How to Coach (Mostly Unsuccessfully)

I’ve been thinking about all my experiences coaching over the past few years of my life, and as we traverse into the summer months and I coach myself into visiting new destinations (as part of my Four Seasons project), I shall keep the lessons I have learned in the back of my mind.

1. 1. Utilize your skills efficiently. I’m not a master communicator, or a master at most things, but I can utilize the content knowledge acquired over the years to “coach” people into doing things. For example, I was able to use my knowledge from script-writing and my worthless Communications degree to create a script (actual screenplay here) for the Stacey Hunsucker movie, filmed in college. In summary, it was a movie I directed, wrote, and produced dedicated to our Resident Advisor at the end of my freshman year of college. Directing is very much the same as coaching because you have to tell people how to act in certain segments.
   2. Add some humor into the mix. I like to think that humor usually calms down a group of people you are coaching, especially if they are all strangers to one another. Making fun of yourself or other people serves as a good way to “lighten” the tone. When I trained my replacements at Environment Health and Safety, I made sure to make fun of them and keep a consistently light-hearted tone at the end of the day. Here’s a video we were able to produce:
   3. DON’T COME UNPREPARED. When I had to coach a soccer team in my first year of teaching, I had no idea what I was doing. And even though I read some stuff and watched some Youtube videos, I was never adequately prepared. This led to of course a season of 3 wins, 3 ties, and 6 losses, and a disappointing number of students. I did try my best though.
   4. PEP TALKS. You have to figure out a way to raise morale when the morale is low. This was virtually impossible for me when I was a soccer coach because I had no idea what to say. When we lost 15-0 in one of our blow-out games I didn’t even bother “huddling” with the team at the end of the day. “Okay kids. Back to the buses, I said!”
   5. Get creative with solutions. This year, I think I had my “best year of coaching” with my Field Day group, a competition held at our school between all the teachers and their randomly assorted teams. Even though we were an island of misfits and students with virtually nothing in common, I was able to get them to connect on certain things. For example, I must have subconsciously sabotaged the t-shirts we were decorating by painting them and then stacking them all on top of one another, only to find out 3 months later that they were stuck together, ripping when we tore them apart. As a solution, I brought random free t-shirts from the past for them to decorate and wear, having them all question me with absolute disdain saying that the shirts smelled like me.
      
   6. Know what to scream at the team when they are playing. When I coached soccer, I had no idea what to scream at children. “Run!” “Get the ball!” “Score!”. I think the best advice I gave them was to fake foul, but I had no idea how to “in-game coach”, so to speak. This year, in preparation for Field Day we watched the original Karate Kids and episodes of Cobra Kai (the sequel Youtube-Red series). As a result, the kids all connected with various phrases from the show.
      And so, when I started screaming at them “Wax on! Wax off!”, “Strike first! Strike hard! No Mercy!” It all connected with them. When the quietest Asian girl in my team started screaming these phrases I knew that what I had done (without intention, had ultimately been successful). But not really, because we ended up losing 5 out of 6 games we played anyway.
      
   7. Have fun. Field Day was more fun this year, because I told the kids directly I wanted them to place 5th so we could go back and continue watching Cobra Kai. It was a miracle we were able to finish 4th place though (the cheer we practiced as a parody of Vanessa Carlton’s a thousand miles saved us). Here’s the lyrics below:Making my way downtown, walking fast
      Faces passed, and dat’s vveird

      Staring blankly ahead just making my way
      Making a way through the weirdos
      And I need you. And I miss you. And now I wonder.
      If I could fall into the ground, that would hurt.
      That’ weird
      It sounds pretty terrible, but because we had some dumb choreography to go along with it, we got plenty of points from doing so. I kind of regret not filming it. As a result, we placed fourth by the end of the day, somehow beating out 19 other teams.
      

I hope I can utilize all the skills I’ve learned coaching over the years to continue coaching in the future next year’s field day group, next year’s 7th grade team, and the future offspring I hope to produce in the not-so-immediate future.