How to train the youth

[Attitude]

Now that I've been a coach at my club for almost a year, I've repeatedly asked myself what concept or methodology is best for training adolescent or younger players in general. In Germany, there is a very rough guideline for this, which I find somewhat inadequate and leaves too much leeway in something where I suspect that there are already "best practices" and established methods with which you can make your training as effective as possible for the children.
As I really enjoy my work, I would like to improve it as quickly as possible and ask around whether there are well-developed training concepts in other countries that you could share, because googling it doesnt help that much.

This could also be a collective thread in which something like this would be worked out, at least I would be very interested in it.

If relevant:
The age of the children in our training group is between 8 and 14, while the most talented are between 9 and 10.
German-TTR is currently between 1000-1100 Training frequency averages 2-3 times a week, plus individual training if required.

 

[Tyce]

Do you have certification? I know you can get different levels of trainer certification, which will give you a lot of framework to use for various levels and ages.
You could ask the club if they are willing to help you, because it's advantageous for a club to have a certified trainer/coach.

If your club is sponsored by a brand, or a bigger TT store, you can also contact them to see if they can collaborate with you.

 

[Tony's Table Tennis]

how many coaches are there and how many kids are there (how many 8-10 and 11~14) and what are you currently doing?

 

[Attitude]

Do you have certification? I know you can get different levels of trainer certification, which will give you a lot of framework to use for various levels and ages.
You could ask the club if they are willing to help you, because it's advantageous for a club to have a certified trainer/coach.

If your club is sponsored by a brand, or a bigger TT store, you can also contact them to see if they can collaborate with you.

I am aware, and we have one with a B-Trainer license, so i do have access to those, but i as ive said these guidelines are kinda too rough and not detailed enough imo. And in some parts we kinda disagree with the guidelines that are used in our region or germany as a whole.
The club is helping as we are trainer group and some more players that are somewhat involved.
The rest is currently not existent, because we currently lack the infrastructure of a bigger club that we are just becoming. 1-2 years ago we were less than half of the current players we have now.

 

[Attitude]

how many coaches are there and how many kids are there (how many 8-10 and 11~14) and what are you currently doing?

Good questions.
We have currently 3-4 coaches. One licensed, one that is more or less just there to support the other coaches and 2 of the best players in the club that have a decent understanding of the game i would say so myself^^

We have 2 seperate levels of groups. The pure beginner group which is more in the area of 8-12 years old. Those we are mostly teaching the basics. Mostly the different strokes, like drive, push... and sometimes loops if they have the other stuff ready.
This group consists of usually 4-10 kids.

The second group is capable of doing most of the basics to a certain level.
This group is usually a bit bigger and consists of 8-16 kids. almost half the group is usually 8-10 years old.
Currently we are doing a variety of things, so the kids dont get bored so easily. Those things consist of legwork, service and servicereceive training, more in depth technique training for topspins and loops and sometimes flips, depending on the level of the group.
I could go more into detail if needed, but the issue here is, that we didnt work out and concept on which we want to focus and didnt periodize our training. Therefore it is a bit chaotic and often times more or less improvised. That leads to the situation, that if i am doing the session then i usually pick out weaknesses of several players that i witnessed and elaborate the session based on that. Most of the times with short regular drills.
Hope that this somewhat answers your questions^^

 

[Tyce]

I remember from my stint of youth training that it's pretty easy to go towards improvised programs. Not that it's bad per se, but it should have a base.

The certified trainer was the lead, and he put together a schedule for the theme of the training. For the youngest group that would be one word, like "backhand" or "placement", and 80% of the training would be focused on the theme.
For the second group, the theme would be two words, like "backhand opening" and the program would be progressing towards that.

Progress would be something like,
-warm up with a bit more BH-BH than FH-FH
-Do a placement/footwork exercise with one side alternating BH and FH
-Pushing short and long
-Opening up on the long push

A lot of the details are up to the trainer, usually. And having multiple trainers with different views (who communicate with each other) helps to make things click, as explaining something in different ways will.

 

[Tony's Table Tennis]

Good questions.
We have currently 3-4 coaches. One licensed, one that is more or less just there to support the other coaches and 2 of the best players in the club that have a decent understanding of the game i would say so myself^^

We have 2 seperate levels of groups. The pure beginner group which is more in the area of 8-12 years old. Those we are mostly teaching the basics. Mostly the different strokes, like drive, push... and sometimes loops if they have the other stuff ready.
This group consists of usually 4-10 kids.

The second group is capable of doing most of the basics to a certain level.
This group is usually a bit bigger and consists of 8-16 kids. almost half the group is usually 8-10 years old.
Currently we are doing a variety of things, so the kids dont get bored so easily. Those things consist of legwork, service and servicereceive training, more in depth technique training for topspins and loops and sometimes flips, depending on the level of the group.
I could go more into detail if needed, but the issue here is, that we didnt work out and concept on which we want to focus and didnt periodize our training. Therefore it is a bit chaotic and often times more or less improvised. That leads to the situation, that if i am doing the session then i usually pick out weaknesses of several players that i witnessed and elaborate the session based on that. Most of the times with short regular drills.
Hope that this somewhat answers your questions^^

how long is each session
and how good do you want the kids to get?

 

[Attitude]

how long is each session
and how good do you want the kids to get?

On 2 days we have a 2hr session.
One of the days we "only" have 1,5hr session.

Hm hard to say. We have at least 5 really solid kids (8-10 years old) that already have a decent foundation and something i would call talent. I dont have a general meassurement to name you a level i would like them to achieve, so i would say i want them to be better than the competition

The current goal should be to get a better quality for the training sessions, so im on the look out for trainingconcepts or methods that i can smoothly implementin our sessions.
For example we have a training book, from a really good coach that brought the kids of his club to the highest national levels and wrote down is his trainings and methods. That thing is awesome and already did implement some of those concepts into our training. But it is impossible to copy it as a whole because the level and requirements to succeed in his drills is way too high. And his kids were older ofc, which changes a lot from the getgo.

 

[Leno]

how long is each session
and how good do you want the kids to get?

You need to ask the kid/parent this question (maybe attitude should ask the kids this question. Gives really perspective on what you work with). Most of the clubs are build on hobby basis in germany and not a lot of them are commited to the sport. The hardest struggle in this age range is to have them disciplined/motivated and focused. In asia culture the discipline/respect part is already taught at home. In other countries, you sometimes need to start with the basics. I would like to take pointers as well on how to keep them discplined. Not like I have the answer for that.

However, back to the method part. I think similiar to tyce. You start with the basics and then make them improve the quality. Then you top it up with a footwork. Lastly you let them play matches with condition to the things you have taught. The rest you can improvise.

Really great topic. Would like to read more of other peoples experiences.

 

[jk1980]

i am surely not qualified as a coach, but i can tell a few common mistakes from the club i am member in and what i do see in youth players that are about the same age range like described in the original post.

From what i have wittnessed the approach of our youth coach (which basically consists of 3 people, one with a license (women with about 1400 TTR), one woman without license afaik with around 1200 TTR and from time to time one guy with 1600TTR. We had another "young" guy try to teach and coach the kids (also >1600TTR) but he basically threw the towel because even the group of the advanced kids had too many unmotivated kids (where the parents just used table tennis training as an after hours kindergarten). We had a few promising kids, but they went to another club with better training. I think one of them is 12 or 13 and has 1200 TTR right now.

What i see as an issue is that having kids play exercises against kids only will lead to them having "quick wins" by learning the technique to loop or serve/receive quite fast, but if they play even against a quite low level grown up, they can not manage the spin.
i think learning the basic strokes (playing with peers) like this is good for motivation, but there should be a "step up" where they actually also refine these strokes against real players and spin. The amount of disbelief you see in the youth players face when the struggle to return any serve because they never encountered backspin, topspin or sidespin is really telling.
One way would be to let them improve the skill by using a robot. We got a robot (amicus prime iirc) and it is not really used unfortunately. Having the kids loop underspin of at least -2 or -3 would help them adjust their stroke to proper play. Having kids drills with kids and exercising "looping underspin", while the training partner is uncapable of actually imparting backspin on the push seems stupid to me.

You having a quite decent level will probably be able to spot these weaknesses in the kids already. How to "easily" make kids play a more spinful game that mirrors more closely the more mature game is indeed a challenge that is not that easy otherwise we would not have that many kids in the in that 800 - 1100 TTR range.

 

[Tyce]

Don't mistake me for a high level trainer though what I've sketched is in my opinion the bare minimum to be able to learn actual table tennis.
I've observed and talked with our, high level, coaches and there's a lot of takeaways that I see, but don't really pertain to the exercises themselves:
-be clear to parents and players about commitment, what is necessary to get to a level. This can be a bit harsh, but ranges from actively notifying when you can't make it to a training, to making very concrete plans to improve individual weaknesses with personal training sessions. One kid in our club who has good potential, he basically worked with the coaches extra hours for 2 months to improve his recovery so he can actually compete in the class he's aiming for.
-take notes, keep files. Not for everyone, but after the kid has shown a certain level of commitment and maybe some ambition, document them. (always record presence/absence)
-push for fitting equipment. Once they're going somewhere, premades are a big no. If they want fast stuff, have them pass a test with it first.
-keep showing glimpses of what a higher level looks like. Not to the point of disappointment of course, but to the point of "this is what you can reach with your hard work". Our head trainer does little challenges every once in a while where the kids can try to return his serve to earn a drink, or cool trickshots. You have to inspire.
-similarly, aim on their level, but also slightly above it. Give success stories and tough challenges.
-celebrate accomplishments with the group. At the start of a session, the trainer will talk about how a kid fared in a tournament, winning their league game, stuff like that. This is really nice, but it also helps them getting used to the spotlight.