Tonight's Announcements
Welcome to Night One of Soccer Nights 2015! I hope you are excited. Please read the following information carefully so you are prepped and ready to go when you arrive at the field!
Tonight's Schedule
5:30 –6:00 Check in, directed to teams
6:15 –6:25 Large group welcome, intro theme & skill of the night 6:25 –6:40 Warm ups in division, skill demonstration 6:45 –7:00 Team time #1: team name, learn names, set goal for the night 7:00 –7:25 Team Drill work 3 7:25 –7:30 Team time #2: debrief drill work, check in on team goal 7:35 –8:05 Scrimmages 8:05 –8:10 Team time #3: check in, debrief scrimmage and team goal 8:10 –8:20 Large group closing 8:20 –8:30 Snack in teams, check out Tonight's Skill: Passing
See also pages 5-9 of Soccer Curriculum Packet.
*********NOTE TO COACHES: Feel free to modify this and/or do something totally different- as long as the kids learn how to pass the ball correctly and are having a good time, that is what we care about.********* Coaching Skills to Focus on: 1) Form: a) Head down and eyes on the ball b) Place non-kicking foot approx. 6 inches to the side of the ball and 3 inches behind the ball, toe pointed in the direction of the pass. c) Pass with the “instep” of the kicking-foot, toe up, ankle locked d) Follow through, so your teammate can see the bottom of your kicking shoe. 2) Accuracy 3) Pace of pass 4) Timing Exercise/Drill: 1) PASSING THROUGH CONES- set up: multiple sets of 2 cones arranged 1 yd apart for each pair of players to pass the ball through. -Players stand 5 yards away from the cones, and pass through the cones to their partner. Partner stops the ball, then passes the ball through the cones back to the original player. Progressions a) back up further, b) use non-dominant foot, c) one touch (pass slowly), d) Shuttles: pass and follow, run to end of the line (need to have 3+ kids) Games: 1) KIDS VS CONES VS COACHES set up: cones lined up randomly in a line - Players stand in two lines (shoulder to shoulder) with 5-10 cones spread out in between them. Players pass to each other trying to knock over all the cones. Coaches frantically pick up the cones after they get knocked over, trying to keep all the cones upright. “Scoring:” The kids win when all of the cones are knocked over at one time. Keep track of time, and see if kids can improve their time each round. Progressions: Play vs one coach, then the other coach. See which coach takes longer to ‘beat’ the kids 2) MULTI-GOAL SOCCER set up: cones set up in pairs 1 yd apart to make mini goals. Make the goals spread out and oriented in different directions - Players pair up and each pair gets a ball. Players run around the designated area, and get a point for every time they pass the ball through the cones to their partner. Players have to pass the ball every 3rd touch, even if its not through a goal (this prevents them from dribbling up to the goal and knocking it through, then dribbling away to another goal. This is a PASSING drill) “Scoring:” See how many goals teams can score in 1 minute. Progressions: 2 minutes. See if they can improve each round. See how long it takes for a team to score 10 goals 3) PASSING LADDER set up: give each kid a number (1-_?_ ) that they must remember. -Players have to jog around in a designated area (size determined by size of team) and they can ONLY pass to the number ABOVE them. Players must keep moving around, and must only pass to the number above them. “Scoring:" See how long it takes to get the ball back to the first player. See if you can improve the team time each round. Add a 2nd ball, and see if the team can keep both balls passing. When the ball gets back to the first player, they continue to pass. See if you can add a 3rd ball. ***MAKE UP YOUR OWN SCORING FOR ANY GAME! And HAVE FUN WITH IT***
Each night during team time, your team should set a goal pertaining to the theme and/or skill of the night. Below you will find suggested goals each evening, but please feel free to have your team come up with an original goal each night - the suggestions are there to help if you have trouble.
Suggestions for setting team goals: Try to set a goal that includes both the soccer skill and value of the night. E.g. Tuesday’s skill/theme combo is dribbling/perspective. A good goal might be “Tonight we are to work hard to keep our heads up while we dribble so we can see the field and look for open passes.” This goal encompasses both dribbling and perspective. Feel to add bonus goals throughout the night to challenge your team. Monday: Teamwork & Passing Team Time #1 (before drill work)
possible goals:
■ How can our team show TEAMWORK? Team Time #2 (before scrimmage
■ what could we do to improve? ■ if we’ve already reached it, what could we add to challenge ourselves? ■ Who has shown the value of TEAMWORK like KAITI AND BRIAN? when? Team Time: #3 (after scrimmage)
- What could we do to improve as a team for tomorrow?
Tonight's Value: Team Work (Instructions for Team Time)
Point System Reminder
Throughout the week, division leaders will keep track of points awarded to the teams in their divisions. Divisions will compete against each other for the most points at the end of the week, and the participants in the winning division will receive a small prize.
Ways to earn points Team Time: Explained later, during team time teams will set a nightly goal. Coaches may award points for teams meeting their goal. ○ Completely met = 10 points ○ Majority of team met goal = 8 points ○ Partially met = 5 points Awarding to individuals: coaches or division leaders may award points to individual participants for anything they see fit, including but not limited to the following: ○ embodying RRT (respect your coach, respect your teammates, try your hardest) ○ exceptional commitment to either theme or skill of the night ○ specific challenges during the night (e.g. making a drill harder or challenging a particular kid during the scrimmage to meet a specific goal for X amount of points) Large Group Competitions: ○ Each night there will be competitions between divisions during opening large group (outlined later). Winning division will be allotted 10 points for the night. Regulating Points In past years we have had all divisions “compete” when in actuality they were all working together to reach a corporate goal. Thus, when different divisions had different economies for awarding points, it didn’t really matter. THis year as teams are actually competing, we’d like to strive for more consistency. I’ve suggested point values for some things (like nightly team goals and large group competitions), but additional points can be at the discretion of coaches and division leaders. While obviously each division will vary (especially at sites where some divisions have more teams than others), divisions should aim for somewhere in the 30-60 realm for points per night.
7 Comments
Hey all! Thanks for sharing your stories during debrief time. It really was inspiring to hear how the kids are learning the names of their teammates, and getting excited about playing soccer.
In case you missed it, here are the stories that were shared at the end of the night: Max – Team Coach, Orange Division "I had one student who was incredibly shy, and didn’t want to speak up. It was actually incredibly difficult because I couldn’t catch her name right away. And she has an awesome name. During the warm-ups & drills, she was very shy, and didn’t want to get involved. But the second we got to the scrimmage, she was all over the pitch. She was all over the ball, and as a defender, she defended half the shots on goal, and almost made a couple! It was the biggest transformation I saw tonight, and it was really inspiring." Alex – Assistant Coach, Red Division "My story is about a girl. When we were doing the scrimmage everyone wanted to be goalie. So I told them to either go to offense or defense. I told them to pick two people on the defense side, and three people on the offense side (because there were more people on the offense side) who wanted to be goalie. Each day, I was going to have one of those kids be goalie. Bella looked really sad, and it looked like she wouldn’t even play if she wasn’t goalie. So I put her in as goalie, and she looked excited. At one point she said to her teammates, ‘I need some defense!’ She was really good at goalie. I asked her how her day was, and she said, ‘At the beginning it was boring, but once I became goalie I had fun!’" Petre – Team Coach, Green Division "In our team, we had a kid that actually learned the name of everybody on the team after the first 10 minutes, plus the three values! And just taught everyone else. I thought, ‘Okay, kid! You can take it from here!’" Matt – Team Coach, Blue Division "We were just scrimmaging, and I was just playing with this little boy and his father. We were just passing the ball back and forth, and a little girl—yea high (lifting his hand not much past his knee)—came running along ready to kick the ball. It was just encouraging to have the parents there, saying thanks, and ready to have some fun. That’s my story, and I’m sticking to it!" Claudyne – 3-5 year olds "There was this little girl who didn’t know how to hula-hoop, so I taught her. She’s actually better than me now!" Grant – Lead Volunteer, Registration & Snacks "Registration is kind of crazy on the first night – we have walk-ons, we have people who thought they signed up, but really didn’t sign up, we have--unfortunately--some disappointed kids, and some disappointed parents as well if the kids couldn’t play. But we had some awesome volunteers tonight. Evadne and I really wanted to make sure that we gave some shout-outs to some people, specifically Sarah, Taylor, and Nicholas. They went back to the Vineyard and transferred all the paper forms, all 78 of them, onto the database. Now I don’t have to go back and do that late tonight! I'm so thankful for their work!" Brian – Coaching Director "There was a kid who arrived late named Henry* on Daniele’s team. I was watching when Henry came on over to his team, and Daniele said to the kids, ‘Alright guys! We have a new player who got here late. I just want to introduce him to the team!’ All the kids smiled and shouted, ‘Hi Henry!’ There was one kid who even before Daniele did that said, ‘Oh Henry! I remember you from last year! Hey!’ Henry just smiled and looked happy that someone remembered him from last year. Those little connections mean a lot. They are connections between youth that might not happen otherwise. They are really powerful. It was super great!" Susanna – Lead Volunteer, Parents Team "The night was chock-full of fun moments. Well, there was one particular pair of parents that were really passionate and said that Soccer Nights was great and should happen year-round. Optimally, twice a day. We’ll just leave it as a cliff hanger, and see how that story unfolds…But it was a great connection to make!" *Names of children in stories have been changed. If you have an awesome story that wasn't shared during debrief time, be sure to post a comment below with your story by 3pm today! Everyone who shared a story will enter the chance to win a gift certificate to JP Licks (yum!). |
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