When questioning students or setting guided discovery tasks, sometimes students come back with unexpected answers. One strategy to use here is ‘Utilisation’. Have a look at the video to find out more.
“I failed!”, “that’s wrong!”, and “that didn’t work!” are all potentially negative ways of perceiving an experience – but they are frequently heard terms when people are learning new canoe and kayak skills.
‘Failure’ can be repackaged as another way to describe learning what not to do. ‘Failing’ and making mistakes provide valuable information.
‘Failure’ is another word for understanding and gaining knowledge about what did not work on this occasion. And by a process of elimination, the more mistakes we make the closer we must be to a solution – so we never really fail until we give up, we just find lots of ways of not doing something yet!
We all know that confident leadership can inspire the rest of the group and help canoeists and kayakers perform at their best – but what can we do to come across as being confident?
We need to be confident in our decisions, and confident in our instructions. We need to have clear aims and objectives, and communicate them effectively to the group. And there’s a simple way for us to achieve this – we can do what great leaders do and eliminate the word “try” from our vocabulary.
When we use the word “try”, we introduce the possibility of failure. We plant seeds of doubt in the minds of our group. And yet “try” is a word I so often hear when assessing leaders for their 4 or 5 star awards.
“We’ll try to get that eddy”, “I’ll try to hit the line”, We’ll try not to capsize” – these are all common phrases, but they don’t inspire confidence in either the leaders or the groups ability.
In fact, “try” does not exist in the real world. We either do something or we don’t – there is no try. Many people think of Winston Churchill when we think of great leadership. For him, trying didn’t exist either. Imagine the effect on the morale of the people if he’d broadcast this speech before our ‘finest hour’-
“we shall try to fight on the beaches,
we shall try to fight on the landing grounds,
we shall try to fight in the fields and in the streets,
we shall try to fight in the hills;
we shall try not to surrender”.
-the effect’s not quite the same is it? It’s almost as if the word ‘try’ gives us permission to fail! So when you’re out paddling, let’s stop trying – let’s just “do”.
Sometimes, it seems like there are so many things to remember that it can help to have a mental checklist to make sure that everything is covered.
One way to remember and check you have covered everything is to use the acronym My ABCDE.
M.Y.A.B.C.D.E. stands for-
Me – Introduction and a bit about me.
You – Introductions from the group.
Area – the plan for the day, the water we will be on, and the ‘type’ of trip we will be undertaking.
Boats and kit – safety checks and also who has what kit and where.
Communication – how will we communicate, what signals will we use.
Doctor – an invitation for anyone to let me know any relevant medical needs and a reminder for people to carry any relevent medication.
Emergency – what to do if an incident occurs – a swim brief and what the rest of the group should do.
“But….I Can’t!”It’s also one of the most commonly used words people use to stop themselves doing something. This is because the word ‘but’ deletes from our attention the part of the sentence before it, and directs our attention to the part of the sentence after it.
Take this example-
“I really want to paddle grade 3, but I’m just not confident.”
It uses this common structure-
“Positive statement……BUT…..Negative Statement”
We make a positive statement about something we want (“I really want to paddle grade 3″) , we then use the word ‘but’, then we make a negative statement giving a reason why we can’t do it (“I’m just not confident”). Now, as the word ‘but’ in effect deletes the first half of the sentence, this is what we hear-
“I really want to paddle grade 3, but I’m just not confident!”
-and this is what we base our behaviour on.
Many sports psychologists know this, and have learned that the word ‘but’ can be replaced with the word ‘and’. This can work, especially when giving feedback. For example, if a coach gives the following feedback,
“You controlled the edge of the boat well, but you lost your boat angle in the flow. Next time work on this.”
The student will often unconsciously delete the first part of the sentence and miss the praise, and only hear the second half-
“You controlled the edge of the boat well, but you lost your boat angle in the flow! Next time work on this!”
However, by replacing ‘but’ with ‘and’ the whole sentence is perceived more positively -
“You controlled the edge of the boat well and you lost your boat angle in the flow. Next time work on this”.
BUT, how does this change our original sentence? Now it becomes,
“I really want to paddle grade 3, and I’m just not confident.”
Well, the ‘but’ has gone, but the use of the word ‘and’ doesn’t really add much. So let’s go back to the word ‘but’, and think about how it can be used to our advantage.
At the moment, the sentence is structured-
“Positive statement……BUT…..Negative Statement”
If the word ‘but’ deletes the part of the sentence before it, what happens if we change the order of the statements within the sentence? If we put the negative statement before the ‘but’, and the positive statement after it, we can change which part of the sentence gets deleted. The sentence would now be structured-
“Negative statement……BUT…..Positive Statement”
So now, our sentence becomes,
“I’m just not confident, but I really want to paddle grade 3!”
Suddenly, the whole sentence has a different emphasis. And smart coaches can use this structure to empower their students. So if you have students who doubt their abililty, listen out for ‘but’ sentences when talking to them and reverse them!
The conversation might go something like this -
(Coach) “So we’re going to paddle a new river today, I think you’re ready for a new challenge. What would you like to do?”
(Student) “I really want to paddle grade 3, but I’m just not confident. ”
(Coach) “So, you’re not confident yet, but you really want to paddle grade 3!”
(Student) “mmmm, yes.”
(Coach) “OK, let’s go and do River X (insert your local grade 3 river here!)”.
It’s a lot easier to learn something new than to re-learn something and overcome bad habits or inappropriate schema. Coaches know this, and students know this too, so the very mention of ‘re-learning’ means an uphill challenge before we even start coaching. So how can coaches use this to their advantage?
We can reframe the situation, and utilise the curiosity and eagerness our students possess. Instead of going through the long and painful process of re-learning, invite your students to learn how to do things in a different way.
It’s a lot easier to learn another way of achieving something – and it gives us more options!
Have you ever wondered how really good leaders make the right decisions? How do they know when to stop the group and put them in a safe place while they paddle something or scout ahead? How do they know when to stop the group and change strategy?
One thing they do is unconsciously monitor where they are placing their focus of attention.
Evidence suggests we can only focus our attention on one thing at a time. However, we can switch focus from one thing to another quickly, with practice. What we need to decide is how much of our time we should spend attending to any particular thing.
There are so many things we could attend to, and they can be put into three general categories-
Good leaders are paying attention to these three areas in different proportions, and these proportions will vary depending on the situation.
If a leader is well within their own comfort zone, their focus of attention may look something like this-
Focus of Attention |
||
Group45% |
Environment45% |
Self10% |
Now, imagine that the group arrive at a challenging piece of water. The Leader decides that he needs to pay more attention to the environment – perhaps 70% of his attention. But that means the very most he can attend to the group is 30%, perhaps not enough. So the leader stops the group, puts them in a safe place, and no longer has to worry about them while he pays attention to the environment and his own safety.
Now, perhaps the leader decides that the challenges ahead are within the capabilities of the group, but when actually paddling the leader will have to concentrate of his own performance and increase the focus of attention on himself to 50%. And he’ll need to adapt his performance within the environment, so the environment requires 40% attention. Again, that means that he cannot focus on keeping the group safe, so he decides to run the water one at a time with those not running it safely out of harms way.
So next time you’re out with your groups, have a think about how much attention you are paying to these different areas at different times and in different places. Calibrating this can be a useful way to know when it’s time to change strategy.
There are some real benefits from sharing delivery and working with other people.
If you’re a coach, I can recommend finding another coach to work with for a day. It’s a great way for you to develop and become even more skilled.
Sea Kayaking in Alaska
Research shows that those who set goals have a greater chance of being successful in their pursuits. Yet very few of us set personal goals about our canoeing and kayaking. Here’s one way of doing this simply and easily – using the benefit of hindsight.
Find a quiet place where you can spend just a few moments going through this simple exercise.
Imagine that you have travelled forward in time. It is New Year’s Eve on 31st December 2011, the end of another year and you are in a reflective mood. It’s time to look back on all you have achieved and the progress you have made in the year just past.
As you look back over 2011 you might like to reflect and ask yourself:
Imagine you could go back to the beginning of 2011, what advice would you give yourself that will help you make the best of this coming year?
Come back to the present moment, the beginning of this New Year and consider everything you have to look forward to.
‘Questioning’ is widely used by coaches and has many purposes. However, questioning needs to be used carefully. Poor use of questioning can be a bit like shooting in the dark. I use a model of questioning to allow students to recover information from autonomous (unconscious) actions and bring it into their conscious awareness. In this article, I will outline this model of questioning and give some practical examples.
This model of questioning is useful to us as it builds intrinsic feedback loops within our students, moves their performance up the improvement cycle from “unconscious competence” to “conscious uncompetence” (necessary to move from competence to mastery), allows us to coach skilled performers (who may be technically more competent than us) and encourages reflective practice by our athletes.
The model borrows techniques from Neuro Linguistic Programming, utilising aspects of “clean language” linguistic patterning. A sound understanding of this model of coaching will allow you to use a style which can unlock an athletes performance and take their learning to a new level.
What is Clean Language?
Clean Language is the use of questioning in a way that allows the athlete to explore their own experience and recover the detail of specific unconscious actions taken within their sport – be it to develop technique, tactics, strategy or mindset. This allows the athlete to develop a model of their own performance and once recovered, skillful athletes will often ‘self coach’ and identify ways to improve themselves without imput from the coach. It fits well within the current thinking and use of the ‘Fundamentals’ within paddle sport as it directs the athletes attention towards ‘feel’ with direct links to posture, connectivity and power transfer.
Aims and Objectives
The process starts with the athlete stating the intention to change some aspect of their performance in a beneficial way (goal setting and deliberate practice).
The Questions
The next stage is for the coach to ask questions designed to allow the athlete to gather information and assemble a model of their performance. Very often, the athlete can provide a model of their behaviour in general/macro terms, and the quesions are used to recover the specific subtleties, actions and sensations which the athlete is unaware of at a micro level.
In their simplist form, the questions are designed to illicit information from the athlete about three things- a description of what they do, a sequence and order of event and a location of where things happen.
A description – We direct the attention of our athlete to a particular area and ask questions to allow the athlete to become more familiar with their actions by describing them.
The questions are -
“And x, and what kind of x is that x?”
or
“And x, and when x, x like what?”
A sequence – we direct our athletes attention to the order in which events take place. The questions are -
“And when x, what happens before x?”
or
“And when x, what happens next?”
A Location – we direct the attention of our athlete towards specific locations. The questions are -
“And when x, where is that x?”
or
“And when x, whereabout is x?”
There is no set order in which to ask these questions, and some time will be taken following leads and perhaps going down blind alleys. The aim is to gather enough information to allow the athlete to construct a detailed model, bringing information from their unconscious to conscious awareness. If the athlete does not know the answer to a question, you can ask them to go and find out.
Using the information
The information is now reviewed, examined, explored and probed for relevent connections and detail. The experience of the coach and the response of the athlete will help guide this process.
The Change
At some point within this process the athlete experiences the ‘lightbulb’ moment, and wonders how they ever missed something so obvious. This leads to an adjustment in the athletes model and the role of the coach is to now guide this adjustment and help explore how appropriate it is.
What is meant by ‘Clean’ Coaching?
The ‘clean’ aspects refers to the fact that the questioning directs the athletes attention within themselves and is not contaminated by presuppositions made by the coach. In all of the questions the first part (” And x, and when x…”), the x is the use of the athletes own words feeding back their own experience to them. This is particularly important as many people answer the questions using metaphor. Metaphor has particular meaning to an individual, and even a small change to this metaphor can change the experience considerably. If the coach uses their own words rather than those of the athlete they can ‘contaminate’ the athletes experience – using ‘dirty’ words!
For example, clean coaching would be ( ‘A’ denotes athletes words, ‘C’ the coach’s)-
A “I want to improve the wind up and my power stroke”
C ” The ‘wind up’, and when the ‘wind up’, that’s ‘wind up’ like what?” (seeking a description)
A “Like a coiled spring”
C “And when a ‘coiled spring’, whereabouts is that ‘coiled spring’?” (seeking a location)
A ” In my torso”
C “And when a ‘coiled spring’ in your ‘torso’, what happens next? (seeking a sequence)
A “I take a breath”
C ” And when you ‘take a breath’, then what happens?” (seeking a sequence)
A ” I drive out of the eddy”
C ” And when you ‘drive out of the eddy’, what happens just before you ‘drive out of the eddy’?” (seeking a sequence)
A “Uuuur, oh, I’m not sure….”
C “Ok – go and find out and come back when you know.”
After finding out
A “I feel for the paddle gripping the water”
C “And what kind of ‘feel’ is that ‘feel for the paddle’? (seeking a description)
A “It’s like a jerky check – I know, I need a more solid pull, I need to pull more steadily”
C “OK, let’s do some exercises to experiment with how to pull more steadily…”
So the athlete has ‘filled in the blanks’ and developed sufficient self awareness of their skill to be able to self coach and identify a useful change in their performance.
This style of questioning is particularly useful when coaching skilful performers who have the knowledge to decide how to change their performance. I am now increasingly using this model with cognitive learners too (relative beginners). I find that these people do not have the ‘eureka!’ moment, but the quesioning style develops feel within paddlers very early on in their learning.
For more information or training in how to use Clean Language please contact me at kim@kimbull.co.uk.
