This teaching style would suit an individual sport as the competitor can provide feedback either positive or negative by themselves, as they can use times or measurements as the feedback either in training or competitions, where they cannot shout to the performer during the activity being performed; this type of teaching style is also a great motivator as the competitor feels trusted to make their own decisions as the teacher is there as a consultant.
Reciprocal
This type of teaching style helps relationships within peers by asking them to work in pairs and to provide feedback for each other. The teachers outline a task and will then give coaching points for the skill to be performed, pointing out any particular areas to watch out for and common faults. They are usually informal, relaxed and active within the group; this teaching style has both characteristics of relationship centred leader and task orientated as the teacher likes to make sure everyone has their input in training and competitions but, also focuses on the goals in hand; this gives the learners slightly more freedom than command style teaching style. This teaching style would suit a democratic leader as the whole group is involved and everyone feels they have made an impact within the team by providing feedback and introducing different techniques to help others.
Reciprocal style is there to help, explain, and give appropriate feedback and encouragement by making sure the individuals understands the game in play so they can provide appropriate feedback to each other. The weakness of this teaching style is that the feedback given back from the students may be incorrect and unreliable, also that not everyone in the group gets individual attention and may not fix their faults during training until, a competition comes up and their faults are acknowledge but, its too late.
This type of style suits a team sport such as football or netball; this is because a team has to be co-operative with each other and get along, in order to do so everyone must have their say on how to improve performance in training or within a game. It helps the players relationships grow and encourages feedback to each other during training and motivation within the game.
Command style
This style adopts a very authoritarian style generally based on strong rule structures. They give step by step instructions in training and make all the decisions in a competition. This type of teaching is used in the initial stage of training and complies well when time is limited for a competition. It is based on connectionist approach, where the learner acquires skills by learning to associate a stimulus with a particular response. This method allows a lot of information to be given in a short periods of time, and ensures the learner performs the skill as they are told, thus avoiding danger. This teaching style has similar characteristics as an autocratic leader by the way they are very inflexible, and make all the decisions, these leaders tends to be leader centred, better with clear, impersonal goals and task orientated which means they focus on setting goals, getting the task completed, meeting objectives and concentrating on performance and productivity. The weaknesses of this teaching style is that the learner doesn’t get a true understanding of the skills being taught and become de-motivated as they are not putting any input in their learning.
This style of teaching and leadership is better associated with racket sports because racket sports tend to be doubles or individual so, the pressure is on them to perform well, that’s when command style is the best teaching style for this sport because they must be precise in their skills and actions so the end performance is well completed. In training for a racket sport the command style of teaching gives the learner the right basic skills for them to improve on so from the start they are precise and have the right technique. During competitions, of course in racket sports they are not allowed to shout out during the performance so, they have limited time during the breaks, which is where the command style works best as they are able to give lots of correct, precise information in a short amount of time.
In conclusion each style has their own weaknesses and advantages against each other, and its very important that the right teaching style is selected to get the best possible outcome from the performers because if the wrong teaching style is corrected it could have serious consequences on the performer, for example if a selection of beginners has a discovery style teacher then they may provide each other with the wrong feedback and solutions so, when the competition comes up then they will under perform or another example is if elite football players has a command style coach, that may be suited for beginners; they might start to under perform as they are given basic skills and knowledge rather than each giving their elite knowledge of tactics, skills and feedback.