Monday 17 th September 2012

1. Monday 17th September 2012 Methods of Practice

2. Factors affecting practice • Age • Ability/Disability • Complexity of skill • Open/closed skill • Discrete/continuous/serial skill • Experience • Personal factors – confidence, motivation • Equipment and environment

3. Methods of practice • You should be working at your own level • You should be using a variety of practice methods to keep making the skill more game like Remember “perfect practice makes perfect”

4. Shadow practice • Allows you to feel the movement • Allows you to slow down the movement • Allows you to stop the movement and check • Closes the skill • Allows the skill to be learnt as a discrete skill • Can isolate movement within the skill to make it simple

5. Solo Practice Solo Practice • Allows you to make the skill more game like • Allows you to pace/time the skill • Allows you to achieve quality practice at own level(not relying on a feeder)

6. Feeder drills • Allows you to be prepared for the shot (you know what shot is expected) • You have to make fewer decisions • Can repeat the movement several times • You receive feedback – KoR • Can make your practice more demanding by feeding deeper, faster, varying the direction or using more than one feeder

7. Continuous drills • Making the skill more open and at game speed • Can increase the difficulty by adding shots into practice whilst still keeping a pattern of movement Overhead clear Overhead clear Overhead clear Drop shot Underarm clear Overhead clear

8. Adapted Games • Change court – long thin court makes playing to the back and then forward encouraging OHC • Change scoring – More points for OHC, shorter games, different opposition • Change rules – have to high serve – encourages OHC returns • Change team sizes – fun games, motivating • Aim is to make sure that the skill you are practicing is used in a game.

9. Principles of Effective Practice • Practices should be challenging but achievable • Practices should be realistic • Practices should be varied – to avoid boredom • - to avoid fatigue • Practices have feedback • Practices should be specific to the aspect of the activity trained for • Practices should have rests built in work: rest • Practices should progress