Fun Soccer Drills - How To Add Fun and Enjoyment Into Kids Soccer Coaching
How To Add Fun and Enjoyment Into Your Coaching
Adding Fun and Enjoyment Into Coaching - well how do we do that??We keep hearing about the importance of having fun training sessions especially for our younger players but how do we incorporate relative and educational fun into our sessions and make sure we still educate our younger players?
Let’s just step back and ask why fun is such a serious element, if you know what I mean!
If you have small children yourself you will be seeing this on a daily basis as they go to playschool, nursery or infant school.You will notice
that everything they do revolves around play. Is that simply because that’s all children want to do?Yes and no. Let me explain.
As children we learn with almost every movement, every touch and everything we see and hear and taste. Our young brains are
absorbing all that information and translating it and storing it into memory for future reference.
The play our children experience at playschools and nurseries is specifically designed to help children learn everything from complex hand-to-eye co-ordinations to mathematical equations to colours and beyond - but it’s all done in play…why?
Because that’s when children learn the most - when they’re having a great time and when they’re enjoying doing what they’re doing and absorbing all that great information that will help.
Can we use the learning power of play in football (soccer)?
You already know the answer to that so I’m guessing that what you really want to know is what can we do to make our sessions fun and how we can do it.
One word of caution - using fun for fun’s sake may not be as effective as using fun and play in your drills to help you players learn.
‘Fun’ is also subjective and one players idea of fun may be another players idea of boring.One easy way to know what your players find fun is observing what they enjoy doing the most. With younger players this, in general, tends to be playing a ‘real’ match - whether that be a small sided game or a full-on 7v7 or 11v11 match.
Or doing fun penalty shoot outs or free-kick training - the kinds of things they see their idols doing on tv.
Aonther proven way is to add a little imagination in to your drills. You can do this in many ways and one is by using different equipment. This will also help you as a coach keep yourself fresh and help to let the creative juices flow.
Creativity is an essential part of your armoury and not as difficult to harness as some may think. I’ll leave that for another time though!
The real point is to develop players by going beyond the usual run of the mill drills with cones and introduce effective, fun training using something a bit different and incorporating a little thought.
Why bother?
The simple answer is that players learn quicker through fun and enjoyment and what you’ll teach in these types of sessions will stay with them.
You’ll also find that what you have taught them will show through in the following game. It’s also a highly effective teaching method that shouldn’t be overlooked for any age group - EVEN the international teams - Brazil, France, England, Holland etc. do this for varying reasons, including team bonding.
If it’s good enough for them, surely it’s good enough for you and your team?
Give it a try and if you’re stuck for some fun sessions to do try these to get you started….
Video Link: Fun Soccer Training Drills For Kids
http://www.thetargetizer.com/catalog/faq.php?cID=14
I hope that help.Resources