Coaching Psychology - Every High School Coach Should Know

Department

Health Promotion and Physical Education

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

Summer 2011

Abstract

High school coaches have great challenges for bringing their teams to success due to these athletes' immature cognitive ability, negative parental infiuences, peer pressures, discipline issues, academic responsibilities, and pressure to win, etc. Many coaches spend their full energies in trying to bring their teams to success but they may fail due to the above reasons. So many high school coaches feel frustrated with their inability of bringing a team together to achieve success regardless of the coaches' great technical skills and work ethics. According to Smoll and Smith (2010), youth sport is a domain equally worthy attention. Yet, according to Coakely (1993), Ewing, Seefeldt, and Brown (1996), Martens (1993), and Scanlan (2002), youth sports are deemed important in child and adolescent development. Sport participation potentially has direct relevance to the acquisition of prosocial attitudes and behaviors, such as self-discipline, cooperation with others, respect for others, following the rules, and the ability to tolerate frustration. Needless to say, coaching a team sport at the high school level is an art that not only requires the coaches' technical ability, but also psychological skills to achieve success. A team's performance (team productivity) is not equal to the sum of the athletes' overall talents because there is a loss of team coordination that refiects any potential causes that could affect the team's performance among athletes. To overcome the loss of team coordination, coaching psychology plays a significant role. With this concept in mind, the purpose of this paper has two folds: (1) elucidate the coaches' challenges, and (2) introduce psychological strategies for champions. Hopefully, these applied strategies will help high school coaches develop a comprehensive understanding of how to set up a well-rounded team system to ensure unity for success. In addition, coaches will be presented with the necessary coaching psychology techniques to better prepare their athletes to achieve peak performance.

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