How to Plan a Football Practice
Mar 11, 2022
One of the biggest pain points as a football coach is trying to get everything you want to get done finished in your 2 hour practice.
Here are 3 things that can help you please your kids parents by getting done on time and make sure you cover all the things you wanted to work on.
1. Write Them Down: MAKE A PRACTICE PLAN AND STICK TO IT!
You have to have some sort of a practice plan. One thing many coaches do that can really affect your football team in a negative way is making a list of things you want to do and when you don't get them all done you put it off until the next day. Make or buy some practice plan templates and use them. The practice plan templates we use are available for you to download inside iCoach!
2. Time Your Practice
Not only should you stick to the length of practice you chose because of their parents and rides, but you should also time each individual drill session. We use 6 minute time slots (we call them periods) and have 20 of them per practice (2 hours). This makes sure we get through everything we want to get through. It also creates a sense of urgency for the coaches. They will know in advance they have this amount of time to get the drills in they need to do.
This is simple to do. Use a watch or stop watch and set it to beep every six minutes. Most score boards will even do this. This is what we use. It is programed and just needs to be turned on and off each day. You can have the same drill cover multiple periods but you will know when you need to wrap it up and move on.
3. Script Your Plays for Practice
Script the plays you want to run in practice and stick to it. Don't be afraid to say we need to move on. Think about it. If you have to spend more than 6 minutes working on one play it probably isn't something the kids are excelling at. Don't beat a dead horse or force things. If you have a script on the field that your are following you can cross off or add things as you go and you won't forget about them when you get home from practice and start working on the next day or reflecting.
Don't be afraid to ask for help. Our most valuable asset is Time and finding ways to gain more of it or utilize it better can make a huge difference when trying to coach and run a family at home.
You can download our scripts inside our iCoach.Football Membership. Here is more info on how to get a 7 Day Trial: START YOUR 7 DAY TRIAL NOW!
