The pedagogy of sport

The role of the sports coach

Sport is increasingly about building not only the athlete (the young person) but also the individual, in how that person is and how they act in society.

Sport, clearly understood as cultural and social in character, cannot be separated from concern for the education and development of young people.

It is up to you, as the sports coach, to pass on, clearly and intelligibly, not only motor and behavioural skills but also the culture inherent in the sport being practised (history, values and more), and so to create a favourable environment.

For sport to have a teaching impact as a form of culture and of "human development", you need to create a model of leadership, setting objectives, rules, sanctions and a way of organising activities.

In child and youth sport you often see attitudes or behaviour that are less than satisfactory, such as bad habits or deviations, which do not match the character of the sporting environment. You therefore need to invest in that change of attitude, because you are the main person who acts on the value system.

Technical and teaching skills

You need to show technical competence in the specific field of your sport, but you also need teaching skills so that you can pass on technical know-how.

That means an attitude that shows your technical and tactical knowledge (recognition of authority), grounded in an interpersonal relationship (assertive communication and leadership).

The leadership process

When leading groups, whether athletes or coaches of an equal or lower grade, you, as a Level II coach, should take care to carry out pedagogical supervision properly.

In the process by which you guide another coach in their professional, personal and human development:

1. The mentor's task: a willing frame of mind is needed.
2. Foster trust: positive intervention.
3. Structure the supervision process:
   • The institution's philosophy: inform the trainee and clear up any doubts about the host institution.
   • Define and plan observations of training and competitions.
   • Define and plan analysis meetings (follow-up).
   • Check updates to the trainee coach's file.

In this mentoring process of the Level II coach, there should be an exchange of views (between the mentor and the trainee), and moments of reflection and self-knowledge should be encouraged (whether by direct observation or self-observation).

In the process by which you guide athletes and pass skills on to them, in a sporting and an educational sense, you should do so in a didactic way:

Planning activities

• Objectives
• Tasks

Exercises

In a technical, tactical and didactic way, according to the person in question.

You will need to create responsibilities with the athletes in question.

The model of training and competition should take the athlete's development into account, both in growth and in maturation.

Content, volumes, intensities and load should therefore be adapted to each person. This affects all structures and functions in an uneven and individual way. The rate of growth over time, for example, varies with each young person.

Bodily changes are characterised as growth (transverse and longitudinal) and relationship (head, trunk and limbs).

You should therefore pay attention to the athletes' biological growth, with a particular focus on managing training load.

• Locomotor system
• Organic system (cardiorespiratory)
• Perceptive-kinetic system (nerves)

Your role goes further than the motor and physical side of each athlete. Beyond that, there are other factors you do not control, to do with each athlete's temperament and way of being.

Many situations are linked to the setting in question, or simply to the fact that each person manages emotions differently.

Success and failure

It is therefore up to you to manage situations of success or failure in competition, to put victory and defeat in perspective, and to assess the situation and the development of each athlete.

Where the target group in child and youth sport is still at initiation or orientation, you should put winning or losing in competition in perspective, and instead value progress and performance during the championship.

After each performance in competition, you and the athlete should have a moment alone, in which you can assess with them their perception of the event, and talk about the points to improve, for example.

At the more advanced level (such as specialisation and high performance), these situations will be quite different, or they will not exist. The objectives, age, and level of growth and maturation (as mentioned above) are different.

Success and failure in learning are always the responsibility of the two parties involved: the person who teaches and the person who learns.

Often those in charge, coaches, parents and officials consider victory the only criterion that identifies success. They state this, and they show that attitude to children and young people who take part in sport, giving meaning and value only to victory and to winners.

Besides putting sporting learning at risk, this situation can lead to dropping out in many cases.

It is up to you to make clear that, besides being a situation without full control (over opponents, conditions, judges and so on), it is an unrealistic situation. Development and progress should be promoted, and improvement encouraged. Victory or defeat, success or failure, should be put in perspective, and effort, commitment and dedication should be recognised, especially in the early stages with groups of children.

For children or young people, the idea of self-improvement should be linked more closely to the pursuit of learning goals and personal progress, and more closely to the effort each person is able to give to each realistic task or objective.

Models of intervention

You should intervene appropriately to regulate each participant's self-improvement and intrinsic motivation, encouraging a liking and an enthusiasm for the sport, through praise and through realistic, achievable objectives and rules, giving the young person a chance to take part, knowing how to listen, and keeping them informed, on the basis of a positive relationship.

There are several models of intervention:

• Directing (low competence and low commitment)
• Delegating (high competence and low commitment)
• Guidance (high competence and high commitment)

It is up to you to know which one to use, and with which athlete, taking as your reference whether the athlete has low or high competence and what their level of commitment is.

This model of teaching intervention in training and competition goes beyond the technical and tactical matters that are taught. It also includes the way you relate to the participant. That runs from making reprimands according to level and development; reprimanding the behaviour and not the person's worth; the second part of a reprimand should be praise; reprimanding at the time of the incident and in private if possible; and showing sincere interest in the person you reprimand.

In both praise and reprimand, any participant who is to improve needs clear and concise interventions, both on their behaviour and attitudes and on the level of their performance. They are therefore two essential tools in your work as a coach, used to secure the conditions best suited to the participants' progress.

The coach's duties

• Verbal communication (language, tone, volume of the voice).
• Non-verbal communication (gaze, body movements, facial expressions, body positions).
• Communicate in a way that is simple, clear, audible, concrete, specific and positive.
• Always show that you are open and available to athletes who want to speak to you.

With calm and low hostility, seek to encourage, and intervene on behaviour and attitude.

The coach's concerns

• Preparation habits (punctuality, looking after equipment, getting changed, the warm-up, and so on).
• A calm and steady environment.
• Directing the athletes' focus (learning, improvement, satisfaction, and less focus on the result).
• A progressive organisation of the warm-up.
• Positive, specific and clear interventions.