The following post is an excerpt from Frank’s newest book, The Soft Science of Tennis.
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Effective Communication is dependent on tone. The same word said with a different tone can often imply the opposite meaning to the listener. I find this true when assisting parents and their athletes. The parent’s words frequently say one thing and their tone says the polar opposite. Athletes listen to their parent’s tone and tune out their parent’s words because their tone reflects their true feelings, tension and attitude.
Throughout your sessions, pay attention as the athletes expose flashes of their inborn personality. An introvert’s theoretic response, an intuitive gut-action, a feelers empathetic reaction or a perceiver’s future speculation speaks volumes. Once dialed into the inner world of your athlete’s brain designs you’ll be able to connect with each athlete’s overall persona and customize your training to their unique needs. As high-performance tennis coaches or parents, it’s our job to get into each student’s world, instead of demanding that they get into ours.
Utilizing Written Communication
The human brain is divided into several regions. Each region processes different forms of incoming information. Listening to verbal instruction engages the auditory region of the brain, while physically writing notes engages the spatial awareness region of the brain. Athletes who collect data in two regions of the brain have a greater chance of retaining a higher proportion of key facts and recalling the information later in competition.
Post Lesson Written Reviews
I have been applying post-lesson written reviews for decades. My athletes are encouraged to take the last few minutes of their training session to write down their top lesson topics and future action plans. Some of my current students still prefer the old school paper and pen journaling while others use their cell phone notepad and to-do apps. Either way, written reminders are an important version of nonverbal communication.
Benefits Include:
- Writing lesson reviews work to preview the athlete’s developmental plan via time management.
- Documenting helps to de-stress and relax the athlete as it unloads cognitive baggage. Athletes can read and re-read their notes to review the lesson.
- It’s estimated that within 24 hours, up to 80% of what our students learn they soon forget. Writing it down helps athletes to digest more information.
- Writing down important solutions helps re-enforce recall. It enables the athlete to memorize more efficiently and recall as needed.
- Documenting assists in organizing and assimilating the new information received.
- Writing down solutions act as the first visualization rehearsal further solidifying the memorization of the data.
The Soft Science of Tennis aims to improve the learning curve. Applying these methods maximizes athletic potential at a quicker rate.
