Junior Soccer

A Session-by-Session Approach

Glyn Jones, Frank Rowe

• Editore: Routledge
• Anno: 2016
• ISBN:
  9781317708940
• Edizione: 1
• Argomento: Bildung
• Categoria: Bildung Allgemein

Developments in National Curriculum Physical Education have placed increasing emphasis on games including football as an area of activity at Key Stage 2. In doing so, it is intended that not only skill levels in the game will improve, but also that personal, social and physical skill levels are developed, and competencies such as good team work, perseverance and sportsmanship should be nurtured alongside the skills of the game. This practical book is designed to help primary school teachers deliver progressive and educationally worthwhile football lessons. It contains a series of lesson plans that tackle both content and delivery aspects and, consequently, offer useful teaching tips on Error Diagnosis And Correction, Methods Of Differentiation, Motivational strategies and organizational hints. The lesson plans adopt a prescriptive approach and this is done to make the material more accessible to the many inexperienced primary school football teachers.

1 INTRODUCTION

The session begins by separating the boys and girls. The latter are sent off to play netball leaving the boys to have a game of soccer. Two teams of eleven are then picked by the ‘captains’ (who are selected because they are the best players) and the game (session!) begins. A largely one-sided game ensues for the next 30 minutes. Little Johnny scores three hat-tricks; Tim saves a penalty; Kieran hurts his leg whilst tackling; and Edward doesn’t kick the ball for the second week in succession (although he did take a foul throw-in!). The red team eventually wins by the record margin of 23 goals to 2 and the session is over.

Good Teaching/Coaching Practice

The caricatured session depicted above serves to illustrate a few of the teaching/coaching principles neglected in a poor soccer session. The following guidelines present a checklist of good teaching/coaching practice in the soccer session and underpin the approach adopted throughout the sessions in the coming chapters.

• Every child should be given the opportunity to succeed and enjoy the session. Repeated failure and a consequent lack of enjoyment are guaranteed to put the child off soccer for life!

• Mixed sex teaching groups should be encouraged. For 7–11 year olds there are no good reasons why boys and girls should not learn alongside one another.

• Each session should begin with a warm-up designed to prepare the body and mind for action.

• Stretches (although not included in the text for reasons of brevity) should proceed the warm-up and prepare the muscle groups to be used during the session.

• Each session should contain some skills learning, whether this be in the techniques and/or strategies of the game.

• Small-sided games (for instance 5 ∨ 5) should be adopted in preference to adult full-sized games.

• Teams and groups should be picked by the teacher/coach.

• Sessions should be progressive ie. each session builds on the previous one and skills learnt in a logical sequence.

• The rules and etiquette of the game should be taught during the session at appropriate moments.

• The safety of the children must be foremost in a contact sport. Consequently, fair play, the wearing of shinpads, good tackling technique, matching children for strength, size and so on must be addressed.

Developments in National Curriculum Physical Education

The National Curriculum has placed increasing emphasis on ‘games’ (including soccer) as an area of activity at Key Stage 2. In so doing, it is intended that not only skill levels in the game will improve but also that personal and social skills are developed. Consequently, the intended learning outcomes of soccer sessions embrace both personal and physical development goals and competencies such as good teamwork, perseverance and sportsmanship should be nurtured alongside the skills of the game.

There are a number of ways in which the National Curriculum requirements for physical education and games may be applied to a programme of soccer sessions and these are presented below:

1 Small-sided games should be employed eg. with a class of thirty children, three 5 ∨ 5 games are appropriate.

2 Basic tactics and strategies of the game should be taught – these should focus on attack and defence.

3 The core skills of soccer ie. sending (passing), receiving (controlling) and travelling (running with, or dribbling, the ball) should be covered.

4 Each session should have sufficient activity in it to promote health benefits in the child (approximately 20 minutes of sustained activity).

5 Basic physiological principles (such as the need to stretch adequately during a warm-up) should be introduced.

Although several foci are mentioned here, it is stressed that the principle concern of a soccer session should be educating the child through practising and performing the skills of the game.

Football in Context

Somewhat erroneously, a series of indifferent international performances by the home nations in both European and World Cup qualifying games, which highlighted inadequacies in skill levels of domestic players, were blamed partly on soccer teaching in schools. Although it might appear absurd to apportion blame on junior school teachers for the lack of skills displayed by international soccer players this conviction has, and will have, an impact on how soccer is taught.

Thus far, the areas identified for improving the standards of soccer throughout the nation centre upon the following principles:

(i) The use of small-sided games.

(ii) An emphasis on individual skills learning.

(iii) The avoidance of too many competitive games (particularly where fundamental skills remain undeveloped).

However, such an approach, whilst promoting the development of skills in the game, does make increased demands on resources. Ideally, in the early stages of learning, the players should have a ball each. This allows them the time to develop their skills individually without the interruptions of having to share equipment. It is appreciated though that in under-resourced schools/clubs this is unlikely to happen and so a number of strategies for delivering soccer sessions and dealing with inadequate facilities and equipment are listed below:

• Whenever possible soccer sessions should be held outside.

• The nature of the playing surface will determine the suitability of various activities. For instance, concrete playgrounds are good for personal skills learning but less suitable for contact aspects of the game such as tackling. Conversely, playing fields are better suited to the rough and tumble elements of the game such as some goal-keeping skills, diving headers and tackling.

• If the amount of space is severely restricted then a number of steps may be appropriate. For instance, the use of skills circuits which alternate skills and fitness drills; the use of relay-type activities and the modification of equipment (for instance using foam or tennis balls).

• On occasions when it proves impossible to go outside, one of the sessions indicated with an asterisk should be selected (these take into account the demands of working within a confined space). Note: these sessions may be readily located using the tables in Chapter 6.

• Adequate equipment is essential to deliver a programme of soccer sessions. The sessions assume an average class/group size of thirty and that there is a minimum of one ball between two ie. fifteen balls per class/group (if this is not the case then additional balls must be purchased if the school/club is serious about delivering worthwhile sessions). As stop gaps, children may be able to bring in their own soccer balls or it may be possible to borrow some from a neighbouring school or club. Note: inadequate equipment (eg. one ball per class of thirty) makes offering a worthwhile soccer programme impossible.

• Pitch markings are not essen...