Coaching youth football can be a challenging endeavour even for the most experienced football coach. There are always challenges and hurdles and issues along the way to solve even before you manage to play your first game. Understand that just because of their younger age it is still not an easy assignment. There's a lot of work involved!
The most important thing is that you have to be organized, have a structured practice plan in place that includes emphasis on fundamentals such as blocking and tackling daily! Running plays in practice is the least important when you consider all of what has to be done in order for youth football program to take-off! Your football systems need to be simple but effective and for the most part, the high school offence that you played and thrived in years ago is not suitable for your youth football team. But that doesn't mean you cannot adapt to a simpler more effective offence that your youth players will thrive in! There's certainly a lot of good information on the internet today by credible and experienced coaches and most of its free! The problem with the free information is that you have to spend countless hours poring through information and sorting out the good from the bad for your youth football team.
One of the products that I endorse on this website for the beginner youth football coach is Dave Cisars Winning Youth Football: A step by step plan. Coach Cisar promotes a simple but effective plan through a series of DVD's, CD-Rom, or paperback that can be purchased at a very reasonable cost that will help you effectively manage your youth football program. Coach Cisar has many years of coaching experience at the youth football level and his step by step plan is based on solid football fundamentals complimented with a simple but effective plan!
Cheers!
Showing posts with label youth football practice plan. Show all posts
Showing posts with label youth football practice plan. Show all posts
Monday, March 14, 2011
Thursday, February 17, 2011
Football Blocking: Tackling in Football
Schedule Blocking and Tackling Drills in Practice
Football blocking and tackling are the cornerstone fundamentals of playing youth football. To play the game successfully and with confidence all youth football coaches across the country need to focus on these specific football fundamentals. To neglect these would be an absolute complete failure on your part as a football coach.
As part of your football practice plan you need to incorporate specific tackling and blocking drills into each and every football practice. Not only do you need to practice blocking and tackling in football, you need to talk about the importance of solid blocking and tackling fundamentals with your youth football players. They need to hear how important these elements are to their game and how their game will improve once they are solid in both blocking and tackling.
It's all about confidence!
In the long run you will be much better, your players will be much more confident in their assignments and it all starts in practice. You have the control! You can have great athletes on your football team but if they cannot block or tackle then you're in for a long season. You'd be amazed what a minimum of 15 minutes of blocking drills and another 15 minutes of tackling drills will do for your youth football team. No doubt, you will be an improved football team.
Cheers!
Football blocking and tackling are the cornerstone fundamentals of playing youth football. To play the game successfully and with confidence all youth football coaches across the country need to focus on these specific football fundamentals. To neglect these would be an absolute complete failure on your part as a football coach.
As part of your football practice plan you need to incorporate specific tackling and blocking drills into each and every football practice. Not only do you need to practice blocking and tackling in football, you need to talk about the importance of solid blocking and tackling fundamentals with your youth football players. They need to hear how important these elements are to their game and how their game will improve once they are solid in both blocking and tackling.
It's all about confidence!
In the long run you will be much better, your players will be much more confident in their assignments and it all starts in practice. You have the control! You can have great athletes on your football team but if they cannot block or tackle then you're in for a long season. You'd be amazed what a minimum of 15 minutes of blocking drills and another 15 minutes of tackling drills will do for your youth football team. No doubt, you will be an improved football team.
Cheers!
Friday, January 28, 2011
Football Practice Plan
Your first football practice is a few days away, you're excited about getting out there and getting things going, working with the youth in the hour plus time allotted. Wait a minute... an hour... how do you fill the time in? Well, let's get started. You need to be organized and you need to have a football practice plan. You cannot do it off the top off your head. You need to have a football practice plan that accounts for every minute of your planned practice.
A good football practice plan will cover all aspects of your specific sport: warm-up, conditioning, fundamentals, skills, team play and systems, as well as special teams. Account for at least a minimum of 10-15 minutes per category. Too much in one area and the players will lose interest and you will lose out in the other areas that you want to cover. By having a football practice plan and following it, you will have good flow to your practice, maintain player concentration, and get the most out of your practice by covering all aspects.
A poor football practice plan and you will have down time which invites fooling around and lack of focus especially at the youth level.
Follow your plan!
If you are working on a specific fundamental or system and things are not working out after your allotted time frame, move on to the next scheduled assignment, and after practice make a note of how each session went and what you need to continue to work on in practice. Keep practice logs recording your thoughts, ideas, and player evaluation and development. Refer to the log prior to planning the following football practice so you know what you need to schedule. It's important that you work on fundamentals of some sort for each and very practice, do not omit this in order to work on something else. Solid fundamentals such as tackling and blocking are very important. You need to do fundamentals well in order to be good in your systems.
Remember you play like you practice!
Cheers!
Monday, May 17, 2010
Youth Football Fundamentals
While participating in a youth football camp last week I heard an interesting comment from a youth coach while he was running offensive plays with his players. " You fellows have to learn how to tackle". I stopped what I was doing at the time and watched a bit of this group and the phrase" You guys gotta learn how to tackle" has been with me since.
Spending time on football fundamentals such as blocking,tackling, and footwork will pay dividends with your football team. Runnning plays with players who have poor fundamentals will be frustrating, sloppy, and ineffective come game time regardless of whether or not you play offence or defence.
You will not be successful!
Once again as I watched them try and run plays I noticed that the coach was spending as much time correcting stances as he was running plays. He would have been better off just canning the offensive plays for the day and work on their stances and first step, then a session on basic blocking. Once his players had basic fundamentals his offensive plays would have been a lot smoother and his players would not have struggled so bad.
A lot of youth coaches jump the gun too quick and try to implement their systems with players that have poor fundamentals. One thing I've learned is that they will never get it unless they are fundamentally sound. Again, it comes down to implementing a solid practice plan. Training camp is the ideal time to begin to develope football fundamentals and as they progress, introduce slowly some of your basic schemes and do not move on until they get it. If the stances are poor or the blocking is brutal, then schedule in stance and blocking segments in your next practice. Sometimes its necessary to take a step back in order to gain two steps forward.
Cheers
Spending time on football fundamentals such as blocking,tackling, and footwork will pay dividends with your football team. Runnning plays with players who have poor fundamentals will be frustrating, sloppy, and ineffective come game time regardless of whether or not you play offence or defence.
You will not be successful!
Once again as I watched them try and run plays I noticed that the coach was spending as much time correcting stances as he was running plays. He would have been better off just canning the offensive plays for the day and work on their stances and first step, then a session on basic blocking. Once his players had basic fundamentals his offensive plays would have been a lot smoother and his players would not have struggled so bad.
A lot of youth coaches jump the gun too quick and try to implement their systems with players that have poor fundamentals. One thing I've learned is that they will never get it unless they are fundamentally sound. Again, it comes down to implementing a solid practice plan. Training camp is the ideal time to begin to develope football fundamentals and as they progress, introduce slowly some of your basic schemes and do not move on until they get it. If the stances are poor or the blocking is brutal, then schedule in stance and blocking segments in your next practice. Sometimes its necessary to take a step back in order to gain two steps forward.
Cheers
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Football Practice Plan: Individual Group Work
One of the elements of your practice plan should include at least 30 minutes of individual group work .Depending on the availability of coaches, groups can be divided by position such as offensive linemen, linebackers, quarterbacks, recievers, defensive backs,defensive line,and running backs.
At a designated time during the practice, individual group work would be scheduled and each group would go to their designated area of the practice field and work specifically on position orientated fundamentals and skills. Assistant coaches would know that their allotted time frame for individaul group would be for 30 minutes and they would manage their time effectively covering footwork, skills,and fundamentals associatted with their specific position.
If lack of coaches is an issue, then you can group together your linebackers and defensive backs, offensive and defensive linemen, and lump together your quarterbacks, running-backs, and recievers.
Use this time wisely. In other words don't just use the time to throw the football with your wide-recievers, spend specific time on open field blocking for example. You'll be happy you did when your recievers block hard and well down-field and give your athletic running back more time and space to score.
Cheers
At a designated time during the practice, individual group work would be scheduled and each group would go to their designated area of the practice field and work specifically on position orientated fundamentals and skills. Assistant coaches would know that their allotted time frame for individaul group would be for 30 minutes and they would manage their time effectively covering footwork, skills,and fundamentals associatted with their specific position.
If lack of coaches is an issue, then you can group together your linebackers and defensive backs, offensive and defensive linemen, and lump together your quarterbacks, running-backs, and recievers.
Use this time wisely. In other words don't just use the time to throw the football with your wide-recievers, spend specific time on open field blocking for example. You'll be happy you did when your recievers block hard and well down-field and give your athletic running back more time and space to score.
Cheers
Monday, April 19, 2010
Youth Football Practice Plan
We have all heard that saying "practice makes perfect". Repetition of skills is the best way to get your players to perform better. Knowing what to do in a given situation is one of the characteristics of a good player. The more you practice, the more inclined your players are to do the right thing at the right time.
A majority of successful football coaches share one very important characteristic- they are organized and structured in their approach to practice planning. Football is one of the most challenging sports to coach because there are so many different positions, skills, and plays that need to be worked on throughout a practice.
Having an organized, structured practice plan allows you to cover the most amount of material in your allotted practice time. The most effective football coaching practice structure involves dividing time into structured “Training Elements”.
There are 7 key Training Elements which should appear in each of your practices:
Warm-up & Stretching
Review of New Team Plays and/or Conditioning
Individual Techniques by Position
Special Teams
Group Work
Game Preparation and Team Drills
Cool-Down
Make sure that you cover each training element during your practice and allot a specific time for each element. Once the time is up, move on to your next scheduled element. Stick to your schedule and your players will get the most out of the practice. You'll have good flow to your practice with very little down time!
A majority of successful football coaches share one very important characteristic- they are organized and structured in their approach to practice planning. Football is one of the most challenging sports to coach because there are so many different positions, skills, and plays that need to be worked on throughout a practice.
Having an organized, structured practice plan allows you to cover the most amount of material in your allotted practice time. The most effective football coaching practice structure involves dividing time into structured “Training Elements”.
There are 7 key Training Elements which should appear in each of your practices:
Warm-up & Stretching
Review of New Team Plays and/or Conditioning
Individual Techniques by Position
Special Teams
Group Work
Game Preparation and Team Drills
Cool-Down
Make sure that you cover each training element during your practice and allot a specific time for each element. Once the time is up, move on to your next scheduled element. Stick to your schedule and your players will get the most out of the practice. You'll have good flow to your practice with very little down time!
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