same skill. Exception: some parts of the game takes longer chunks of time, i.e. 20-30 min. • Percentage of total time spent on certain skills daily: in volleyball, 30% of time on serve, 30% serve receive, 40% on other things • Vary drills. Alternate the pace, fast and slow. Another example would be to condition then do a slower paced drill. Elements of an Effective Practice

9. Alternate offensive and defensive days: drills on those days are specific to defense or offense. • Certain things are practiced every day. pick 1 or 2things you have to do to win games—practice them every day. Conditioning (mental toughness) • 1-2 days of conditioning—ideally Mon and Tues • Vary times. Condition at beginning then make them concentrate on technique when tired. Condition at the end execute skills without fatigue factor (I do both) Condition using the ball and skills used on the court or on the field.

10. Feed back praise, correct, praise (Mary Poppins—spoon full of sugar) What are they doing right? Catch them doing it. Coach to the positive—use DO’s not DON’T’s. Try to end practice with positive feeling. Do everything you can to help them want to come to practice. Coach involvement bring intensity (moving and talking) Demand and expect their involvement--physically, mentally, emotionally Intensity---Should build during the week Jim Rosenbeck theory---1 or 2 perfect performances Move through the week and build in intensity Learn to coach through your leadership— I add pressure situations and stress starting at the beginning of the season and have kids work through it as a team. Use your captains and leadership in problem solving Why is a drill or skill breaking down? What do we have to do to execute as a team? How do we get our team to execute with or without pressure?

11. Social Kids are social. Allow time to talk, then move on. They have to learn self discipline. They have to know when to work and when to play. Some kids have to be taught how to get back to work. Play and fun is important for younger players because you want them to love the game and stick with it. We don’t waste a lot of time but we do talk and laugh during warm-ups. Once practice gets going it is about getting things done. (If something is funny—have fun.) Be specific about which times are important for concentrating. Certain skills are no talk and total concentration---ex. serving in volleyball, free throws in basketball The younger the kids are, the more time is spent doing fun drills and mini games.

12. KNOW WHERE YOU ARE HEADED GOALS---attainable, observable, measurable Long Term season goals both team and individual Short Term weekly due on Monday 3 skill, 1 attitude, and 1-2 team goals The Overall Plan

13. Season starts for me, as my husband says, scouting at state for the following year. • I check other teams—offensive and defensive systems, players, tendencies, serve receive patterns. • I look at coaching styles, coaching systems and schemes. Summertime (13 days) • Personal Camp • Summer League—free, whoever shows up • Team Camp • 2-3 Tournaments • Open gyms, weight lifting • Send a letter 3 weeks before the season starts. This includes a workout with conditioning and ball workout

14. Preseason and Early Season Midseason End of Season Season Plan

15. Preseason and early season are centered primarily around developing my individual players, their skills and strategies. Establishing our offensive system and defensive system • Focus on conditioning, basic fundamentals, some team play (depending on team level) • I want individuals to have strong fundamentals and team concepts • Add enough team play to be competitive Establish Roles • —they could change. • Where do I see them fitting in? • What are their strengths and what do they need to work on? • Where do I need them to improve? • What holes do I need someone to fill? • Team strengths and weaknesses Preseason/Early Season

16. Establish team chemistry- • Only positive comments, • leadership, train court leader(s), competitive thinking My focus in matches. • Take League 1 match at a time—working on individual skills and offense and defensive system. • Take my best athletes and train them to do what I want and need them to do. Look at performances —wishes and pluses (What we wish would have happened. What positives did happen.) • How can we get our best performance? • What do we need to work on for the next match?

17. Midseason • Focus on combination drills, complex skills, review basics-1 skill a day, more team play • Revisit goals. This is the tough part of season. Obstacles such as homecoming, long road trips, midterms provide distractions and can derail a team. • Play certain stretches of points that are giving us problems from each rotation. 0-5, 10-15, 15-20. • Keep reinforcing system—ideal play • Prepare for important league matches—might watch film • Try and add something new. Keeps things fresh. I never want to be the same team at the end of the season Skills should build upon each other, add something new to prevent boredom. Midseason

18. End of season Intensity picks up • Team drills, review complex drills, revisit goals, game situations • For playoffs, I set up situations and use score clock • Work on specific substitutions at specific times • Be a perfectionist—Don’t let little things slide: I demand execution. End of Season

19. Done throughout season • Unity is about trust. • Unity promotes enthusiasm and communication. • Unity helps your team solve problems together Helps them work together more efficiently Develop your leadership--- I do frustration drills, drills that find breaking point of team and individuals. The leaders have to figure out how to work through frustrations and adversity. They need to know who can work through it. Validation---”gold starring” We validate each player’s strengths. • Discuss individual roles and what situations we would use them in. • Players tell us (coaches and teammates) what they need from us in a pressure situation. • Each team member should know what they have to do to help their teammates play better. Create Unity

20. Every game has moments of adversity. Adversity teaches me about my players’ attitudes and behaviors. Also I find out what my players need from me. It is critical for the team to be tough and able to work through adversity together. Fight or flight • Which players are your fighters ? (Which would rather flee?) • Who are your clutch players? • Who do you need on the court or field to make kids play better? (Chemistry) Trains them to become risk takers • Train all athletes, individual and team, to want to take the risk. • Teaches players to stay aggressive. Usually the team that stays aggressive and plays strong will win the game. I want them to learn to stay aggressive even when things aren’t going their way. Create adversity

21. Mental practice • —visualization—see themselves doing the skill that wins the game and feeling all those emotions when it happens. Physical Practice Here coaching with fear and punishment often makes teams implode—fight among themselves, break emotionally, and physically Use practices—create pressure so they must focus and concentrate in the pressure situation Use frustration drills in practice where you push them to their limits especially your key players, . Make them start drills over. Call bad calls against them. Make them earn their way out of situations. Train them to handle stressful times and work through them (individually and as a team) Try everything during the season—what works, what doesn’t. Pray we get put in every situation we need to. Ask for feedback—individuals, team, captains, assistant coaches

22. End of the season The last couple of weeks we do a lot of running laps if balls drop or the team looses. We talk about visualizing –seeing themselves win the game. If you concentrate on the game and talk, your body will relax and you will play smooth. I should know what I have to do to help my players play their best. -I know what my players look like when they are playing well. (that might not be reflected by the score at that time) -At the end of the season, I know if I can yell or have to be soft spoken. I know when I have to sub. - When it comes down to it, my players know that I will do whatever it takes to win the game.

23. Planning an Effective Practice Sue Doering Colfax School District sued@csd300.com Suedoering @gmail.com