As a former physical education teacher, I had the opportunity to hone my teaching skills and develop many teaching styles. Back in the 80’s I was intrigued by fitness and watched just about every fitness related show and read every magazine and newspaper available to me. The big difference I noticed between my profession as a teacher and my new passion, fitness, was that there didn’t seem to be a solid foundation of teaching methodology in the field of fitness. Most of the trainers were giving their clients the same exercise routine they did that morning, plus they were using a more motivating teaching style without instruction. In other words, there was a lot of yelling but little teaching.

As time went on, I took the fitness industry more seriously and started teaching athletes how to improve their athletic skills. Because my previous exposure was from other coaches and what I’ve seen on TV and what I’ve read about, I basically adopted those methods for my teaching style. But it didn’t take me long to realize there had to be a better way to harness athletes’ learning abilities for more natural results. What I mean by natural results is that I wanted the body to move as intended and not so robotic and rehearsed.

Based on my experience as a teacher, I started using a teaching method called Guided Discovery. I remember in college I took a class called education in movement. It was based on experimenting and discovering how to perform a task. So what I started doing is using this form of teaching to get my athletes to move correctly and more naturally. The other important aspect of Guided Discovery that has always benefited me as an athlete is when I did something correctly because of the sensation, it was an instant kinesthetic understanding of my body and how it should move. No matter how many times a coach or teacher told me how to do it, I had to feel it to learn it and reproduce it.

So I began to incorporate this style of teaching and learning in athletes. Over time I became more adept at recognizing which skills needed a more direct approach to teaching and which skills needed to be discovered through kinesthetic awareness. Some skills required a bit of both, and some athletes varied greatly in how they needed to be taught. The most important benefit I wanted all of my athletes to get from the learning experience is empowerment. I wanted them to take charge of their bodies and minds and try to establish a grounded connection. I really felt that if I could train athletes to realize basic balance and body positions to perform movements, they would be able to make the necessary adjustments for virtually any athletic ability.

So how did I use guided discovery? What was the basic foundation of this teaching method in everyday learning? First, I had developed a set of rules that fit my personality as a teacher and made sense in the role of using guided discovery. 6 basic rules that I adopted over time are listed:

1. Never place the athlete in an offensive environment. If the athlete has the potential for self-injury, it is the athlete’s responsibility as a coach to reduce this potential.

2. Always set your athlete up for success. The athlete must be placed in a position where he can achieve success. This doesn’t mean they don’t have to work for it, but never give them a task that is guaranteed to fail.

3. Give them as few cues as possible to guide them in the right direction. The goal is for the athlete to discover how to move correctly through feel and orientation.

4. Ask questions that give you as much information as possible about how they feel physically during the skill and find out what you want. For example; “Can you feel your glutes shoot when your heel is in contact with the ground”? This will give you the answer you want, but it will also guide you to make sure your heel is in contact with the ground without actually saying “place your heel on the ground.”

5. Reward the correct movement pattern with strong phrases or words. “Fantastic, you did it” or “You did it” or “Great job”. Psychologically, this is more powerful and rewarding and gives a good feel to the right move.

6. Don’t reward sloppy or poor movements. You don’t want to punish either. Simply use terms like; “you’re not there yet” or “you can do better than that”. Give them the feeling that they have to focus and deliver a better performance than they just did.

Guided discovery is used in such a way that instruction is limited to the point of making sure the athlete understands what the skill is and what it should look like, but the athlete must use their feel to perform it correctly.

Important points:

  • The coach must immediately recognize if the skill is not correct, even if the athlete feels it is correct. This is where the coach needs to have a proper working knowledge of what the skill should look and feel like.
  • The coach may give hints that will guide the athletes to perform the skill correctly, but not really give them a step-by-step approach which can lead to more confusion due to too many instructions. Sometimes, less is more.

Another important aspect of guided discovery that has not yet been addressed is the coach’s act of physically forcing the athlete to self-correct a poor movement. Gray Cook, a noted physical therapist and strength coach, uses Reactive Neuromuscular Training (RNT) to guide his clients into a correct movement pattern. This is done by pushing the client to make his mistake and forcing him to correct himself. This can be done using your hands or using a rubber band. An example of an RNT would be forcing a client going into valgus (medial collapse of the knees) to additional values ​​by placing the elastic band around the outside of the knees, obviously forcing them inward. The only indication that should be given is not to let the band collapse the knees or to keep the knees over the middle of the toes.

As you can see, guided discovery is about putting the obligation of right movement on the individual. The coach’s responsibility is to guide when necessary. I have always felt that too many coaches try to find something to say because they feel like it is their job, when in fact saying little can get quicker and more powerful results.

Now, I’m certainly not advocating that guided discovery be used as the only teaching method, but if used correctly, it can create a lasting learning effect. You can establish a framework of understanding on the part of the athlete to make self-corrections when necessary.

I strongly advise coaches to fully educate themselves on the skill or movement pattern they are teaching. Because the foundation of education is knowledge. One coach cannot guide another if he has not acquired a working knowledge of the task at hand. Enjoy the results you’ll discover as a result of guided discovery.