Don’t just study, train like an Olympian
Four years ago, on a break from my day-job teaching science and maths, I had the honour of taking part in the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games. Not that I was at the level to compete, but after several years working my way through the ranks of sabre fencing referees, I found myself officiating on the greatest stage my sport has to offer.
Along the way, I witnessed athletes (with the guidance of their coaches) develop from junior levels right to the pinnacle of sporting achievement… and I absorbed a great deal of knowledge and inspiration as I saw them work, train, practise, sacrifice, travel and compete, over and over, year after year.
Four years later, as the Rio Games get underway, I see the journey complete as athletes like Yana Egorian (above), whom I refereed as teenagers, climb the top step of the podium to receive their gold medal.
What made the difference for them? What was it about the way they trained that got them to the top? And how can the lessons from their journeys apply to my own science students?
Even though I left the sport after 2012, the last four years of my life have been dedicated to a different, but parallel, kind of coaching: I began applying the methods I learned through sport to help my students tackle the problems they faced in their personal study.
Adapting these methods to make study as smart and simple as possible, and in an effort to make these techniques more widely available, Tassomai was born; from a few dozen users then, we are now coaching thousands of new students each year all around Britain.
The comparison between a student working towards a big exam and an athlete working towards their competition date may seem trivial, but I’ve found it to be highly instructive. Where the comparison breaks down, the differences are even more useful in refining and improving upon the way we all learn….
While most students revise on their own with their notes and textbooks, Olympians rarely practise alone — and for a crucial reason: to become the best, they must test themselves against others who will expose and exploit their weaknesses.
A training partner or a coach constantly shows them where they are going wrong, and this is how they improve to achieve their goals.
What marks out the world-beater from the rest of the crowd is that, in the crucible of this constant confrontation, friction-testing and criticism, they do not allow their weaknesses to become a problem, they embrace the mechanism that exposes their faults as a means to correct and improve, they learn from their errors and they practise until they cannot make that same mistake again.
Students studying at home, however, naturally play to their strengths. Of course they want to feel positive about their work, and it’s only human nature to take that path of less resistance… if they didn’t have their training partners and coaches, most athletes would fall into the same comfort trap.
Testing and coaching are the essential ingredients for success. A great coach must watch, analyse, and plan the next lesson, balancing correction and practice with positive confidence-building. It’s a tricky formula to get right, but if they master these skills then that’s how they get their students onto the podium. And this symbiotic relationship between coach and pupil works both ways — both improve by their mutual endeavors.
We are still developing that formula — to help students test their knowledge, learn from their mistakes and feel both supported and challenged along their path towards great results… but we are far enough along that journey that we are making a difference, and we continue to learn from our students as they learn from us.
When a great set of grades feels, for most teenagers, like a medal of pride, I’m proud too that we can play our part in their successes.
