As a new coach, I’m eager to get hands on with delivering the best sessions I can think of. Sometimes they hit and just as often they miss. That’s life and that’s part of the journey. We all make mistakes and we don’t always get it right but I accept that from myself because I accept it from my players. I’m okay with mistakes. The thing that troubled me was, I didn’t know how to handle a group of 10 year olds and I didn’t know how to deal with behaviour.
As adults, we like to think children will just blindly obey us and do everything we ask. But that’s now how humans work and that includes children! Kids will do as we ask, so long we’ve built a solid relationship with them. This realisation dawned on me one night after a particularly bad training session, I was having a negative impact on that relationship due to my lack of skills. This left me feeling awful, it wasn’t fair on them and it wasn’t good for me. So I undertook a challenging behaviour course and this is what I learned.
Consider the underlying reasons for behaviour that challenges.
First of all, I love this definition. ‘Behaviour that challenges’, the course didn’t ever label a behaviour bad because well, kids aren’t bad people and they’re not behaving in a way to be a villain. Behaviours are often a child’s way of expressing themselves and communicating their emotions. Any behaviour that we would normally describe as naughtiness could be a result of a child’s home life, experiencing trauma or neglect, social media/peer pressure or have special educational needs or disabilities. This is why we mustn’t react badly or ‘snap’ at behaviour that challenges, we should always approach with intelligence and compassion.
Deflect before you react.
This is what I mean by reacting in an intelligent way. Rather than an instant reaction to a low level disruption by scalding the child, use softer techniques. Such as strategic ignoring for attention seeking behaviours, sometimes children who want attention, seek it even if it’s negative. Be sure to give attention positively at more appropriate times. When possible, use humour to deflect and get back on track, this one is easy as a football coach because the players love abit of banter. Also using peer praise to help get the group on task, you’ll notice only a few will be disruptive and others will be displaying model behaviour, so praise them. Let them know they’re showing the behaviours required and watch as the ones who aren’t, start looking for praise themselves, and then, praise them.
Always, always, always, remain calm!
I refer to the training session mentioned as the session I wish I knew how todo this. I’m not talking about losing your rag with players, if you go ballistic at 10 year olds, you need to seriously consider if you’re capable of working with children. I’m talking about the frustration that can come out when trying to lead a session and you’ve got disruptive behaviour all over the place. There’s sessions where children are wrestling each other the ground, shouting over you and totally disregarding your instructions. At times like this, you might be ready to cancel the session, pack up and go home. It’s vital to stay calm, how you react is your first step to reclaiming the room or group. If they sense you’ve lost it, you wont get them back! Worse still, when you lose it with them, you’ll start to fracture any relationship you’ve built up with them.
Bonus tip. Don’t allow them to switch off or even think of messing about. Make your sessions as fun as possible with plenty of activities and games. I believe the warm up sets the tone, make that interesting and then set the behaviours expected right from the off! Finally, be fun! Have a laugh with them, make them feel good and be positive. Show your passion and enthusiasm for our sport! The reason we all turn up on cold nights is because we love this game, let them see it. All this sounds simple but it’s not easy, the world class basics take continual effort and study.
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