Player Homework

[timberley11]

Without getting on my soap box to much, I get very annoyed with driving past empty fields and not seeing kids playing on them in pick-up games or even out just having fun and juggling the ball.

I am not sure if it is just the area I live in, after all we did get out first snow fall this week, but it frustrates me that when I was a kid growing up back in England I would be out playing every night.

Now I understand we have to get the kids to fall in love with the game, and they have a lot on their plates with other activities, but I would like to know how other coaches get their players to do soccer homework or practice on their own time, or even encorage pick-up games.

At the club I work at now I have set up a Street Soccer program, which I am hoping will help.

Any other ideas are welcomed.

[uniteo]

good luck with that...

Have competitions in practice to reward players for skills you don't work on in practice. For example, I have juggling contests.

I also send out notices when there are games on TV the players should watch (like UEFA Champion's League and national team games).

Still plenty of players who don't do it, but some do...

[timberley11]

[QUOTE=uniteo]I also send out notices when there are games on TV the players should watch (like UEFA Champion's League and national team games). QUOTE]

I like this idea, kids don't even watch it on TV

[Benito]

"[QUOTE=timberley11]Without getting on my soap box to much, I get very annoyed with driving past empty fields and not seeing kids playing on them in pick-up games or even out just having fun and juggling the ball.

I am not sure if it is just the area I live in, after all we did get out first snow fall this week, but it frustrates me that when I was a kid growing up back in England I would be out playing every night."
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Depends where you live but not how you mean. In the part of Brooklyn where I live they don't play soccer.

So I traveled to another part of Brooklyn where they did.I used to take my kid to Ave J park when he was 8 or 9 he is 30 now. It was a Haitian area then. Any way the haitians played street soccer there all the time seven days a week until it got real dark no lights there. They would let anyone play my 30 yr old at 9 was a very good player. I was a very good player so we both would play there. We would go back all the time and play did it for years.

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"I would like to know how other coaches get their players to do soccer homework or practice on their own time, or even encorage pick-up games."

When i coached kids we worked on skills and moves. I would tell them to practice these things when they went home. I would also tell them next practice I want to see this stuff and I want to see improvement. If they did not I would tell them I would know it.

Next practice show me this show me that. If they could not do it at all I knew they did not practice and would call them out on it. Later they did it to avoid having to deal with me being on them for not practing.
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"At the club I work at now I have set up a Street Soccer program, which I am hoping will help."

I would be interested in know just how you set it up exactly if you don't mind sharing?

[GKbenji]

A bit of a tangent, but one thing I do with my teams is make the players watch high-level soccer. Many kids have no clue what the game is supposed to look like at the highest level, and if they see a few cool things on TV they might actually grab their ball and go out and try to duplicate them.

After all, what kid isn't Barry Bonds, or Peter Forsberg, or Allen Iverson, or John Elway... at least in their own mind. :) We need kids who want to be David Beckham, or Landon Donovan, or Tim Howard.

I assign my team "homework" of completing a match analysis. I provide a form to fill out with questions to answer. With the lack of soccer on TV, this often means printing TV schedules and handing them out, and loaning out videotapes. Make it more palatable by allowing them to do it together. Even make it a group activity with some pizza or popcorn.

This past season, I showed some tape to my HS boys team the day before a match. First we watched half of their previous game that week. Then we watched half of the '03 Champions League semi between Real Madrid and Man U. It think it really opened their eyes as to how the game is supposed to look. They went out and played their best game of the season the next day.

[DUTCHVIZ]

Here are a few ideas. Hope it helps.

http://www.bettersoccermorefun.com/dwtext/homework.htm

[redondo66]

A bit of a tangent, but one thing I do with my teams is make the players watch high-level soccer. Many kids have no clue what the game is supposed to look like at the highest level, and if they see a few cool things on TV they might actually grab their ball and go out and try to duplicate them.

After all, what kid isn't Barry Bonds, or Peter Forsberg, or Allen Iverson, or John Elway... at least in their own mind. :) We need kids who want to be David Beckham, or Landon Donovan, or Tim Howard.

I assign my team "homework" of completing a match analysis. I provide a form to fill out with questions to answer. With the lack of soccer on TV, this often means printing TV schedules and handing them out, and loaning out videotapes. Make it more palatable by allowing them to do it together. Even make it a group activity with some pizza or popcorn.

This past season, I showed some tape to my HS boys team the day before a match. First we watched half of their previous game that week. Then we watched half of the '03 Champions League semi between Real Madrid and Man U. It think it really opened their eyes as to how the game is supposed to look. They went out and played their best game of the season the next day.

I have done the exact same with my HS team every year and think turning kids on to the world's best football makes a difference. Ironically, I used the '99 madrid-utd. champions league match (a redondo heel, and a beckham screamer for highlights) and it really fires some kids up who you would have never guessed it may have had an impact on. I have presented a written exam as well. Strangely, my name is benjy and i'm also a keeper. :confused:

[Coachssi]

I think the difference in England was all our friends lived close to each other and it was nothing to go outside in the back street and play football/soccer. Over here the kids live that far apart from each other it is difficult to get together after school. For this reason I have noticed that I do not see kids playing American football or baseball.

I give the kids I coach homework and I would hope they do it in their own yards.

In the area I live we also play pick up every Sunday. The pick up involves older guys like me down to youth players. It is just a fun kick around on a Sunday. Sometimes we get 20 there, sometimes only 10, but it is always fun.

[Benito]

"In the area I live we also play pick up every Sunday. The pick up involves older guys like me down to youth players. It is just a fun kick around on a Sunday. Sometimes we get 20 there, sometimes only 10, but it is always fun."

That my friends is real street soccer. There is coaching in this kind of play because the young ones learn from the older ones by watching and demonstration. The younger ones see something and they try to copy it.

[coachrob]

I'm in the suburbs of Buffalo (Lancaster, NY) and our local club offers soccer year round (Outdoor for Spring/Fall and Indoor November through March). We also have training sessions at local school gym's for those enrolled in the programs.

I coach ages 6 through 9, if your interested in a friendly scrimmage, please feel free to contact me directly. Also, we open our registration to kids from different communities.

[Coachssi]

"In the area I live we also play pick up every Sunday. The pick up involves older guys like me down to youth players. It is just a fun kick around on a Sunday. Sometimes we get 20 there, sometimes only 10, but it is always fun."

That my friends is real street soccer. There is coaching in this kind of play because the young ones learn from the older ones by watching and demonstration. The younger ones see something and they try to copy it.

Yeah Benito,

As we play pick up I am always talking to the younger players. I enjoy seeing how they develop each week.