In my last article (“Reading the Game” for Volleyball: Reading – Planning – Doing Model) I introduced Karch Kiraly, Hugh McCutcheon, Paula Weishoff, Ron Larson and Tom Black theories on “Reading the Game” These theories have significantly changed volleyball skills coaching and practice planning in the last 5 years. The result:
 
READING – PLANNING – DOING Model.
Reading – Seeing outside stimuli. Planning – Mentally responding to the stimuli and planning your action and /or how the skill is performed. Doing – Where the volleyball skill is performed.
 
After over 3 years of research through my own observations as a player and coach I realized this system can be vastly improved, specifically how we as coaches teach players the process of how we as humans respond to stimuli (predominantly with our eyes), which is the basis of how all volleyball skills and sports are performed.
 
Now for me the first time I heard what Karch had to say I was impressed! I was like this is great I cannot wait to try this “Reading”. So a week later I am on the beach in Santa Monica playing beach following his instructions! Watch the player, look for information rich parts of the players arm swing like their body position, shoulders and arm. Read the attacker and then dig the ball on defense.
 
Now I am no volleyball newbie. By most people standards I am elite caliber player having won an NCAA championship at UCLA, gotten as high as a 21st Finish on the AVP plus having been invited to play indoor and beach volleyball for my country South Africa. Yet, for the life of me I could not do what Karch was instructing and believed me I tried and I tried for months. Also note, I watch his videos on teaching / coaching this over and over again!
 
So I sought out more coaches, scientist and experts eventually connecting with Dr. Bill Harrison, a 40 year vision expert who has worked with Hall of fame athletes in every sport including volleyball.
 
Dr. Bill quickly helped me become aware of some major important principals that Karch was not aware of or was not effectively communicating. Additionally Dr. Bill made me realize that in order to accelerate a learning curve that may have taken Karch Kiraly 10 or 20 years to develop other vision skills / exercises would be needed in order to coach or perform the skills myself. These skills / exercises if practiced correctly could significantly speed up my response time performing volleyball skills and improve my ability to “Read the Game” effectively.
 
So let me start by sharing one of the most important missing parts in the current Reading – Planning – Doing Model, Orientation. See video below:
 

 

 
(This picture is one of those things you should recognize instantly. What is crazy is once you learn what it is forever you will understand and be able to see it. You will go how did I not see that before? The same is true with volleyball and volleyball coaching. The question needs to change to: “How do I get my players to get meaning from what they see?” “How Do I get meaning from what I see?”)
 
This is concept was introduced by Dr. Samuel Renshaw. “Most of the process of seeing,” Renshaw explains, “is not done by the eyes.” His theory is that the eyes act as hands which reach “out there” and grab meaningless “things” and bring them inside to the brain. The brain then turns “the things” over to memory and demands, “Hey, what the heck is this? Just where out there is it, and how big is it?” Not until the brain gets an answer and interprets it in terms of comparative action do we really see anything.
 
Now Karch Kiraly with 37+ years of volleyball experience can likely process meaning (ORIENTATE), more rapidly what he see (READING the GAME) on the volleyball court than any human in history.
Now most youth, especially newer players would find this ability to orientate – get meaning from what they see, very, very difficult if not impossible. How many times have you heard a coach say I could have run on the court and dug that ball, what is wrong with these kids. Think about it, it’s not that they did not see it! They saw the player drop their arm, open their hand and get ready to do a tip shot. The problem was they could not get meaning or orientate from what they saw in order to plan and do or perform the defensive skill.
 
Now over the next few weeks I am going to share why orientation is the Schwerpunkt (The Schwerpunkt -the center of gravity or point of maximum effort!) of how we as humans respond to stimuli (predominantly with our eyes).
 
I too will be teaching in-person these new “Reading the Game” Concepts at our TRAVEL TO YOU Volleyball1on1 Summer 2015 camps. If you are interested in finding out more about my Volleyball1on1 Summer Camps, click the link.
 
Finally if you have thoughts or comments on this topic please let me know below in the comment section.