Amanda and Vickie practice Special Education law in Southern California. They also run a non-profit called Inclusive Education Project where they aim to level the playing field in academic settings for students living with disabilities. They co-host their own weekly podcast by the same name – the Inclusive Education Project Podcast and they feature conversations on how parents and teachers can best ensure an inclusive school environment.
Kids learn differently – kids with special needs might need things slowed down, show visually, or some other approach
Utilize the parents – they have lots of techniques that work well with their child
Peer role models and buddy systems work great, and benefit not only the kid with special needs but equally (if not more) it benefits the peer role model
Positive reinforcement is much more effective than negative reinforcement. Catch them doing something right
Breaking down skills into small pieces
The steps: Hearing what you’re being asked to do, then seeing what you need to do, then physically doing it. Sometimes actually taking their arm or leg and doing the motion for them.
Handling emotions with kids with special needs
Address it, don’t hide from it. Handle it the same as you would with any kid who gets upset – address it, teach them what is acceptable. Then re-focus them.
The parents are a great resource to get ideas
Reach out to the school to get more inclusive
P.E. teachers, school administrators could recommend a few kids that could be good candidates to join your team
Favorite Quotes
Quote: ‘Clear eyes, full hearts, can’t lose’ – Friday Night Lights
Quote: ‘All of us do not have equal talents. But all of us should have an equal opportunity to develop our talents.’ – JFK
—
Reviews are the lifeblood of the podcast!- If you like the podcast- please take 2 minutes to write a review! Click here
–
Ready to be an Awesome Youth Coach? Sign up for our free weekly newsletter:
2018 will mark John Adair’s fourth year at Coerver Coaching. Adair is the Regional Director for all of New Jersey and Pennsylvania, overseeing player development and coaching education. Prior to joining the Coerver Coaching staff, he has enjoyed success at both the club and high school levels in the South Jersey area.
Early on John did a lot of cone drills and isolated movements without decision-making and learning the game through their own mistakes
Creativity and problem-solving
Instead of cones, set up small area games in confined spaces. 2 v 1’s. 3 v 2’s.
Training better individuals vs just winning as a team
Instead of 11 v 11, break the game into corridors and small area games
Use this mentality to create mini-goals so each unit has accountability and measurements to look at after games, not just wins/losses as a team
Constraints based coaching
Create games where players have a variety of choices, they learn skills while making decisions
Self-confidence for players
Focus on the process – so it’s different for each player. Don’t compare them with other kids. Use guided discovery through side conversations with players for them to uncover solutions to what they need to improve.
Team Culture
Involve the kids to get buy-in. Have the kids write down what they thing a good player on this team will do.
Great teambuilder
Have play days. The kids run the day, play mini-tournaments. Kids make all the decisions.
5 for 5
Spend at least 5 minutes talking to 5 different kids about something other than sports
Connecting with and Impacting Kids
John coached a kid who had the physical tools but not the technical and mental tools needed. The kid approached John and worked his butt off over the summer and went on to play college soccer.
The one that got away
Coaching a state playoff game, they played the underdog role too much, changed their tactics too much, and went away from what got them there. This led to a lack of confidence.
Best learned/stolen idea
Constraints based coaching. Make everything in practice relate back to the game and involve decision-making. Don’t be reactive in practice-planning – set objectives and have a plan that you stick to.
Tywanna Smith, President & Founder of The Athlete’s NeXus, has several years of experience working with professional athletes in a financial and business capacity. Smith earned her Bachelor of Business Administration (B.B.A.) in Marketing and her Master of Business Administration (M.B.A.) from The University of Mississippi (Ole Miss). She was also a four-year starter for the SEC program’s women’s basketball team, eventually taking her talents to Europe for a 2-year professional career.
As a Registered Financial Representative, Entrepreneur, and Best-Selling Author of Surviving the Lights: A Professional Athlete’s Playbook to Avoiding the Curse, Tywanna takes pride in her business professionalism and integrity. She is committed to helping each professional athlete become a better citizen, a better role model, and a better businessman.
Athletes are always preparing for the next transition, on and off the field
Tywanna tore her ACL her junior year of high school – she used this as fuel when people starting to write her off.
The importance of education
Even if a student athlete’s priority is to play college athletics, their grades will be extremely important in determining what opportunities they will be afforded
Off the field keys
Grades
Social media – future coaches, employers – will look over your entire history of social media posts
Mental toughness
It comes from the top down. The coach’s energy and confidence in the players is very contagious.
Tough practices teach athletes how to deal with adversity, and they want competition
Visualization – Have the athletes close their eyes and visualize favorable results
Surviving the Lights
Preparing for all the different areas of life beyond sports
Ben Kissam is a youth sports coach and writer in Denver, CO. Ben’s areas of expertise are in relationship-based coaching and teaching, effective communication, and fusing lessons in sport and entrepreneurship.
Ben had 2 examples from his athletic career – 1 very positive and 1 very negative. He learned from both
Cringe moment
His attitude towards the kids – he thought they should just always do what he says. The lesson learned was to focus on getting buy-in instead of just mandating what should be done.
Practice format
Routines help. Teach them to run their own warm-ups.
Lots of reps, but get creative in making it competitive. It’s also very important to start with the basics when explaining a skill and continue to reinforce what good looks like.
Good practice games
The gauntlet – Set up a 10 yard tunnel, and kids go 1 on 1 in it
Odd man situations – 3 on 2
Self-confidence
Teaching a growth mindset is key. Every failure is a step on the journey to success and it is a necessary part of learning.
Be a relationships-based coach. Focus on having as many 1 on 1 conversations with your kids as possible.
Captains
It’s important to have a right-hand man. They can also help with communication – group texts, etc.
Four Quarter mentality culture
Setting up a practice plan that builds up the intensity throughout and emphasize finishing strong
Best team builder
Eating together. Pasta nights.
Connecting with kids
A goalie who Ben coached lacked confidence, and after working with him for 3 years he sees a totally different kid who now is confident
Favorite quote
‘Athletes don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care’
The one that got away
Ben coached a team of super talented, super knowledgeable kids.
They rolled through the regular season, and played a way lower ranked team in the first round of the playoffs, and lost.
Best Stolen Idea
Have a sense of urgency in practice. Create a long-term vision but create a sense of immediate urgency of the importance of every drill and everything you do in practice.
Carter Armendarez is a senior at Wesleyan University, where he’s also captain of the wrestling team. Getting recruited to play sports in college is confusing to lots of athletes, but it really shouldn’t be. Carter has seen too many athletes fail to get recruited. So he made Acute Recruit’s College Recruitment Guide for Athletes so that doesn’t happen anymore.
Had me focus on becoming an expert in one skill vs trying to be OK at everything
Getting Recruited to college
The most overlooked area is grades
Start early
Coaches want to hear from the athlete, not their parents
Start a website to have as a landing page to share with coaches. Include:
A page with highlight films
An ‘about me’ with your accomplishments and bio
A contact page with your contact details and your coach’s contact details
A big opportunity
A lot of D3 schools have trouble recruiting quality athletes because their academic standards are too high. This is a great opportunity for athletes who may not have been the highest level elite athlete in high school.
Contacting Coaches
Meet them in person at tournaments
Research schools you want to pursue and look up the coaches online
The one that got away
Carter lost by one point his senior year on the match to qualify for state
What he learned: He learned to play to his strengths
Best Stolen Idea
Quote from Tim Ferris when he asked an professional skier what the most important turns are on the run: ‘The most important turns are the 3 years I spent preparing before the run.’
Parting Advice
Focus on the basics
Keep it fun!
—
Reviews are the lifeblood of the podcast!- If you like the podcast- please take 2 minutes to write a review! Click here
–
Ready to be an Awesome Youth Coach? Sign up for our free weekly newsletter:
Michael Richards is the Owner and Operator of Elite Athletic Performance in Benton, Arkansas. After missing out on an opportunity to play collegiate baseball due to what he describes as “Youthful ignorance and a slightly bad attitude”, Michael began playing semi-pro baseball and attending his sophomore year of college. Shortly thereafter he began training fitness clients and young athletes as a sole proprietor. What started as a fun way to “Not get a real job” and make extra money in college, has turned into 16 years and approximately 30,000 hours of “in the trenches” training experience.
Today he strives every day to help kids be the best athlete and person they can be. A particular love for Velocity and Accuracy training for baseball and softball pitchers has led to a number of 90+ MPH clients, professional and collegiate coaching contacts, and a burning desire to learn new information whenever possible.
Michael had the athletic ability to play baseball beyond high school, but his attitude and his grades prevented him from that opportunity
Myths around youth sports
1 – Pitchers running day after pitching to flush the lactic acid buildup. J-bands (Jaeger bands) or massaging the muscles makes way more sense.
2 – Everyone needs to be hyper-flexible. Some people just aren’t very flexible, and while some stretching can add a bit of flexibility, there are other things such as massage rollers and dynamic stretches that are much more beneficial.
Multi-sport athletes
If kids love multiple sports, they should play them. But the belief that you must be a multi-sport athlete to be recruited to college is not always true. Especially in your junior and senior years – Don’t play a 2nd sport just to do it if you don’t love it.
Travel ball and showcases
Don’t fall into the trap of thinking the most efficient use of time is travel teams and showcases. Private lessons are often a much more time and cost efficient. And the lessons don’t need to be year-round.
Kathy Feinstein is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor and Certified Sport Performance Consultant (CMPC). Since 1998 her unique practice has empowered adolescents, adults, couples, families and teams to achieve greater satisfaction in sport, health and life. Kathy’s practice focuses on the 3 key areas: counseling, sport performance psychology and education through seminars and workshops. Kathy works with youth, high school, collegiate, adult amateur and professional athletes in such sports as golf, tennis, hockey, volleyball, basketball, figure skating, cheerleading, track and field, swimming and cycling. In addition to sport and exercise psychology consulting, she also offers team and coach consulting.
Kathy got really excited about her daughter riding horses, but she lost sight of doing what’s best for her daughter
Performance Anxiety
The first step is to normalize the need – kids need to know that performance anxiety is very normal
The importance of breathing
Anxiety is all about the future. What if…
Breathing is all about the present.
If you can do this 20 minutes per day, it changes your mindset
When you inhale, there will be a cool sensation at the tip of your nostrils. When you exhale, there is a warm sensation at the tip of your nostrils.
When you do this, you will start having some thoughts. Without any judgement, bring your focus back to the breath. Do this over and over again.
Do this for 5 minutes with your team, your coaches, your players, etc.
Recovery routines
Having a discharge routine – if you are upset about something, have a quick discharge routine to flush away the past. Then have a different re-focus routine that gets you back in the moment and focused on the future.
Growth Mindset
Encourage kids to take risks, risk making mistakes. Mistakes are an opportunity to get better.
Confidence inventory
Have kids make a list of all of their accomplishments. Then have them read it before a performance.
Post-competition routine
After routines, write down what you did well, then add 1 or 2 things you want to do better next time
Visualization
You have to train how to visualize: Have the athlete do a simple activity (touch your toes and and jump in the air.) Then have them close their eyes and visualize doing that same activity.
The more vivid the visualization is, the more effective it is. Try to involve as many senses as possible
Kathy had a presentation that went bad and she got stuck. She learned a new way to prepare for presentations, where she focuses on the audience and their needs.
Best borrowed/stolen idea
The post-performance routine
Well-better-next
Favorite Quotes/books
Quote: ‘What is before us and what is behind us are small matters compared to what’s within us’ – Emerson
Steve and his wife Kerry started their first camp in 2008, and only 4 summers later, the camp was declared “Best Summer Camp” in Hartford Magazine’s Readers Poll and their programs have received tremendous positive coverage from area media outlets. Now over 1000 kids have come to recognize that “Life’s 2 Short 4 Just 1 Sport” and kids from throughout the U.S. and beyond are attending their programs.
Steve was probably the 4th best player on his high school basketball team. He approached his coach and said he thought he could play D1 basketball. His coach did everything but laugh at him.
That fueled him to go on and start for his D1 team in college
He now takes pride in living life as a ‘walk-on.’ Trying things he has no experience with and taking risks.
Lesson for coaches: Be careful about ever telling a kid ‘this just isn’t your sport’- you never know when someone will be a late-bloomer or just outwork the others.
Physical Literacy and Project Play
Physical Literacy – The ability, the confidence, and the desire to be physically active for life
Jenn Casey is the Program Director for CrossFit Kids and Swing Fit (a Kettlebell Sport class) at CrossFit Kennesaw in Marietta, Georgia. She is the President and Co-Founder of Georgia Kettlebell Sport, which has the mission to develop and promote Kettlebell Sport in the state of Georgia and the greater Southeast Region of the US. She is developing a youth-focused Kettlebell Sport program and is taking her youth team on their first road trip in December 2017. Jenn is an active Kettlebell Sport athlete and in 2017 was chosen to participate in the IUKL World Championship in Seoul, South Korea as part of Team USA where she placed 4th in 16kg One Arm Long Cycle.
Jenn was on the team track in gymnastics, but by age 12 or 13 she quit because it wasn’t fun anymore. Then she didn’t do much of any athletic activity for 2 decades.
At age 39 she jumped into Crossfit
Kettlebell
Look like a cannonball with a handle
You can use them for hip-hinge movements, but they also can be great for cardio
The competitive side of the sport involves Kettlebell overhead lifts
The competitive side involves how many overhead lifts you can do in 10 minutes
Keeping the fun in movement
Give kids lots of opportunities for success and catch them doing things right
Ask lots of question – ‘where do I put my feet in a squat?’, etc.
Definitely praise when they self-correct
Rep / No-rep – Coach does a rep, some correctly and some incorrectly, then the kids call out whether that was a good rep or a no-rep.
Good analogies
‘Glue your feet to the ground. Pretend you have concrete blocks on your feet’
‘Your knees don’t like each other’
‘Pretend you are lifting an elephant over your head’
Mental toughness
Jenn was a kid who was good in practice, then would freeze up in competition/tryouts
Breathing is key to keep your heart rate steady
Do practice reps using the same routine you will use in games
Ian Goldberg is the Founder and CEO of iSport360, Inc. a SportsTech venture that helps youth sport coaches and parents share objective player feedback. As a sport parent and coach, Ian has witnessed the chaos on the sidelines and in the bleachers when coaches’ and parents’ expectations are not aligned….and the kids suffer. His company has developed a solution to the pain in the form of an app and an informative (and frequently humorous) newsletter “The Chaotic World of Youth Sports”.
Ongoing feedback is way more effective than end-of-the-year feedback
Regular feedback is important, but can be time-consuming. Ideally coaches should be able to spend a few minutes and quickly evaluate and provide feedback to all players
Objective goals
It’s easy to just look at how many points/goals players score, but most coaches are trying to evaluate many things beyond just scoring. The key is to define measurable objectives of what you are trying to improve in players.
Empowering kids
Ideally kids should be able to:
Talk to the coaches themselves
Set their own goals
What happens in a parents’ brain when watching their kids play sports
Fight or flight mode – Parents’ stress levels and cortisol levels are skyrocketing when being on the sideline watching their kids
Parents are either part of your process or part of your problem
Involve them – they want to know what’s going on, regardless of age
A good way to base how much parents are involved – how much money they are spending. So for cheap low-level rec sports, not as much. For high-level travel teams costing thousands of dollars – the parents should be communicated with more.
iSport360 – The feedback loop
Mobile app – Coaches can work with players to set goals at beginning of season and allows the coach to provide feedback
Parents can also send other players on the team positive emojis
Weekly newsletter with funny stories
Best Stolen Idea
Barbara Corcoran from the Shark Tank: ‘To be successful, you have to have a certain level of stupidity, so that when you keep getting knocked down, you continuously get back up, expecting better results.’
Parting Advice
Don’t let sports take over your life. Enjoy it and keep it in perspective.
—
Reviews are the lifeblood of the podcast!- If you like the podcast- please take 2 minutes to write a review! Click here
–
Ready to be an Awesome Youth Coach? Sign up for our free weekly newsletter:
