Humanising Language Teaching
Year 4; Issue 2; March 02

The Language Coach

Language Teaching Ideas from Sports Coaching

by Steve Schuyler, France

In the introduction to "WINNING TENNIS, A COMPLETE GUIDE FOR COACHES AND ADVANCED PLAYERS", the tennis instruction book I published in 1993, I wrote: "Improving your tennis is not easy. Tennis is a complex and difficult game, involving just about every movement the body is capable of making. And how you move is only half of the whole story----tennis involves your mind too."

What if we substitute a word like "German" or "English" for "tennis" in this text? Improving in a second or third language certainly is not easy either. As a full-time tennis teacher and coach for over 25 years, I found that my teaching methodology changed and evolved with time. I realized that the mechanical side of the sport was only a part of what players needed. There is a more complex side of this game, and it has to do with many different factors. If I finally became what I call the "Complete Coach," (and I think that I did), it was because I was able to identify the other skills top players need, and found ways to develop that knowledge.

When I was first asked to write an article on how tennis coaching techniques and attitudes might relate to language teaching, I thought that it might be difficult. Happily, this was not the case. As I went back through some of my tennis material, I discovered that a great many of the principles, methods and techniques of tennis coaching can be applied, without too much modification, to the teaching of foreign languages. See if you agree.....

The development of an accomplished tennis player begins with the neccessary apprenticeship of the technical basics. The different strokes must be learned to the point where they are relatively reliable. The next step involves teaching your disciple when he or she should employ those strokes, which shot to use for the situation at hand. The third stage, one that is never really over, involves a great variety of things; practice routines; philosophies, long -term strategies, self -evaluation and the developement of a great deal of self control are a few of them.

Is not the first hurdle for a language student and his or her instructor the basics; the grammar, vocabulary and structures without which communication is impossible? The intermediate language student, like the tennis player, must then learn when to use new language acquisitions, to choose the right words for the situation. Finally, as in tennis, one is never finished learning a language. Continued progress is not automatic, but needs a long-range "game plan."

Let's take a look now at some of the areas that I believe are common to both subjects. Language teachers who want to coach tennis will get help here, if there are any of you out there, though obviously what I hope is that you will take ideas and principles from sports coaching and put them to work in the language classroom.

Know Your Players

One of first things a tennis teacher should do with a new pupil is to find out as much as possible about him or her. This is not only to put the relationship between player and coach on a more personal level, but also to help discover what kind of learner the player is. Is she a good imitator, who can copy a demonstrated movement without alot of explanation? Or does she need the movement broken down into smaller, easier understood segments? Is this player "creative" on the court, or does he or she play in a predictable manner most of the time?

I think that there is a direct parallel here to good language instruction. You need to know how your students learn best. Do they "hear" the new language, or do they have to "see" it first? On the tennis court, I used to conduct exercises aimed at determining someone's degree of body control. For example, I would blindfold them and ask them to perform certain movements. Some were not very good at this without visual confirmation. Language teachers can also conduct inobtrusive tests, such as homonym games or rhyming exercises to determine linguistic talent, or something involving physical movement, which will give you an idea of that person's kinesthetic senses.

Have a Long-Term Game Plan

I would often encounter resistance from players who didn't want to try to change a technical weakness, since it was working for them at their present level. I had to convince them that, although their wierd-looking backhand seemed to do the job, it wouldn't stand the pressure from better players. They had to realize that progress would take effort, for it is most difficult to change a deep-seated error.

We have the same situation in language teaching. We have students who are relatively fluent, in spite of reoccurent grammar mistakes, or poor pronunciation of certain sounds. They can communicate, so when we correct them and push for more accuracy and better pronunciation, they are not always convinced. If we accept this attitude, we risk "fossilising" the mistake; it will become indelible. Convince the doubters by putting them in a situation where they cannot succeed.... (without crushing them forever).

Every long term plan has to have a goal or goals. For tennis players, their final goal should be to become as good as their capabilities will permit. Talent alone is not a criteria, nor are physical characteristics. Hard work can equal talent for a long way.

Do language learners have goals? Sure, we talk about this when we are selling a set of new courses, and we may even ask the students to write down their goals and to commit to them. You can get a pretty wide scala of ambition here. Some people only want to be able to go on vacation and order a meal in a restaurant. Others aim higher. Well, use my tennis player's aim. Be the best that you can. Why not strive for near-native fluency? Why quit at 3,000 words when you can learn 2,000 more and say things three different ways.

Managing Groups

Managing groups is something an effective coach must know how to do. All team sports are by definition made up of groups, and a tennis team, although the sport is at least 50% individual, is also a group.

Group instruction must be balanced in a way so that the better players are challenged but the weaker ones are not left behind. I would do this in a variety of ways. One was to give the stronger players a "teaching role." By making them my assistants, they had to be much more precise themselves, and usually felt good about the added responsibility.

Another trick that works is to handicap the better players, or give the weaker ones an advantage. The stronger players have smaller targets to aim at, for example. Or make them defend the doubles court in a singles drill.

In teaching language to groups, pair-work is obviously very important. We can pair the best student with the weakest. And we can handicap the stronger people too; for example, play a recorded text just once for them, twice or more for the others.

Keep watch over the "temperature" of your group. Be aware of it's mood as the lesson progresses. This does not mean that you as the teacher or coach should do only what they want, because typically they will want to do what is easy, (more on this when we discuss practice routines). But you do have to gauge the group's mood. Do not, in my opinion, beat a dead horse. Stop an exercise that is not working, right in the middle of it. Do something totally different. Surprise them!

Strategy and Tactics

I define strategy as, again, your overall game plan. In a sports context, this could mean "How do we beat the Jonesville Tigers (American) football team on Saturday?" Well, the Tigers are big, heavy boys, so it will not be easy to push them in a straight line. We will have to capitalise on the fact that they are not very mobile.

Tactics then, are the actual plays we will use to put our strategy to work. We will not match muscles with Jonesville, but try to make them do things requiring agility.

In language teaching, your strategy should address this question: "How do I get this student to his or her goal, which is near-native fluency?" How long will it take? What kinds of support will we need? Will the student be able to immerse him or herself in the language, either here or where the language is spoken?

Tactics, then are the actual mechanisms you will use in working towards your student's linguistic goal. The exercises, drills, presentations, dictations, written work....everything you conciously do in moving, in line with your strategy, towards the goal.

That said, we have to consider the possibility that our strategy and/or game plan may not work. What if our football team strategy to beat Jonesville is not functioning? The Jonesville team is big, but more agile than we gave them credit for. We will have to try something else, or lose. If the football coach has prepared an alternative plan, we still have a good chance.

This important principle also applies to language teaching. We may progress to a certain point with a particular student, and notice that he or she is stagnating. Perhaps we need to rethink how we are going about achieving our long-term goals. The same goes for the actual way we are working, the "tactics" question. Have another solution on hand for today's lesson. If you don't need it, fine. But it's much better to be ready for a "worst case" scenario.

I wonder how many language teachers think often about the long-term development of their students? How many discuss the question with their students? It is very easy to slip into some kind of dull routine. We are teaching the sames things over and over again, a subject that we know very well ourselves. We can quickly become lazy and nonchalant.

The sports coach has a very real barometer to consult in this respect. Are his or her players winning? Results in language teaching are not always as obvious. Not everyone wants to take a standardised test such as the TOEFL or TOEIC. Regardless, we have to evaluate and reevaluate our students regularly in some manner, even if it is known only to ourselves.

Mental Strength

This is an immense category in all sports, and particularly in tennis. Tennis players are alone, solely responsible during a match. They cannot receive any help or advice from their coach. They cannot stall and wait for the clock to run out either. I cannot think of many other sports in which player and coach do not communicate. Therefore, tennis players all need a good helping of what is referred to as "Mental Strength."

Of course, not everyone has a full tank of mental strength, but all the great champions do. This is probably the most important difference between the real stars, and the rest of the "good" players.

Tennis stars have learned to control their emotions on court, if not completely, then at least to a very high degree. That is why we so often see an upset in the making fizzle out at 5-3 for the weaker player. This player does not expect to win, and has therefore been playing freely. As unexpected victory becomes visible, this person "chokes" and cannot continue at the same level. This common phenomenon is called "fear of winning," and is a sure sign of a lack of mental strength.

The tennis player who almost won didn't because there was no stigma connected to loss. This is synonymous with the langauge learner who convinces him or herself that it isn't really neccessary to speak Italian well. This person will not want to get up in front a group and give a short talk in Italian either. There is a saying from golf: "Never Up, Never In." You have to try. We must keep reminding the timid that no one is going to laugh at them for trying.

Top athletes have also learned to measure and influence their own level of motivation. Motivation is connected to energy and concentration and,.obviously...results.

They do this in a variety of ways. Talking to one's self is common. Between the points you can hear them muttering under their breaths, saying things like "Let's go now!" or "Move your feet!" Another physical trick that actually works is to create a bit of minor pain. Pain gets your attention, (did you fall asleep in the dentist's chair?). Slapping your thigh is a good way to do this.

There certainly are times in language instruction when we need to get "fired up." After lunch, for example. We've all seen energy-raiser exercises, but do we use them enough? I don't; guilty as charged. Perhaps we think it's silly to ask adults to stand up, move around or throw something (light) at each other, but it's neither silly nor boring.

Another aspect of mental strength is the ability to deal with distractions. For tennis players, common distractions are the fans, the weather, bad line calls and often, the opponent him or herself. The stars have all developed their own techniques for dealing with distractions. Some players never look at the crowd. If the fans are too noisy, seasoned players will simply wait until the stands are quiet again before resuming play.

My tennis teams used to practice this quality by collectively heckling two of the group who were trying to play a match. This is, in effect, nothing other than a role play.

Use the same principle in language instruction. Try one of the group exercises that puts conversation partners on opposite sides of the room, or set up small groups in which two different conversations take place simultaneously.

Mental strength is needed in life, not just in sports or language teaching. We are teaching more than just language, or at least, we should be trying to.

Practice

This is another extremely important area for sports teams. In American schools and universities, sports are practiced daily during that sport's season. It is therefore not surprising that results are substancial.

My tennis players would practice what they were going to need in the near future. If, for example, we knew the next opponent was a good volley player, we would practice passing shots.

We would continually practice weaknesses. This seems obvious, but I have to mention it because it is equally important to practice one's strengths as well. This aspect of practice often needs emphasis. Everybody naturally wants to improve their weaknesses, but neglect to keep their strong points tuned up. In tennis, it is just as important to practice your big shots, for you cannot win without weapons.

Finally, there is the principle of practicing until the exercise becomes practically boring. I would ask tennis players to hit backhand shots at a certain target. It might take them a few minutes to get the range and begin hitting the spot I'd asked for. They would hit for another minute, and then stop, satisfied with themselves. And I would put them back to work on the same drill for at least another 5 minutes, if not longer. It is the repetition of the correct form of an exercise that we need, and when it does finally start to become a bore, then we have really learned it.

All of these practice principles apply to language instruction. If your student is going to give a presentation in the 2nd language, practice the phrases and key words he or she will need to move through the parts of the presentation. If your student is the company receptionist, do more telephone work than you would with someone else.

If your student is a good speaker, push him or her to get better. Give her long monologues on spur-of-the- moment subjects. Or challenge him to a debate on a subject of mutual interest. Make sure that you don't spend all your time addressing weaknesses.

Your student can't remember the irregular verbs. Drill them until there are no more mistakes. And then check back two weeks later. If you are not satisfied, keep working on it. Yes, there is the danger of boring your students here. But no one gets bored with success; they will thank you later for being persistent. Our responsibilty as teachers is not only to entertain the students, but also to insure than they learn something, and that they learn it permanently.

Keeping Fit

Tennis is a very physical game. To win, you have to have enough stamina for three long sets, five if you are a male tournament pro in a Grand Slam event. You also need muscle strength combined with flexibility. So, all serious tennis players have to stay physically fit. This means a diet, not drinking much or any alcohol, sleeping regularly, and following an adapted regime of physical exercise.

How do language learners "keep fit?" Well, sadly enough, many make no effort. If they do, however, they buy a newspaper in the 2nd language from time to time. Or they watch "original version" films whenever possible. Or they seek out opportunities to speak the language, either with other students or, if possible, with native speakers. That much committment is needed to go all the way, and is something that the teacher or coach cannot do for his student. We must remind our language learners of their responsibility in this respect. "I can show you how to play tennis or speak French, but I cannot do it for you..."

A Good Practice Session

Long before I knew anything about "Presentation, Practice and Production" in the context of language instruction, I was doing something very similar with tennis teams. In fact, if I add up the number of "Ps" that make up a good practice session, there are 5. They are: "Points, Presentation, Practice, Production, and Points". (Thank you, French Tennis Federation)

The FFT is very clear in their recommendations concerning the organization of a group practice session. Some kind of scoring game is played at the start of a session, before the actual theme of the lesson has been explained, and again, at the end of the session. This is done to motivate the players, and to get them used to the feel of competition. It also serves as an evaluation of what was (or not) learned in the practice session.

I know that we language teachers use competitions in our classes, but I wonder if we often use them at the beginning of a lesson, before the subject matter is presented? Why not? A friendly competition between groups or individuals at the start of a session gets people interested and motivated.

Have a balanced lesson. There are not as many sub-divisions to tennis as there are elements to a language, so it is easier to touch on all of them during a practice session. Groundstrokes, net play and overheads, serve and return are all included, even though the major emphasis is on the volley.

In language instruction, we should also remember to "balance" listening, speaking, reading and writing, the four major elements of all language. We may not have time to treat each area during each lesson, but we should not neglect reading or writing for the sake of conversation for very long.

Finish the practice session on a "Up." This is very important. Don't send your tennis players or language students home after a disappointing exercise that did not succeed. Take another few minutes and do something that works.

There are certainly more areas common both to the coaching of a sport like tennis and teaching foreign langauges, but I hope that I've covered most of the major ones here. In conclusion then, I'd like to consider the differences between the definitions of a teacher and a coach.

A coach is generally thought of as someone working with individuals who already know quite a bit about their sport or area of expertise. A teacher seems to be the person who does the groundwork in a subject. We don't talk about "grade school coaches". This way of considering the two positions is, in my opinion, not quite accurate. Teachers can be coaches. Coaches are teachers, but with an added set of responsibilities.

If asked to pin down the major difference between the two, I would say that coaches deal with teams, but that teachers may not. Not every class and classroom has within it a feeling of teamwork. But good coaching must create this sentiment, for without teamwork there is no team. A group of people who are not a team is not even really a group, rather just a bunch of random individuals. So, if you think of yourself as a "teacher of a foreign language", expand that definition to "coach of people, who are, at the moment, learning a foreign language."