The classifcation of the student’s learning pattern through golf instruction

The classifcation of the student’s learning pattern through golf instruction

Abstract

This study’s purpose was to find an effective method to help the student better understand the golf coach’s instruction and suggestion. The purpose of sports coaching is for a coach to communicate useful and helpful information to a student that is trying to improve his or her performance. Therefore, a relationship of mutual trust is necessary between a student and a coach. In this study, six golf coaches including an author, were picked as subjects.

These coaches were interviewed about the characteristics of the students with whom they felt they could not build a relationship of mutual trust well. In this present study, the example of the learner whom the leader had felt difficult to build a good mutual trust with, was enumerated at first. In the end, this study made clear that the students tended to trouble coaches fell into two types: positive-aggressive and negative-passive. Also, the cases where coaches able to successfully build a mutual relationship of trust with these two student-type are discussed. The coaches’ methods of building this trust with each type is clarified in comprehensive detail. Therefore, positive-passive method is needed in order to build good relations between an instructor and a student. The coach should use the positive-passive method while actively paying attention to the student.

INTRODUCTION

This study’s purpose was to find an effective method to help the student better understand the golf coach’s instructions and suggestions. The purpose of sports coaching is for a coach to communicate useful and helpful information to a student that is trying to improve his or her performance. However, when coaches in the field get impatient, important guidance and helpful suggestions can be overlooked, and as a result the mutual trust between coach and student erodes.

One theory for this phenomenon is that the coach can often ignore the learning type of the student, and instead uses his or her own unmodified teaching method. It was thought before that the cause of misunderstanding was due to the student ignoring the coach’s instructions. Therefore, a relationship of mutual trust is necessary between a student and a coach. In order for the coach and student to build this mutual trust, a study about the personality of the learner’s psychological domain is taken into account. Certainly, in the area of psychology, the relation between learner’s personality and activity participation, or, learner’s personality and learner’s success, has been researched.

However, these studies do not serve as a reference to build the relationship of mutual trust with the learner. In this present study, the example of the learner whom the leader had felt difficult to build a good mutual trust with, was enumerated at first. As a result, the characteristics of those learners was studied, and “the classification of the learner’s types” used on-site were tried. Using the information gained, this study classifies the different student learning traits, and how they frustrated the methods of on-site coaches and hindered coach-student relations.

METHOD

Six golf coaches, including the author, were picked as subjects. Table 1 below presents each coach’s years of teaching experience, age, and the number of students they taught per week.

Table 1. Profile of the coaches

Table 1. The classifcation of the student’s learning pattern through golf instruction

Contenido disponible en el CD Colección Congresos nº 16

Each coach teaches anywhere between 120 and 70 people a week. These coaches were interviewed about the characteristics of the students with whom they felt they could not build a relationship of mutual trust well. Three interviews were performed with each coach and the information which they dictated or expressed was faithfully documented and properly cataloged. Three interviews were performed on the dates below in table 2.

Table 2. Interview days

Table 2. The classifcation of the student’s learning pattern through golf instruction

Contenido disponible en el CD Colección Congresos nº 16

Each coach tried to deepen each other’s understanding after having checked relations with the learners between interviews.

RESULTS

From opinions collected from each coach, the characteristics of students whom the coaches could not build mutual relationships with were defined. The learner’s classification was done based on these opinions. As a result, the learners to whom the coaches did not build mutual trust easily were classified as the following the two types: One group’s characteristic is that they advance to learn from themselves and only the thing that they need is learning. We named this group the “positive-aggressive type”. On the other hand, another group’s characteristic is that they did not study voluntarily and only did what was ordered. We named this group “the negative-passive type”. In the end, this study made clear that the students who tended to trouble coaches fell into two types: positive-aggressive and negative-passive. (See Figure 1)

Figure 1. The classifcation of the student’s learning pattern through golf instruction

Contenido disponible en el CD Colección Congresos nº 16

Figure 1 The classification of interview contents

DISCUSSION

The cases where coaches are able to successfully build a mutual relationship of trust with these two student-types are discussed below. The 2 successful cases followed advice shown in Figure 2. In the advice given to the positive-aggressive types, the aggressive behavior changed into passive behavior by not saying more than was necessary. Moreover, negative behavior changed into positive behavior by giving encouraging advice to the negative-passive types.

Since each coach was good at teaching students that fit their own learning style, it was hard for them to communicate with the people on the opposite end of their teaching style. Usually it is thought that a student doesn’t have the will to learn when they receive advice given to them by the instructor. (See figure 2.) Therefore, positive-passive method is needed in order to build good relations between an instructor and a student. The coach should use the positive-passive method while actively paying attention to the student. In the future, I will think that it is necessary for a leader to build a method that determines whether a learner is a negative-passive type or a positive-aggressive type before giving guidance.

Figure 2. The classifcation of the student’s learning pattern through golf instruction

Contenido disponible en el CD Colección Congresos nº 16

Figure 2 Successful advice and failure advice