Tuesday, March 19th, 2024

Awareness Game #2

September 19, 2014 by  
Filed under Coaching

Yesterday, in Part 1 of this three part series, I talked about the importance of being aware of your surroundings both on and off the field.  I also addressed the difficulty of teaching our players how to be more aware.  At the end of the post I offered an Awareness Game that could be played to get your kids/players to see more around

Noticing this type of thing will likely make it less likely they will do this in the future.

Noticing this type of thing may make it less likely that your players will do this in the future.

them.  Today, it’s Awareness Game #2.

Awareness Game #2

This game is similar to yesterday’s but instead of looking at your environment and later being able to recall what you saw, this game has kids/players purposely looking for things in their surroundings.  When I play this with my children, I do it this way …

Let’s say I’m taking my kids to the local mall.  Before going in I might tell them they need to be on the lookout for these three things:

  • Someone with an unnaturally colored hair like blue, green, pink, etc.
  • Someone who looks visibly angry or upset.
  • Someone who is being very careless with their pocketbook, money, or wallet.

In general, all three force my kids to be more observant when in public.  Specifically, each one serves a unique purpose.  The first one forces them to see things that stand out or seem out of place.  The second forces them to see people who might pose a problem or a threat.  The third forces them to see how many people are careless in public which hopefully makes THEM less careless in public when I am not around.

For baseball teams, a coach can have his players be on the lookout for three things as well.  They might include:

  • A player on the other team who is wearing their uniform incorrectly.
  • A player who let his emotions get the better of him.
  • An opposing player who does not get in the ready position before the pitch.
  • An opposing player whose arm appears to be bothering him.
  • A player who seems to have another injury. (limping, pulled muscle, etc.)
  • A bench player on the other team who is the “bad apple” – pouting or angry that he is not playing.

All serve the purpose of getting your players to look around and see things most players miss.  They also get a chance to see how THEY look when they make some of those same mistakes.

Next post:  Awareness Game #3

 

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

*

* Copy This Password *

* Type Or Paste Password Here *

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>