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Post by nltdiego on Dec 16, 2016 7:49:48 GMT -6
We had a problem with kids staying engaged this year during practice. Example, on walk thru for offense we would explain a new play and 2nd O would come out and not be able to run the play because not paying attention. On D we had same issue. Look in back and see socializing a ton when instruction going on.
Biggest issue was during team even though 1s are getting instruction and reps the 2s felt it was period they could mess around.
What are some ways you kept team engaged and make sure they were paying attention?
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Post by donaldduck on Dec 16, 2016 8:37:25 GMT -6
How is your practice divided? We typically go Individual, one special team, Group, another special team, and team. That's overly generalized of course, but it keeps kids in smaller groups, therefore getting more reps. Teach the new play in Indy, reinforce it in Group, and by Team, you can have a little more assurance that it'll come out mostly right. Also try to make subs sporadically instead of wholesale.
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Post by 53 on Dec 16, 2016 8:46:31 GMT -6
Don't give them the chance to stand around and zone out by how you structure practice. If they're not zoned in enough, give them a little PIE and get back to work quickly.
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Post by lions23 on Dec 16, 2016 10:39:32 GMT -6
You should spend fifteen minutes in the classroom installing and then have both groups actually walking through at practice. What you are describing is not a walk through. The kids should be doing the work and making adjustments during a walk through.
What you are describing is instruction time.
Kids want to play that is why they signed up. If you need to teach do it in the classroom. During practice the kids should be practicing.
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Post by carookie on Dec 16, 2016 11:04:45 GMT -6
1. Chunking- break things up into smaller bits, the longer the amount of any given thing the greater the opportunity to be distracted.
2. Movement- If the primary verb they are doing is listening then they will get bored quickly. If you have 12 players in your indy group, and you are talking to them, and having three walk through movements then the other 9 are not really actively engaged. Limit your talking, or at the very least talk while they are moving.
3.Be Engaging- If your voice is one that they want to listen to they will pay more attention when you speak, if not they will ignore you.
Step away from practice once and look and see how much time is spent with kids just standing around; most teams are HORRIBLE in the amount of time they waste with kids standing, and then we blame them for not being engaged.
Also, you wrote, "on walk thru for offense we would explain a new play and 2nd O would come out and not be able to run the play because not paying attention." Now you may be right, maybe they failed because they were not paying attention; but maybe they failed because simply telling someone how to do something does not directly lead to success. If all you had to do was tell kids what to do and they would execute it perfectly we'd all be great coaches.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 18, 2016 0:52:16 GMT -6
Keep them engaged by giving them something productive to do besides stand around and watch others get reps.
Instead of second team standing there, rotate them out every other play--call the play for them while first team is lining up to run it, then have them watch. If you have to call them out for not paying attention a few times, they'll eventually get the hint.
You can rotate scout team out in the same way if you have enough numbers, or break the 3rd team off with the JV or whatever to work something on the opposite end of the field.
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Post by realdawg on Dec 18, 2016 6:12:46 GMT -6
Install on the board before you go to practice. Then keep them moving as much as possible once practice starts. We are dealing with 14-17 year olds for the most part. Some of that is inevitable. The less standing around the better.
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Post by jacobbear on Dec 18, 2016 7:29:46 GMT -6
Switch your 2nd team O in every 5 reps. I'd say 6 reps max, you could go lower if you wanted of course. If you do Scout Defence, do the same thing and switch your 2nd stringers in that are paying attention, that way the kids that are messing around on the sideline will realize the kids that pay attention and work hard in practice are getting reps even if they're not the best, while they (kids messing around.) are getting very limited reps.
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Post by 3rdandlong on Dec 18, 2016 10:15:29 GMT -6
Another thing you can do is split them up with other coaches. Now this requires a big enough staff and a staff that is on the same page but the 2's can be learning the exact same stuff the 1's are learning from another coach on another part of the field. This also gives your other coaches an opportunity to teach during team time. I've noticed sometimes that during team periods only 1 coach is doing any coaching. Not saying it's right but it happens sometimes.
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Post by georgefred86 on Dec 18, 2016 11:32:50 GMT -6
Film practice and keep it moving. The teaching aspect is during individual time and the use of Hudl. When we get home from practice corrections are made during group and team time via Hudl. Practice fast, play fast. All of our attention spans are shorter than ever before.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 18, 2016 21:08:54 GMT -6
Step away from practice once and look and see how much time is spent with kids just standing around; most teams are HORRIBLE in the amount of time they waste with kids standing, and then we blame them for not being engaged. Great point, this is something we're working on in our program. Last summer I and some of our coaches were invited to watch a practice of a national powerhouse team (top 5 in the country) and ask questions of their coaches. First thing I noticed while watching was that everything happened at tempo and there was never time for kids to stand around and scratch their balls. When running drills there was not two lines with 8 kids in them, there were 8 lines with 2 kids in them. Maximum reps in every phase of practice. If first team was lined up to run a new play, second team was lined up 5 yards behind them. As soon as 1st team was done 2nd team was rolling through it.
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Post by somecoach on Dec 18, 2016 21:59:09 GMT -6
Biggest issue was during team even though 1s are getting instruction and reps the 2s felt it was period they could mess around. We NEVER stop team to instruct because of this. We want to get as many reps in as possible. Only "instruction" are short coaching points from the OC (me), or personnel switches by who ever is running the scout defense
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Post by nltdiego on Dec 18, 2016 22:07:51 GMT -6
Biggest issue was during team even though 1s are getting instruction and reps the 2s felt it was period they could mess around. We NEVER stop team to instruct because of this. We want to get as many reps in as possible. Only "instruction" are short coaching points from the OC (me), or personnel switches by who ever is running the scout defense What are 2s doing during team?
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Post by Deleted on Dec 19, 2016 6:36:06 GMT -6
Step away from practice once and look and see how much time is spent with kids just standing around; most teams are HORRIBLE in the amount of time they waste with kids standing, and then we blame them for not being engaged. Great point, this is something we're working on in our program. Last summer I and some of our coaches were invited to watch a practice of a national powerhouse team (top 5 in the country) and ask questions of their coaches. First thing I noticed while watching was that everything happened at tempo and there was never time for kids to stand around and scratch their balls. When running drills there was not two lines with 8 kids in them, there were 8 lines with 2 kids in them. Maximum reps in every phase of practice. If first team was lined up to run a new play, second team was lined up 5 yards behind them. As soon as 1st team was done 2nd team was rolling through it. This stuff is all great, but you have to be careful to teach the drills and teach the skills first, which takes longer. Otherwise you're just going to see a bunch of garbage reps that don't accomplish much. When you're just jumping in like that, you see a finished product, but you miss all the work that had to be done up front to get to that point. People used to rave about Chip Kelly's practices and everyone wanted to be up tempo in practice, coach on the run, etc. but without seeing how the Oregon staff: A.) Was recruiting players who were already pretty good before they came to him, so they didn't need to learn most of the fundamentals B.) Spent a lot of time in the offseason teaching these drills on a whiteboard, in walkthrough, etc. A lot of them, myself included, found that up tempo practices with maximum reps and "coaching on the run" isn't always the best approach, especially for young and inexperienced/raw players. In HS, if you don't invest in slowly teaching each fundamental and each drill in spring and summer, and even in slowing things down some once the season starts when you see things aren't being done right, then all the up tempo reps in the world aren't going to make you better.
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Post by shocktroop34 on Dec 19, 2016 7:15:21 GMT -6
1. Condition during ST's:
One thing we did is brief sessions of conditioning during Special Teams periods.
When kickoff runs down, everyone on the sidelines ran to the other side and stopped.
When kickoff ran back to set up again, everyone sprinted back to the other side.
They ran so much that they were fighting to be on ST's, which is what you want anyway.
2. Play your 2's:
Our 2's played. They were told, and we held ourselves accountable as a staff to play all of our 2's, at least one play. I understand that this may be more achievable with larger rosters, but I did it with a roster of 20. They are more inclined to pay attention and play around much less when they know they are going to play.
3. Follow up (Check for understanding) after practice:
When you bring the team in, ask a couple players one thing they picked up on from today's practice. Ask the guys that you know weren't engaged. Just like the classroom, players are more inclined to pay attention if they know they are going to be held accountable for what they learned.
Just a few off the top of the dome.
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Post by gibbs72 on Dec 19, 2016 8:28:39 GMT -6
We started having "stand by" drills set up and ready to go for groups that were not engaged. If we have a period with more than a handful of kids on the sideline, then we have a coach assigned to run the extras through these drills.... agility bags, cones, tackling bags, etc. It helped us in a couple ways....
1) less standing 2) any down time was being used to help kids get better at some aspect of being a football player (agility, tackling, blocks, etc) 3) more kids on the sideline wanted to sub in and play on scout teams. Regular rotations keeping the scout team fresh and giving the older guys a better look 4) more kids wanting to be on the field and get coached
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Post by buck42 on Dec 19, 2016 14:32:46 GMT -6
Be organized...
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Post by carookie on Dec 19, 2016 17:00:59 GMT -6
Great point, this is something we're working on in our program. Last summer I and some of our coaches were invited to watch a practice of a national powerhouse team (top 5 in the country) and ask questions of their coaches. First thing I noticed while watching was that everything happened at tempo and there was never time for kids to stand around and scratch their balls. When running drills there was not two lines with 8 kids in them, there were 8 lines with 2 kids in them. Maximum reps in every phase of practice. If first team was lined up to run a new play, second team was lined up 5 yards behind them. As soon as 1st team was done 2nd team was rolling through it. This stuff is all great, but you have to be careful to teach the drills and teach the skills first, which takes longer. Otherwise you're just going to see a bunch of garbage reps that don't accomplish much. When you're just jumping in like that, you see a finished product, but you miss all the work that had to be done up front to get to that point. A lot of them, myself included, found that up tempo practices with maximum reps and "coaching on the run" isn't always the best approach, especially for young and inexperienced/raw players. In HS, if you don't invest in slowly teaching each fundamental and each drill in spring and summer, and even in slowing things down some once the season starts when you see things aren't being done right, then all the up tempo reps in the world aren't going to make you better. I think there is a material difference between constant action up tempo as you seem to imply, and players being engaged in action (performing movement) as I imply . Now let me preface that I agree with your general premise, personally I have often been criticized for going to SLOW in my progressions in spring time, but I strongly believe in the following:" If you don't have time to do it right, when will you have time to do it again." That being written, the practice policies I am writing about does not mean you gloss over fundamentals for the sake of constantly moving; if anything it means you go more in depth with the fundamentals. My players will be taught step 1, then perform step 1, and then repeat step 1 over and over and over until they can't get it wrong. We ask that the players 'DO' not just stand around and watch, but that does not mean we are just rushing through things for the sake of up tempo- it is quite the opposite. Now, contrast this with a practice policy where a coach demonstrates something, then 1 player does it while everyone else watches. The coach then tells the first player what he did wrong and he goes back in line for the next player up. All the while the 8th player in line is sitting and not performing the actions. Or similarly where the #1s are out running plays for 10 minutes while the #2s stand in a straight line behind them getting 'mental reps'. I'll go to bat with the style that increase player performing the action they will do in the game. We are what we repeatedly DO so having a practice where players DO those things (whole or part) they will do in the game more often is better.
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Post by Coach Vint on Dec 21, 2016 19:21:28 GMT -6
I teach my players what to do when they are not in. I take 5 minutes to teach them what to do during any individual, group, or team drill they are not personally involved in. They are to watch the signal and process the call just like if they are in the drill. They then must watch their position and come up with one coaching point. Periodically during practice I will call a guy out and say, "hey Johnny, coach Fred." They have to have a one or two word coaching point. Sometimes I will ask a player what the call was. If they don't have an answer we will have a reminder after practice. Our reminder is one perfect up-down. It might take us ten to get one perfect one. We do this for every guy caught not paying attention.
Our standard is that you are focused during practice. This means watching with your eyes and listening with your ears. You are not talking about BS during a rep. Ever. If they get caught during a rep talking about something other than the current task at hand we handle it. We teach them this is bigger than football. This is how you will be more successful in the classroom and in the business world.
Kids will rise to the level of expectations you set for them. If they know the standard and are held accountable for deviation from the standard, they will meet the standard.
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