Coach Wooden the "winning-est coach" of all time, viewed
himself as more of a teacher than a coach.
In the early years Coach had the knowledge but did not know how to
teach:
Coach Wooden in his early years as a basketball coach at Dayton
High School said, “I was a leader who couldn’t teach but didn’t know it.” His
team was having a losing season. He was “knowledgeable” and experienced about
the game and knew the essentials but he did not know “how to teach it”. In his
Pyramid of Success, Coach calls knowledge “Skill” and put it “in the heart” of
his Pyramid.
Teach
students how to do it!
Coach said, his former coach at Martinsville High School, Glenn
Curtis had the skill and knew “how to teach”. Coach said, “Knowledge is not
enough. You must be able to effectively transfer what you know to those you
manage-not just the nuts and bolts material, but your standards, values,
ideals, beliefs, as well as your way of doing things. Most of all, you
must teach those under your leadership how to become a real team rather than a
group of individuals who simply work at the same place for the same boss. All
this is only possible if you know how to teach.”
Coach Wooden’s Four Principles of Effective Teaching:
As an English teacher, Coach learned how to teach by breaking down
“teaching into a set of four components: demonstration, imitation,
correction, and repetition. These four principles are the key to
effective teaching.”
Teach with Patience.
Coach Wooden said, “Mistakes that are corrected by a leader-a
teacher who is fair, knowledgeable, and patient quickly disappear. There is
something inherently simple, noble, and modest about a leader who sees his role
as a teacher, not as a boss. The teacher’s function is to help the
student to be their best; a boss views his employees as helping the
organization achieve goals. Coach wanted his players to know that they
were working with him, not for him.”
Everyone is a teacher to someone.
People in the public spot light, celebrities, and athletes may not want to be viewed as role models, but
they are.
You are too. To your family, the people you work with, and in
your community. We teach others by the way we live our everyday lives and these lessons speak louder than any billboard champaign.
One of my first
teachers was my Grandmother Mary Chernick Leader. When I was seven, Grandma Mary came to
visit us. When she discovered I could not read, she quietly sat down beside me
and patiently pointed to the page in my book and read a line on the page,
sounding out each word for me. She then had me repeat that line slowly and
carefully pronouncing each word and then asked me to try the next line the same
way. Grandma enjoyed reading and explained to me how you could
visit anywhere in the world and go on an adventure through reading a book.
On a table nearby,
Grandma had a large Hershey's Chocolate bar and a small bottle of Coca-Cola.
Every page I read pronouncing the words correctly, Grandma would hand me as a
prize, for good work, a piece of chocolate and a sip of Coca-Cola. This was our
"little secret" as my Momma never allowed soda or chocolate in the
house.
Grandma taught me to
read with kindness and patience. If I made a mistake she would say quietly,
“Mimi, sound it out slowly. Try it again, you can do it!”
She was a ferocious
reader who devoured newspapers, biographies, and she loved doing crossword
puzzles. These efforts kept her mentally sharp and helped her in her efforts of
teaching me to read.
“Action Speaks Louder Than Words.” Wooden led by Example:
Coach Wooden said, “I
used to smoke cigarettes as a young high school coach at South Bend. I would
quit during the basketball season to set a good example, but then I was also
setting an example by smoking-a bad one. So I quit.” My example, I felt,
meant more than my words.”
Practice what you preach.
One of Coach Wooden’s favorite poem’s that helped him quit smoking
was written in the mid-‘30s:
“No written word, no spoken plea can teach our youth what they
should be. Nor all the books on all the shelves, it's what the teachers are
themselves.”
When I was 17, I attended Virginia Commonwealth University, VCU,
as a full scholarship student on the violin. As part of the scholarship
obligation, I played my violin as a member of the Richmond Symphony, studied
and excelled in my freshman classes, and assisted Professor Peter Zaret, my
violin professor, in teaching his adult beginning violin class.
Music education majors were required to take a class on learning
to play the violin for credit.
Before attending VCU, I had performed in Carnegie Hall,
4 months before, graduated from high school at the North Carolina School of
Performing Arts in Winston-Salem, North Carolina graduating with my high school
diploma, and my Violin Performance Diploma. That summer I performed and studied
at Wolf Trap Music Festival in Vienna, Virginia on full scholarship.
In teaching Professor Zaret’s class of adult beginning students
they needed to learn the following:
-How to stand straight and tall and balance on their feet, how to
hold the violin and bow, how to make a sound on the violin by pulling the bow
across the string, and finally where to place their fingers on the violin to
play simple tunes.
We began the class from the ground up: Balance of feet
Step 1: I first demonstrated to the beginning adult
violin students how to stand straight and tall with their shoulders down and
balance his or her feet like a tree with the roots going down.
Also I demonstrated how to bend my left and right arms from the
elbows keeping them close to the body.
Step 2:Then each student took a turn by imitation, how
he or she would stand straight and tall, balancing their feet, and bending
their arms from their elbows keeping them close to the body.
Step 3:Next, going around the room once more, I made corrections showing
each person, the little details they were missing.
Step 4: Each student again showed by repetition how
they were to stand straight and tall, balance their feet, and bend their elbows
keeping their shoulders down.
Each step was done with patience and paying attention to the
smallest detail.
Our next step was to hold the violin. I demonstrated to
them how to hold their violin with their shoulders down, bending their arms at
the elbow. We followed our four steps –demonstration, imitation,
correction, and repetition.
We began the process again this time with learning to hold the
violin bow.
Step 1: I showed them by demonstrating how to hold my bow by making a
loose fist keeping the thumb and fingers curved putting the fingers on the
bottom of the bow called the frog. The fingers are close together with the
thumb and second finger touching forming an oval shape.
Step 2: Each violin student, as I walked around the room, imitated how
I had shown them to do it. As each student took their turn they watched how the
other students were doing it. One student had huge hands and had trouble
holding the bow. I had him make a loose fist, curving and bending his
fingers, and then wrapping his fingers around the bow.
Step 3:Next, going around the room once more, I made corrections showing
each person the little details they needed for a good position of holding their
bows.
Step 4: Each student again showed by repetition how
they held their bows.
Each step was done with patience and paying attention to the
smallest detail.
Our next step was to make a clear sound on the violin with the
bow: I demonstrated to them how to put their bows on the
string of the violin, drop their elbows a little to put the weight in to the
string and pull a sound from the violin by leaning into the string with their
index finger on the bow and pulling the bow across the string to make the
string vibrate.
Each violin student, as I walked around the room, imitated how
I had shown them to do it. When they had difficulty, I would have them lean
into the string with their index finger on the bow, dropping their elbow
slightly with a little weight added.
Next, going
around the room once more, I made corrections showing each
person the little details they needed to make a clear focused sound.
Our last step was repetition, repeating the process
over and over to practice making a clear smooth sound. I reminded them to
practice what we were working on so they would improve by the next lesson.
Each step was done with patience and paying attention to the
smallest detail.
Dr. Albert Einstein said, “If you can’t explain it simply you
don’t understand it well enough.”
Coach Wooden said, “You haven’t taught until they’ve learned.”
As a role model add in to your daily life Coach
Wooden’s four components of teaching -demonstration, imitation, correction, and
repetition. By doing this you will become a better and more effective leader, coach, mentor,
parent, friend, and teacher.
Andrew Hill and Coach Wooden said, “Remember, corrections
shouldn’t be given in anger, and if you wait to correct behavior until you are
angry, it will be difficult to strip your feelings from your comments. But
mistakes that are corrected by a leader-a teacher- who is fair, knowledgeable,
and patient quickly disappear. There is also something inherently simple,
noble, and modest about a leader who sees his role as teacher, not as boss. The
teacher’s function is to help the student to be their best; a boss views his
employees as helping the boss achieve his own goals.”
Andrew Hill said, “Coach Wooden wanted his players to know that
they were working with him, not for him.” Remember, whether you are a leader,
boss, coach, or parent you want the people you are working with to feel that
they are “working with” you, not for you!
Starting today, who will you guide and help to improve their skills with Coach
Wooden 4 teaching components?
