Dr. Nigel Williams BA(Hons) Psychology, Phd.
Parents, teachers,…and coaches are forever asking “How can I motivate people to behave themselves, perform well, act responsibly?” But that’s the wrong question…, they should be asking a profoundly different question “How can I create the conditions within which people will motivate themselves?” (Deci & Flaste, 1995, Motivation experts).
It’s not about forcing the child to learn and perform well, it is about helping them WANT to learn and perform well. They must have FUN!
Consistent with this we have been greatly guided by Self-Determination theory (Ryan & Deci, 2000) to providing a fun, high motivation environment that facilitates optimal learning.
There are 2 key parts to creating this high motivation environment:
1. Autonomy (Kids are swimming of their own free will, no coercion!)
2. Competence (Kids have got to feel they are good at swimming)
1. Autonomy
Our programs are designed to help the kids want to come swimming, not because they have to but because they have developed a passion for it.
We do this by making swimming Fun, they don’t even realise they are learning because they are enjoying it so much!
If the kids are having fun they are activating the brains’ reward centre (mesolimbic dopamine system), this will help create more brain pathways (invoke neural plasticity), and that will help them orient positively towards swimming.
If we are having fun (something is rewarding) this pathway is activated. If it is activated it predisposes us to repeat that action. If we repeat that action then we create more neuronal pathways (brains communication system) to make swimming (for example) something we ‘automatically’ associate with a positive feeling.
I don't often recommend Wikipedia but it actually doesn’t have a bad explanation of this, if interested you can read more at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mesolimbic_pathway
To the kids swimming = fun, and they want to do it, thus this achieves our first objective
2. Competence
Autonomy is a necessary prerequisite to developing competence. If the kids are there because they want to be, we can work on their competence, because they are engaged and ready to learn!
In developing a child’s swimming skill we are guided by the seminal work of Ericsson (1996), and his research on the acquisition of expertise. From Ericsson’s work came the 10,000 hour rule, essentially, that if we apply 10,000 hours of practice to developing a skill we will become an expert.
HOWEVER, it is not just doing an activity e.g., swimming up and down a pool endlessly, but being involved in DELIBERATE PRACTICE. So what is the difference?
Regular Practice: Mindless repetition, no reflection on actions, doing the same thing, often wrong, and programming your neural pathways incorrectly, that then takes a lot of time to change. This is how JJ (Head Coach) was predominantly taught as a junior, in both lessons and squad. Subsequently it took him years to fix his own swimming technique problems! We don’t want this for your children!
This is likely to be close to what your child is currently receiving at the local swimming school or swimming squad. The child is in a large class (anything over 4, in our view is a large class), the children are just taught to repeat certain actions, without understanding why they are doing what they are doing, just by rote. Feedback is very limited as there is no time to give each child much individual feedback. This is very inefficient, they will improve, but progress will be slow, and development of their strokes and body position, are likely to be significantly impaired. Unfortunately, this also means that they are ‘programming’ their bodies incorrectly. This means that, if this has occurred, this poor technique has to be ‘unlearnt’ and the correct swimming stroke and body position has then to be learnt.
In essence you are likely to be paying to ‘program’ your children’s swimming incorrectly that will take longer and more expense to correct.
Deliberate Practice:
We follow the basic principles of deliberate practice (Ericsson, 1996) , the key characteristics are:
· Purposeful, why are we doing it?
· Systematic, done in a step by step as part of an overall methodical plan.
· Focused attention, have to be engaged and highly motivated
· Evaluation , as expert needs to be able to assess what needs to be done next.
· Feedback, this is communicated and adjustments are made.
Our approach to deliberate practice is a learning feedback loop:
1. We explain (in easy concrete, fun, age appropriate ways)
2. The individual child demonstrates
3. We evaluate
4. We adjust the information
This process is done multiple times THROUGHOUT every lesson with EACH child, having only made possible by having a Maximum of 4 children, implemented by highly trained (by SWS) and knowledgeable instructors.
The result of this process is that they develop competence.
Thus, the two key components, autonomy and competence, to facilitate a high motivational state, are achieved.
This has resulted in the development of our ethos - Have Fun (Highly motivated), Learn Fast (Deliberate Practice), Swim Fast (result of first two!)
Have Fun, Learn Fast, Swim Fast
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