HOW SIGNIFICANT IS LONG COURSE COMPETITION TO ATHLETE SUCCESS?

POSTED 7/1/2013 ON WWW.USASWIMMING.ORG
BY DAN MCCARTHY//HIGH PERFORMANCE CONSULTANT
 
Many programs across the United States have regularly placed athletes on the National Team and the National Junior Team despite having little or no access to long course training facilities for most of or all of the year. Unlimited access to long course training does not seem to be a significant hurdle to national-level success. However, is the number of events an athlete races long course important for success? In other words, do athletes who race long course the most have an advantage over those who race less long course?

We randomly investigated 12 events from the 2012 US Olympic Trials. For the women, we looked at the Final heat of the 50 Free, 100 Free, 100 Back, 100 Breast, 100 Fly and 400 IM. For the men, we looked at the Final heat of the 50 Free, 400 Free 100 Back, 100 Breast, 100 Fly and 200 Fly. The number of times each athlete swam the event long course between January 1, 2010 and June 24, 2012 was counted and the average number of races was determined for each event.

There were many variables between the events making it hard to compare the results to each other. For example, on average the men in the 100 back final swam the event almost 38 times each, but the women in the 400 IM only swam their race about 17 times each. Instead, we looked at what athletes swam their event the most and the least and if they finished in the top four or the bottom four of the final race. Additionally, we also looked at those who earned an Olympic spot on the team and how often they were an athlete that swam the event the most or the least.

• In 10 of the 12 events, the athlete who swam the most races finished in the top four of finals
• In 8 of the 12 events, the athlete who swam the fewest races finished in the bottom four of finals
• In 10 of the 12 events, the athlete who swam the most races earned a spot on the US Olympic Team
• In 3 of the 12 events, the athlete that swam the fewest races earned a spot on the US Olympic Team

It is interesting to note the three athletes who swam the fewest races during the investigated time period and made the team were very experienced National Team athletes: Allison Schmitt in the 100 Free, Anthony Ervin in the 50 Free and Brendan Hansen in the 100 Breast. There does not appear to be any advantage to having swam fewer races and having no experience.

It will be interesting to see if the trend of swimming a specific race more often continues to suggest a more successful outcome at the Olympic Trials. Some of the additional tangents we will look at:

• How did finalists compare to semi-finalists, or those who finished ninth through sixteenth?
• How did collegiate athletes fare compared to the professional and high school athletes?
• How explainable are the instances when an athlete with the fewest swims makes the US Olympic Team? 
• Do those athletes share anything in common?

Nine Ways to Be a Great Team Member

By Jon Gordon, Author, Motivational Speaker
www.usaswimming.org

While watching the Oscars I noticed that almost every award winner said they couldn’t have done it without their team, family, and the support of others. The fact is no one achieves success alone. We all need a great team to accomplish great things. We are at our best when we are surrounded by those who want the best for us and when we are bringing out the best in others. In this spirit I want to share 9 ways to be a great team member.

1. Set the Example – Instead of worrying about the lack of performance, productivity and commitment of others you simply decide to set the example and show your team members what hard work, passion and commitment looks like. Focus on being your best every day. When you do this you’ll raise the standards and performance of everyone around you.

2. Use Your Strengths to Help the Team – The most powerful way you can contribute to your team is to use your gifts and talents to contribute to the team’s vision and goals. Without your effort, focus, talent and growth the team won’t accomplish its mission. This means you have an obligation to improve so you can improve your team. You are meant to develop your strengths to make a stronger team. Be selfish by developing you and unselfish by making sure your strengths serve the team.

3. Share Positive Contagious Energy – Research shows emotions are contagious and each day you are infecting your team with either positive energy or negative energy. You can be a germ or a big dose a Vitamin C. When you share positive energy you infectiously enhance the mood, morale and performance of your team. Remember, negativity is toxic. Energy Vampires sabotage teams and complaining is like vomiting. Afterwards you feel better but everyone around you feels sick.

4. Know and Live the Magic Ratio – High performing teams have more positive interactions than negative interactions. 3:1 is the ratio to remember. Teams that experience interactions at a ratio equal or greater than 3:1 are more productive and higher performing than those with a ratio of less than 3:1. Teams that have a ratio of 2:1, 1:1 or more negative interactions than positive interactions become stagnant and unproductive. This means you can be a great team member by being a 3 to 1’er. Create more positive interactions. Praise more. Encourage more. Appreciate more. Smile more. High-five more. Recognize more. Energize more. Read more about this at www.FeedthePositiveDog.com

5. Put the Team First – Great team players always put the team first. They work hard for the team. They develop themselves for the team. They serve the team. Their motto is whatever it takes to make the team better. They don’t take credit. They give credit to the team. To be a great team member your ego must be subservient to the mission and purpose of the team. It’s a challenge to keep our ego in check. It’s something most of us struggle with because we have our own goals and desires. But if we monitor our ego and put the team first we’ll make the team better and our servant approach will make us better.

6. Build Relationships – Relationships are the foundation upon which winning teams are built and great team members take the time to connect, communicate and care to build strong bonds and relationships with all their team members. You can be the smartest person in the room but if you don’t connect with others you will fail as a team member. (Tweet This) It’s important to take the time to get to know your team members. Listen to them. Eat with them. Learn about them. Know what inspires them and show them you care about them.

7. Trust and Be Trusted - You can’t have a strong team without strong relationships. And you can’t have strong relationships without trust. Great team members trust their teammates and most of all their team members trust them. Trust is earned through integrity, consistency, honesty, transparency, vulnerability and dependability. If you can’t be trusted you can’t be a great team member. Trust is everything.

8. Hold Them Accountable – Sometimes our team members fall short of the team’s expectations. Sometimes they make mistakes. Sometimes they need a little tough love. Great team members hold each other accountable. They push, challenge and stretch each other to be their best. Don’t be afraid to hold your team members accountable. But remember to be effective you must built trust and a relationship with your team members. If they know you care about them, they will allow you to challenge them and hold them accountable. Tough love works when love comes first. Love tough.

9. Be Humble - Great team members are humble. They are willing to learn, improve and get better. They are open to their team member’s feedback and suggestions and don’t let their ego get in the way of their growth or the team’s growth. I learned the power of being humble in my marriage. My wife had some criticism for me one day and instead of being defensive and prideful, I simply said, "Make me better. I’m open. Tell me how I can improve." Saying this diffused the tension and the conversation was a game changer. If we’re not humble we won’t allow ourselves to be held accountable. We won’t grow. We won’t build strong relationships and we won’t put the team first. There’s tremendous power in humility that makes us and our team better.

In addition here are a few of my favorite sayings about being a great team member.

Your team doesn’t care if you are a superstar. They care if you are a super team member. (Tweet)

You have to work as hard to be a great teammate as you to do be a great player. (Tweet)

Many teams communicate but the great ones connect. Great teams form bonds of trust that strengthen relationships and the team. (Tweet)

What did I miss? What would you add to this list? I value your input and suggestions. Share your suggestions for being a great team member by leaving a comment below, or on Facebook, or Twitter.

-Jon Gordon ® Jon Gordon 2013

When to let learners struggle

By: Annie Murphy Paul
http://anniemurphypaul.com/2014/02/when-and-how-to-let-learners-struggle/ 
Posted: Monday, February 24th 2014

“Let them eat cake,” said Marie Antoinette. Should teachers, parents, and managers say of the learners in their charge, “Let them struggle”?

Allowing learners to struggle will actually help them learn better, according to research on “productive failure” conducted by Manu Kapur, a researcher at the Learning Sciences Lab at the National Institute of Education of Singapore. Kapur’s investigations find that while the model adopted by many teachers and employers when introducing others to new knowledge—providing lots of structure and guidance early on, until the students or workers show that they can do it on their own—makes intuitive sense, it’s not the best way to promote learning. Rather, it’s better to let neophytes wrestle with the material on their own for a while, refraining from giving them any assistance at the start.

In a recent study published in the Journal of the Learning Sciences, Kapur and a co-author, Katerine Bielaczyc, applied the principle of productive failure to mathematical problem solving in three schools in Singapore. With one group of students, the teacher provided intensive “scaffolding”—instructional support—and feedback. With the teacher’s help, these pupils were able to find the answers to their set of problems.

Meanwhile, a second group was directed to solve the same problems by collaborating with one another, absent any prompts from their instructor. These students weren’t able to complete the problems correctly. But in the course of trying to do so, they generated a lot of ideas about the nature of the problems and about what potential solutions would look like. And when the two groups were tested on what they’d learned, the second group “significantly outperformed” the first.

The struggles of the second group have what Kapur calls a “hidden efficacy”: they lead people to understand the deep structure of problems, not simply their correct solutions. When these students encounter a new problem of the same type on a test, they’re able to transfer the knowledge they’ve gathered more effectively than those who were the passive recipients of someone else’s expertise.

In the real world, problems rarely come neatly packaged, so being able to discern their deep structure is key. But, Kapur notes, none of us like to fail, no matter how often Silicon Valley entrepreneurs praise the salutary effects of an idea that flops or a start-up that crashes and burns. So, he says, we need to “design for productive failure” by intentionally managing the way learners fail.

Kapur has identified three conditions that promote a beneficial struggle. First, choose problems to work on that “challenge but do not frustrate.” Second, provide learners with opportunities to explain and elaborate on what they’re doing. Third, give learners the chance to compare and contrast good and bad solutions to the problems.

By allowing learners to experience the discomfort of struggle first, and the triumph of understanding second, we can ensure that they have their cake and eat it, too.

D is for Dedication

This excerpt is taken from: D is for Dedication 
By: Aimee C. Kimball, PhD

www.usaswimming.org/ViewMiscArticle.aspx?TabId=1555&Alias=Rainbow&Lang=en-US&mid=9332&ItemId=4461

Knowing how to be fully dedicated to something is a very important life skill to have. If you don’t ever learn what it means to give 100%, how will you know if you can be successful outside of swimming? There are many reasons why athletes do not fully commit to their sport, some are completely understandable (involvement in other activities) while others need to be overcome (laziness, don’t want to make the sacrifices). Some athletes are at a stage where they just swim for fun rather than the competition, so giving 100% to swimming isn’t important to them. Whatever your current reason for not being fully dedicated, make sure you are still maximizing your commitment level given varying priorities. What I mean is, if you sign up for a swim team, know what is required and maintain that commitment. If you are not willing to put forth the effort that the team requires, there might be a better team for you because you are likely to end up unhappy if you are on a highly-competitive team but you aren’t a highly competitive person. If you find a team that matches your motivation, you will most likely enjoy the sport more and be able to match your dedication level to that of your teammates. I caution you not to sell yourself short though. Some people don’t want to be on a competitive team because they don’t believe the “extreme” swimmers can have any fun. However, the majority of people who give 100% love the sport and find most of it enjoyable. They find the fun in knowing they are getting better, pride in the hard work they put in and excitement in beating someone new or in getting a PR in a race.

Levels of Dedication

§  No Dedication: Showing up at practice when I feel like it.

§  Minimum Dedication: Showing up to mandatory practices.

§  Moderate Dedication: Working hard at mandatory practices and some optional practices.

§  High Dedication: Working hard at all available practices and doing a little bit extra outside of the pool

§  Total Dedication: Working hard at all available practices and doing everything you can outside of the pool (mental training, nutrition, strength/flexibility training…)

If right now you are moderately dedicated to your sport but really want to become a better swimmer, you do not have to totally dedicate yourself to swimming and make your life revolve around it. In order to see some improvement, you just have to do a little bit more than you are now. Maybe you don’t have time for extra training, but you may be able to read the latest articles in Splash magazine or watch an instructional video on YouTube . To become the best swimmer you can be and to truly reach your potential, you do need higher levels of dedication, which include out-of-pool activities. Ultimately, you have to choose your own dedication level, which should be based on your ultimate goals and willingness to make sacrifices. Olympic dreams require more than moderate dedication, while participating on a high school team may not. It’s up to you whether you want to see how good you can be, but your potential in the pool can only be met through consistent dedication. Dedicating yourself to a sport is about working to accomplish something and putting in the effort necessary to meet the challenge. It is much more disappointing to finish a race with a less-than-ideal time and think to yourself, “If only I did a little more” than to finish and say “I gave it all I had.”

Dedication Decoded

Someone once told me that “Dedication is when you are bent over, drenched in sweat, just about to pass out, and then you smile.” I think there’s some truth in the idea that dedication is about pushing your limits and still enjoying the process. If you can get yourself and your team to do that, you know they have the dedication necessary to succeed.                     

Make it Great!

7 Strategies to Help Your Athlete Be More Confident

By: Dr. Patrick J. Cohn

From: www.coloradoavalanchecares.com/columns/parenting/7-ways-to-help-your-athlete-play-with-more-confidence/ 

In this helpful article for youth sports parents, Dr. Patrick J. Cohn, a leading youth sports psychology expert, discusses 7 steps parents can take to help their child perform with more confidence.

7 Steps to Helping Your Athlete Play with More Confidence - Hockey competition can be both mentally and physically challenging for young athletes. Kids may feel nervous, unsettled, or feel more pressure to play their best. Young athletes may experience excitement or nervous jitters before and during competition. Athletes who feel jitters are the players who may under perform.

Some young athletes may have a fear of embarrassment or fear of making mistakes. Some athletes make comparisons with other athletes, which is not always healthy for kids' confidence. Some young hockey players are worried about impressing a coach or parent. Some athletes are held back because they lack confidence and have doubts. Other athletes may try to perform perfectly and tie themselves up in knots doing so.

Below are seven mental game tips to help sports kids perform their best in competition:

1. Let Go of Fear

In sports, most of the fear athletes experience to is not about being in danger or harming themselves physically, although in some sports like hockey, you can be physically injured. The fear I am talking about is a psychological threat that is often based on an athlete's perception of the importance of a performance or game and what others think about his or her performance.

Most of the time, an athlete's fear is worry related to poor results - whether prior to or during a performance. Athletes often fear the negative consequences of their performance. They worry about many things that are often not under their control.

The very first step is to identify the beliefs, attitudes, and expectations that cause your athletes to hold onto over-exactness in competition and lead to fear of failure. You want your athletes to keep the positive aspects of their mental game such as your motivation and commitment to sport.

However, maintaining beliefs or attitudes that support a fearful, cautious, or over-seriousness attitude when performing does not allow kids perform their best. Thoughts such as "I must be perfect if I want to make the team today" or "I must analyze my mistakes and fix them right away so I don't make the same mistake" cause kids to play tentatively.

2. Play Freely instead of Holding Back

During mental toughness training, I teach my students about two mindsets that contribute to success in sports. The first is the training or practice mindset. Great athletes know the value of training. They strive to get better and to improve. They have a tremendous amount of motivation and work ethic, which help them to practice hard so they can master their skills.

The trusting or performance mindset is equally important for success in sports. Trust is the ability to let skills "happ

Some young athletes may have a fear of embarrassment or fear of making mistakes. Some athletes make comparisons with other athletes, which is not always healthy for kids' confidence. Some young hockey players are worried about impressing a coach or parent. Some athletes are held back because they lack confidence and have doubts. Other athletes may try to perform perfectly and tie themselves up in knots doing so.

Below are seven mental game tips to help sports kids perform their best in competition:

1. Let Go of Fear

In sports, most of the fear athletes experience to is not about being in danger or harming themselves physically, although in some sports like hockey, you can be physically injured. The fear I am talking about is a psychological threat that is often based on an athlete's perception of the importance of a performance or game and what others think about his or her performance.

Most of the time, an athlete's fear is worry related to poor results - whether prior to or during a performance. Athletes often fear the negative consequences of their performance. They worry about many things that are often not under their control.

The very first step is to identify the beliefs, attitudes, and expectations that cause your athletes to hold onto over-exactness in competition and lead to fear of failure. You want your athletes to keep the positive aspects of their mental game such as your motivation and commitment to sport.

However, maintaining beliefs or attitudes that support a fearful, cautious, or over-seriousness attitude when performing does not allow kids perform their best. Thoughts such as "I must be perfect if I want to make the team today" or "I must analyze my mistakes and fix them right away so I don't make the same mistake" cause kids to play tentatively.

2. Play Freely instead of Holding Back

During mental toughness training, I teach my students about two mindsets that contribute to success in sports. The first is the training or practice mindset. Great athletes know the value of training. They strive to get better and to improve. They have a tremendous amount of motivation and work ethic, which help them to practice hard so they can master their skills.

The trusting or performance mindset is equally important for success in sports. Trust is the ability to let skills "happen" instinctively by relying on practice instead of consciously directing movements. The performance mindset is the ability to rely on practice, perform freely, and allow skills to flow without excess thought.

The bottom line... If your athletes are stuck in the practice mentality when they compete, they will limit their ability to perform their best because of too much analysis, trying too hard to be perfect, and a loss of trust.

3. Focus on Self not Others - Make No Comparisons.

Your athletes must start with the understanding that most intimidation in sports is self-induced. Yes, other athletes will sometimes use direct intimidation or play head games with your athletes, but they can make the choice to not pay attention and look the other way.

However, your athletes can't "look the other way" when they are their own worst enemy because they are intimidated by their own thoughts about the level of the competition, the rink conditions, or the venue. Athletes who lack confidence often look for others to help them feel confident. Likewise, these same athletes intimidate themselves by paying too much attention to other hockey players or by putting other hockey players on a pedestal.

Most self-induced intimidation comes from your athletes giving too much energy to other competitors by making comparisons, thinking too much about the reputation of their competitors, or feeling like they do not belong at the current level of play.

Tips for helping your athlete overcome self-intimidation:

• Help your athletes avoid putting other athletes on a pedestal, as if they are better than your athletes or superior.


• Help your athlete stop making comparisons to athletes who they think are better.


• Help your athletes focus on their strengths instead thinking about the reputation of other competitors and how they stack up.


• Help your athletes see themselves on equal ground in terms of their ability.

4. Play for Yourself, not Others.

Social approval is an important phenomenon in my discussions with athletes that I coach. Many athletes rely too much on social approval to boost their own levels of self-worth. Some athletes think that if others respect their sports performance, this, for some reason, will make them a better person. Many athletes buy into this notion and think that they are better people if they can achieve acknowledgment, gain approval or respect from others through sports.

For many athletes, a huge source of worry about their performance results from the need to seek "social approval" from others. If this is your athlete, they might have a need to be admired, accepted, respected, or liked by other people. They worry about performing poorly because it may have an influence on what others might think about them.

Thus, athletes who want approval from others can become anxious or are afraid to fail in competition. The need for social approval is the root of fear of failure. But this story gets even better. What happens when your athletes want approval, but can't get it? Does this affect how they feel about themselves as people? For most of my students, yes! Athletes want approval from others so they can feel better about themselves!

Tips to Stop Worrying What Others Think

• Help your athletes understand why they value (sometimes too much) others' opinions. Help your athletes have self-respect not other-based respect.


• Help your athletes stop the mind reading or thinking too much about what others might think.


• Help your athletes know who they are on the inside. They should define who the person is first - called self-concept.


• Help your athletes separate self-esteem and performance. Too often, athletes judge themselves on their performance in sports.

5. Play Functionally - Don't try to be Perfect.

An important lesson I teach my students is to learn how to perform efficiently instead of perfectly. I call this a "functional mindset."

A functional mindset is the opposite of trying to make everything perfect. It starts with the idea that your athletes DO NOT have to be perfect to perform their best. They are human and humans can't be perfect. Your athletes will make mistakes and you and your athletes have to accept mistakes. Tennis coach to professional players, Brad Gilbert, calls the functional mindset "winning ugly," which he wrote a book about.

Tips for how to play functionally:

• Have your kids use the warm up to get a "feel" for their performance. Don't have them practice their game to control it. Remind them not judge the quality of their technique or performance in the warm up. If your athletes miss a couple of shots, tell them not to fret over it.


• Your athletes should let go of the need to control their performance and let it happen.


• Have your athletes think "win ugly." Use whatever works to help them get the job done in tryouts. For example, instead of needing to execute a play exactly from the playbook, be happy with a play that worked well, but maybe was not "textbook" execution.


• Help your athletes use what's working. Stick to what parts of your athletes game are working well.

6. Be Confident.

My definition of self-confidence is how firmly athletes believe in their ability to execute a physical skill or perform a task. That's right--confidence is how strongly an athlete believes in his ability to execute a play. Confidence is derived from a baseline assessment of past performances, training, and preparation. As your athletes' competency or skill mastery grows, their confidence becomes proportionately stronger.

I think of confidence as a cure-all for what ails athletes' mental game. If athletes have high self-confidence, it's very hard to get anxious or tense, or worry about results because they already know that they will perform well. With high confidence, they don't fret about the competition. With confidence, they are relaxed and focused on the correct performance cues. Do you get my point?

Doubt is the number one killer to a confident mindset. Pessimistic, perfectionistic and over-motivated athletes tend to hold on tight to doubts, which if unchecked can ruin an athlete's mindset and derail performance. Some athletes start doubting before they even start the competition or make an error. Most athletes struggle with doubt after making a mistake or performing poorly in competition. When they let doubt run rampant and unchecked, it sabotages confidence.

However, athletes who can recognize doubt and turn it into statements of confidence can counter the negative influence that doubt may have over them. The first step in overcoming doubt is to become aware of the thoughts that deteriorate confidence. The next step is to counter the doubts with thoughts that will lead to better outcomes.

7. Focus on the Process, not Results.

Your athletes have the unique ability to selectively attend to what they want. This mental skill comes in handy when they perform, but only if they focus on the right performance cues. Your athletes objective is to focus their attention on performance "cues" which help them perform their best. A performance cue is any thought, feeling, or image that helps you execute. A hockey player might feel his wrist flick on the shot.

Understanding what is not relevant is an important step in helping your athletes improve focus by understanding their distraction. Many of the athletes I work with tend to overload their brains with too much information - more than they can handle at one time. Information overload or having misleading information sends mixed signals to the body. In this indecisive state, the body will not execute with the desired outcome or rhythm.

Once your athletes define performance cues and can clearly recognize non-relevant cues or distractions, they are now in a better position to become fully immersed into their performance - an important quality of being in the zone or gaining a zone focus. Unimportant cues or distractions might be thinking about missing a previous shot or what the coach might do if you lose the puck.

Learning any new skill takes time. It does not matter if your athletes are learning physical skills or mental skills, repetition and application is necessary to make it part of everyday practice and performance. Helping your athletes commit to improving their mental toughness over time, (even when your athletes are performing well), will lead to a consistent mental game and performance in any situation including tryouts.

Editor's Note: Special thanks to Dr. Patrick Cohn for the above article.

Written by ColoradoAvalancheCares · Filed Under Parenting
    

 

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How Much Practice Is Too Much?

By Annie Murphy Paul
Posted: February 17, 2012
http://blogs.kqed.org/mindshift/2012/02/how-much-practice-is-too-much/

Why do I have to keep practicing? I know it already!”

That’s the familiar wail of a child seated at the piano or in front of the multiplication table (or, for that matter, of an adult taking a tennis lesson). Cognitive science has a persuasive retort: We don’t just need to learn a task in order to perform it well; we need to overlearn it. Decades of research have shown that superior performance requires practicing beyond the point of mastery. The perfect execution of a piano sonata or a tennis serve doesn’t mark the end of practice; it signals that the crucial part of the session is just getting underway.

New evidence of why this is so was provided by a study published in the Journal of Neuroscience earlier this month. Assistant professor Alaa Ahmed and two of her colleagues in the integrative physiology department at the University of Colorado-Boulder asked study subjects to move a cursor on a screen by manipulating a robotic arm. As they did so, the researchers measured the participants’ energy expenditure by analyzing how much oxygen they inhaled and how much carbon dioxide they breathed out. When the subjects first tackled the exercise, they used up a lot of metabolic power, but this decreased as their skill improved. By the end of the learning process, the amount of effort they expended to carry out the task had declined about 20 percent from when they started.

“The lesson here is keep on practicing, even after it seems the task has been learned.”
Whenever we learn to make a new movement, Ahmed explains, we form and then update an internal model—a “sensorimotor map”—which our nervous system uses to predict our muscles’ motions and the resistance they will encounter. As that internal model is refined over time, we’re able to cut down on unnecessary movements and eliminate wasted energy.

Over the course of a practice session, the subjects in Ahmed’s study were becoming more efficient in their muscle activity. But that wasn’t the whole story. Energy expenditures continued to decrease even after the decline in muscle activity had stabilized. In fact, Ahmed and her coauthors report, this is when the greatest reductions in metabolic power were observed—during the very time when it looks to an observer, and to the participant herself, as if “nothing is happening.”

What’s going on here? Ahmed theorizes that even after participants had fine-tuned their muscle movements, the neural processes controlling the movements continued to grow more efficient. The brain uses up energy, too, and through overlearning it can get by on less. These gains in mental efficiency free up resources for other tasks: infusing the music you’re playing with greater emotion and passion, for example, or keeping closer track of your opponent’s moves on the other side of the tennis court. Less effort in one domain means more energy available to others.

While Ahmed’s paper didn’t address the application of overlearning to the classroom, other studies have demonstrated that for a wide variety of academic activities–from recalling vocabulary words to solving math problems–overlearning reduces the amount of effort required to carry out the job at hand.

“The message from this study is that in order to perform with less effort, keep on practicing, even after it seems the task has been learned,” says Ahmed. “We have shown there is an advantage to continued practice beyond any visible changes in performance.” In other words: You’re getting better and better, even when you can’t tell you’re improving—a thought to keep you going through those long hours of practice.

Annie Murphy Paul, the author of Origins, is at work on a book about the science of learning.

Being A Team Player Matters

By: Miranda Romero

Standard-Examiner TX correspondents

Posted: Mon, 10/01/2012 - 7:42am

According to the National Federation of State High School Associations, nearly 8 million high school students participated in school athletics in the 2011-2012 school year. 

The number of high school athletes has drastically increased over the years, especially since Title IX took effect back in 1971, allowing girls to participate more fully in sports. The number of student athletes will continue to increase each year.

So why are students so eager to join sports? How does it change their high school experience?

Being on a team 

Playing a sport means being a part of a team. When you're on a team you are a part of something bigger than yourself. Each member on a team has different strengths, and as you get to know your teammates through an entire season, you learn about what they bring to the team. You can come from completely different backgrounds, have different friends, but in the end you're all working toward a common goal.

"After five months of training together, my wrestling team is practically a family; my teammates become brothers to me," says Christian Kodele, a senior at Clearfield High School who participates in wrestling as well as cross country.

It's important to trust your teammates so that you can succeed at your sport. Playing a sport and being on a team brings a sense of belonging, trust and friendship.

Setting goals

With sports comes goal setting, an important life skill everyone needs. Whether it is winning state, becoming a better team, or just personally improving, an athlete can benefit from making goals.

Coaches push you to be the best player you can be and the harder you work, the better you become. Practice is the place where you can take your weaknesses and turn them into strengths. Playing a sport teaches you self discipline and goal setting. 

Motivation to become a better student

To be eligible to participate in high school sports, there are certain academic requirements a student must meet and standards one must maintain. You have to maintain a certain GPA and have good attendance as well as citizenship. It's good motivation to get things done and be responsible. It allows you to be more focused at school, so that you can do your best on game day. Also, you have to be a good person on and off the field because you are representing your team.

Stress relief

Most importantly students participate in school sports because they're fun. When you spend months training with teammates, you make some really great friends. You can have a really bad day at school and relieve your stress at practice. When you're in a game it's like you're in a different world and nothing else matters, you just live in that moment and play at your best level. 

"It feels great to go exercise while having fun with your friends and working towards something you know who you love doing," says Caity Nielsen, a junior at Bonneville High School who plays basketball and golf.

Health

The recommendation is that teenagers get at least 60 minutes of physical activity per day to maintain good health. Playing sports gives you this opportunity through practice and game days. Conditioning is a big part of playing sports and can help you to stay in shape. Not only are sports good for your physical health, but they also help you mentally. You learn sportsmanship and a good attitude when playing on a team. 

Competition

Sports are competitive and they can inspire you to become a better athlete.

Zach Johnstun is a senior at St. Joseph Catholic High School who has participated in basketball, cross country, and track and field since his freshman year.

"Sports feed my competitive side, but above all sports allow me to better myself," he says. "My competitiveness allows me to gather initiative so I can improve my game and beat my opponent."

If your team knows they're up against tough competition, everyone gets motivated to work harder.

Scholarships

If you play a sport that you're very passionate about, there is a chance you can continue to play in college, if you're good enough. The best part about this is that a college can pay you to come play on their team by giving you a sports scholarship. This can cover some of your college fees or all of them depending on how skilled you are. Playing a sport in college gives you the opportunity to take your athletic talent to the next level. 

You only have four years to make high school a memorable experience and playing sports is a great way to take advantage of the time you have. Athletics brings a sense of belonging, friendship, stress relief and motivation to become a better athlete as well as a better student.

Miranda Romero is a senior at St. Joseph Catholic High School. She loves volleyball, cheerleading, and track and field. Contact her at mpc127_@msn.com.