Let’s Evolve The Way We Teach The Forehand To Young Children
Little kids can be taught to windshield wiper and follow through lower. They can be taught open stance and hip rotation, albeit less explosively than fully grown adults. They can learn reverse finishes. They can learn the same forms or similar forms as the adults on tour with some subtle differences in angles and with less explosiveness of course. These things can all be taught early on rather than waiting for later. It’s more efficient this way.
It’s a myth and a fallacy that little kids need to be taught only closed stances and follow throughs to top of shoulder. It’s old school. It’s just tradition. Coaches need to let go of tradition and see the future of biomechanics—fluid, elastic, rotational movements—and start teaching that as the foundation.
It’s terribly inefficient to teach traditional technique from the 1960s to little children and then hope they evolve to modern form as the get older. Why should they have to learn two separate motor programs? It’s more efficient to learn one motor program and it’s variations.
It’s a shame to me that all little kids U10 are taught to look like little robots from the 1960s technique handbook.
The little champ who enter a U10 program using an open stance and windshield wiper finish that he learned by mimicking a pro on television or from a tournament has almost ZERO chance of keeping that form through U10. Coaches will force those kids time and again to step in and follow through to the shoulder, to “read the time on their watch,” touch their ear, or whatever. It’s a travesty.
The little kids mimicking the pros know more about the future of technique than all the trained and educated coaches in U10! The kids know better! But the coaches force an outdated model on these kids because of tradition and myth.
The craziest thing is that coaches and experts in the field will justify teaching outdated and stiff form by saying little kids are not strong enough or coordinated enough to learn the movements of the pros. This is a very specious argument.
While little kids obviously have some limitations compared to fully grown adults, they can learn almost every movement the pros do but at lower speeds and with less explosiveness for safety.
It’s a complete myth that little kids cannot learn modern technique, elasticity, follow throughs at the biceps or lower, open stances, hip rotation, windshield wiper, etc. because they are “not strong enough or coordinated enough.”
I’ve been teaching little kids for a decade this way and they can do amazing things if coaches only ask it of them!
Chris Lewit, Prodigy Maker