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With clubs and coaches dedicating significant amounts of time devising and defining playing and coaching philosophies it is crucial that the importance of effective practice design as the vehicle for these philosophies to be delivered is not lost.
In my experience of coaching and coach education, I have witnessed many examples where the design and delivery of practice is based on imitation rather than any individual reflection or reasoning. If, however, we are going to be successful in achieving The FA’s stated aim of Developing more innovative coaches who are excellent teachers of the game we must instead help coaches understand and rationalise why they coach and behave in the way they do rather than settling for mimicking others.
One way in which coaches can begin to design more effective practices is to consider the use of a mental model from which their practice is planned. One definition of a mental model is a logically ordered framework of reference points which act to prompt the coach to consider each aspect of practice design. This process helps to ensure that each element of the design process helps contribute to the overall theme and objective.
Using a mental model to devise practices can enable a much more personal, evidence based stamp from which a coach can structure their work whilst remaining within the boundaries of a national or club defined approach.
Here, the intention is to define an example of a mental model, link it to a decision making process that a coach can follow to design practice sessions before providing some example of the demands - also referred to as game-related coaching challenges - that a coach can place upon the players within the session to support them to think about and learn within a game relevant environment.
4
Select a pitch type and organise the players
The use of big, small, wide or narrow pitches can implicitly help the players develop around a certain session theme
5 Add parameters
Different types of pitch markings can help set guidelines to support the practice theme
6 Set the demands
How are you going to instruct, challenge or brief the players to work? Is your challenge designed to restrict, relate or reward?
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