Jun 4, 2012

My coach doesn't care about me

Who's had this experience: you, or your child, is in a lesson, but the coach seems focused on his other student, leaving you talking to the empty air?

I'm happy to say it's a small minority of coaches who behave like this. Most of them know which side their bread is buttered on, and focus on their skaters like a laser. The really good ones are thinking about the skater even off the ice.

The best thing you can do if you feel like your coach is ignoring you during lessons is say something. The coach may not be aware of her own behavior, or, if she is, pointing it out will fix the problem. Simply telling the coach "HEY! I'm over here!" (Okay, telling the coach "it bothers me when you take time out of Suzy's lesson to focus on another student" might be more diplomatic) will usually solve the problem.

If it persists, try simply leaving when the coach loses interest in your lesson--just skate away. When the coach follows, tell him that you figured the lesson was over since he started teaching someone else (and that the bill will reflect this).

To some extent, this situation is your fault. I can think of a couple of coaches with whom this is a persistent problem, and yet the parents keep putting up with it, and new parents keep signing on. And then complaining about it. Everyone knows what these coaches are like, but because they are the "prestige" coaches (whatever that means in a non-competitive rink), they get away with it. Coaches get reputations for a reason. This is one instance when listening to the gossip is a good idea. Then observe the coach; if you spot this behavior consistently, stay away.

The other problem is coaches that phone in the lesson. This one is harder to mitigate, because it's less obvious. Ask the coach what you can be doing to keep the lesson interesting for both of you.

If your coach seems to be tuning out during the lesson, make it your responsibility to keep her interested. Ask for homework. Come prepared with specific questions that you want him to deal with--give him a reason to be engaged. Let him push you to the next level. Especially with adults and once-a-week skaters, coaches often feel like they are teaching the same lesson over and over. It is very difficult to stay focused when the student makes no attempt to improve on their own.

Be an interesting, engaged, demanding student and the coach will respond.

How have you gotten the coach's interest back?

12 comments:

  1. "Be an interesting, engaged, demanding student and the coach will respond." Finally! A part of figure skating I can actually do!

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  2. My coach is too busy with other students, I ask for more coaching time, but has no space available for me and my daughter.

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    1. This is not an uncommon problem. What about asking the coach if s/he has someone s/he works with regularly--a jumps coach, a moves coach, something like that-- with whom you can work on specific things, while s/he remains your primary coach?

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    2. Asking for more coaching time is vague...I know when we were first skating, I was pretty much set that I'd only accept coaching lessons between certain hours on public ice (that came free with my dd's class). So when I asked for more lesson time we were told that she had no time on her schedule. Later, I caved and we went with freestyle session lessons. When she needed more I said, Anything but mornings before school! And it wasn't until I said we could do mornings that she got that extra time. I guess I'm suggesting to make sure you are really working with your coach's schedule when she says she has no space. :D

      Another concern I've hear from being quiet is some parents want their child with a coach and the child almost never does sessions without a coach. There seems to be some desire for kids to pick up more practice time vs coaching time. When dd started LTS, I mentioned how we got too many passes and never used them all....I did get unsolicited advice from manager with that comment. :P After that we have never had enough passes... I'm sure there is some rough formula of individual time vs time with a coach that most coaches like to see. :D ~meg

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    3. Meg-- the "we have too many passes" thing has always driven me crazy. Come and use them for heaven sake! *I* don't need to be there!

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    4. LOL - we were just coming out of a hard core sport and for us skating was simply "fun" - a parks and rec class you take for a session and then move on. Going twice a week sounded extreme. :D Right there with skates being 89.99 (including bag AND gloves)sounding VERY expensive. Now I'm scraping my jewelry box to sell gold to buy replacement skates... Oh the good old days.... ~Meg

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  3. Y'know when I read posts like this... I'm really, really grateful for the wonderful coaches I've had. I've never experienced this.

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  4. I had a coach once who was very professional, a fine coach. But if there was an ice cut in the middle of the lesson, she would disappear into the coaches room without a word. If I was the last student of the day, as soon as I paid her, she pretty much switched me off. If I wanted to ask her a question off-ice I learned to preface it with, "Do you have time for a couple of questions?" I don't know if she just didn't like me, or was addicted to her iphone.

    It got uncomfortable after a while. I'm with someone for a couple of lessons a week, I figure there ought to be some rapport. There never was. After a while my communications with her were pretty much a head nod to acknowledge her directions, or an occasional question to her. She seemed to prefer it that way.

    I felt really uncomfortable towards the end and was relieved when she went to another rink. She was too good to leave, but it was just too obvious that I was just a revenue stream.

    I wanted to find some joy in my skating. With her I felt like it was my job. only my real job was more fun.

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    1. What a sad indictment! Best compliment I ever got was a mom telling me she wasn't sure who was having more fun--me or her kid! A little human kindness goes a long way.

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  5. I can't imagine having to work to get a coaches attention back - that's what the private lesson fee is for! If a coach doesn't want to work with a student, s/he should say so.

    My daughter is very focused during lessons and her coaches are very focused on her. If they weren't (I don't mean once but as a pattern) then I'd definitely have something to say about it. When paying a dollar a minute for coaching, I don't expect my daughter to have to get the coach engaged. S/he better be already.

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  6. I had a Learn to Skate instructor who wasn't attentive. She is the only adult classes instructor at our rink for the most part. I took classes for over a year with her. At one point I was her only student and I still felt she wasn't attentive. At other points she had two students and I felt lucky to get 7 minutes of her time out of a 50 minute session. I finally stopped signing up because it just didn't seem sensible to pay for instruction, but not really receive it. Part of me felt it was a brash decision. It is good to know there are good coaches.

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    1. Longtime readers of this blog know the story of why I got into coaching. I was in a FS1 class, and was having trouble with my waltz jump. I just couldn't do it. I asked an instructor to look at it. When I asked her what the problem was, she shrugged and turned away. Not kidding. I stood there and though "I could not POSSIBLY be any worse a teacher than that." So to all you people out there who are annoyed that I'm a coach--be a better figure skating teacher and people like me won't step in to try to fix things.

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