About
Working with kids is different.
They aren't just smaller high school or college athletes.
They are growing, learning and needing different things as their bodies and brains develop.
"If a child can't learn the way we teach,
maybe we should teach the way they learn."
Ralph Waldo Emerson
NICE TO MEET YOU
I'm Gary Avischious
When my son was five, I was told by the local Rec Center Youth Sports Coordinator, "Your kid can't play, unless you coach. Sound familiar?
That began my journey in coaching. Several years later I became the VP of Marketing for the National Institute for Play and started studying PLAY science. What I learned there was instantly applicable to what I was doing with kids at soccer practice on Tuesday and Thursday. The more I applied the science, the better the kids got. Their engagement was high and consequently their learning, and performance was through the roof.
And we were on to something!
We then connected with various National Governing Bodies (NGB's) and the US Olympic Committee who took a keen liking to what we were doing as they saw our program being an antidote the 70% dropout rate of kids in youth sports.
What started as something to increase engagement also turned out to be the foundation of performance at the highest levels.
Our evidence-based library grew from PLAY science to include behavioral science, psychology, the study of success/effort, children's learning styles (and adult learning styles to work with coaches and change their behavior) as well as incorporating the many great and practical things we learned along the way working with so many great people, coaches and organizations.
During this time CoachingSchool was created as a non-profit project of the Institute for Play, but was later spun off to be an independent, for profit company.
I worked extensively with the USTA as they rolled out what was the called 10 and Under Tennis (now called Red, Orange, & Green Ball Pathway) providing curriculum and training for coaches on how to coach kids. The USTA not only wanted to change the introduction of tennis with different equipment, balls and court size, but also wanted to change HOW they did it with kids.
Today, CoachingSchool provides training and certification solely online so our reach can extend to even more organizations and parents.
We're happy to help your youth sport journey however we can
Evidence-Based
What we teach is based on what works with kids.
Coaching Education
From new parent-coaches to high performance seasoned pros
Parent Guides
Be on the same team with your child's coach with what works.
Why I Do It
We live for those "aha" moments!
When you teach a kid something and they just do it.
Or, when they struggle with it for a while, and then finally get it!
Or when they say that practice is too short, because they're having so much fun!
For us, this also happens in our coaching education.
Where we teach and inspire coaches to think and act differently in working with kids.
It's very rewarding to hear a coach say that what we taught them 15 years ago, or yesterday, has made an impact on how they work with kids.