Instructor Corps

[Doc]

THX-7.3,

My online WordWeb dictionary has four definitions for "consistency" and you can pick any one of them.


Loren,

Remember that old cowboy song you sung to me, "Don't Fence Me In".


Russ,

Your right, for you, a part of my argument will not "wash" but for others who are more objective it will "wash, dry, and clean windows".


Thesita,

Could there be other reasons why coaches don't take the online courses. At one time at Slippery Rock University I was among other things the men's and women's water polo coach, the women's swim coach, the Chairperson of the Computer Science Department, and the Vice President of the Teachers Union, so the only way I could have taken an online course of any kind at that time was to get one of those back scratchers on a stick. Then I would have had to place the stick up my rear end and used the back scratcher part to tap the computer keys because most all other appendages were busy doing work of some kind.

Doc

PS: This is what a chess player must feel like when he or she plays more than one chess player at the same time. Only I wasn't trying to win I was just trying to survive.

[Russ Thompson]

I readily admit that I am not objective. I am a referee and an instructor, so yes I am not objective as a result. My view of the world is through the lens of a referee. Insofar as I am not objective, there are coaches that are also not objective, players that are not objective, fans that are not objective and school presidents that are not objective.

Author of the 7 Habits of Highly Successful people, Stephen Covey teaches that people perceive the world differently, and because we view the world with our own unique "lens," it is difficult to separate the observation from the observer. Covey writes: "... that although many people want to be effective in their lives and achieve certain goals or dreams, they are unwilling to honestly examine their own paradigms. They are unwilling to look at the way they look at things."

Real understanding will not come from all of us joining hands and seeing everything the same way which is, to a large extent, being objective. It will only come (IMHO) when we agree that it is not possible to be truly objective but it is possible to understand that the view as a referee is entirely different than the view as a coach and to accept those differences. Or put another way, we need to be more tolerant of one another because therein lies the lasting solution.

[LABertocci]

...because we view the world with our own unique "lens," it is difficult to separate the observation from the observer

This is a valid behavioral equivalent to Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle... and equally valid in this situation.

[Doc]

I thought one of the purposes of the "Scientific Principle" was to "separate the observation from the observer".

Doc

[jordangregory]

I think that (everything can be conquered through the scientific method i.e. We will find the absolute truth and convince everyone of it) is the goal of modernity, and “that” has yet to be accomplished. Most likely never will. I am more on the page of a postmodernist. More on the lines of what Russ stated. Even though Steven Covey is in no way a modernist, he definitely expresses the philosophy of the postmodern world paradigm well.
When Russ said
"to understand that the view as a referee is entirely different than the view as a coach and to accept those differences. Or put another way, we need to be more tolerant of one another because therein lies the lasting solution."
He definitely hit the nail on the head.
Many think the world is going through a change right now from the modern worldview (scientific method, absolute truth) to a postmodern worldview (more on the lines of Russ's quote). It can take hundreds of years for worldviews to change though out society. I imagine we will have this tension between referees and referees, coaches and coaches, referees and coaches for quite a while.

[Torchbearer]

You stumped me, Loren, with your comment about Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle, and I even went to the appropriate web-site and looked it up. Dates back to the 1920s. Can't understand it, though. I do comprehend Steve Covey's dictates on leadership, the scientific principle, and the world's continuing trend toward postmodernism. I'm on Russ's side when it comes to showing more tolerance, but remain hopeful that it won't take several hundred years, as jordangregory suggests, for us to change our "worldview." I believe it can occur during the 21st century, along with our better understanding of the string theory and the concept of alternate universes, in one of which, maybe, hopefully, coaches and referees get along just fine. In the meantime ... HaPPy ThanksGiving to EveryOne.

[LABertocci]

I was in "one of those moods" and was showing a bit of physics humor...

How this was relevant is less the Heisenberg Uncertainty principle itself (here paraphrased): the values of certain conjugates (groups of descriptors such as position and momentum for example) cannot both be measured... or that the more one knows about one the less one can know (the more uncertainty one will have) about the other...

... than it was/is the logical extension the Observer (Observation) Effect. What this means is that for many kinds of measurements, because of the nature of the phenomenon being observed (going back to our buddy Heisenberg, a sub-atomic phenomenon), the things (instruments usually) available to us that we can use to actually make the observation will almost certainly alter the state of whatever is being measured. For example, using a sub-atomic particle to probe an atom will surely alter the state of the atom. The analogy I use when I introduce this topic in a General Chemistry lecture is to imagine a large billiard table (in a darkened room) with ONE ball moving... and you are asked to measure its position and velocity, using only ONE (fluorescent) ball... so you throw your ball somewhere into the dark, and if it changes direction, you will know WHERE it hit the other ball... and if you know precisely how much your ball weighs and what velocity (speed and direction) it had, and can measure the change in velocity, you will know how much its momentum (as a vector) was changed. But you CANNOT use that measurement to know anything more than the momentum of the ball it hit, you cannot know its mass AND its velocity, only its momentum sum.

Obviously... this is the afternoon before Thanksgiving and I have way too much time on my hands...



How does this relate to water polo?



Referees, or at least the best ones, begin to view the game through their own lens (not caring about, or even remembering, the score / looking at skills and tactics as output functions of WP 7.3...) whereas coaches have another lens, often VERY MUCH colored by the team tactics they coach or (most relevant here) by what kinds of things they usually see whistled. Coaches are, as a group, reactionary to referees, responding to what they see to divine what "they" (the referees) are trying to do, and often try to impose their own ideas on what should be whistled. This is the lens to which I was referring... and the "uncertainty" part of it is that all coaches can do is alter tactics and hope it matches what the referees are trying to do.

I have argued, since forever, that what coaches OUGHT to do is learn what referees are taught THEN devise the tactics to beat the system. This would allow the coach to know what the referee lens is and to use it to benefit.

The observer effect is that most coaches have a way they prefer their teams to play... they try to fit what they see referees do into THEIR internal systems... and WHEN it does not work, blame the referees. This observer effect is one of, if not THE, biggest sources of coach-referee discord.

By making all referee training transparent (meaning any coach could get access to what referees are being taught), this will go away to the extent coaches elect to go get that information.

To the extent coaches do not, they do not.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING ! ! !

[LABertocci]

For the record, the 2009 World Championships is in Rome Italy. I already have more than THREE referees who have contacted me about sharing our (paid for by Joanie and my $$) apartment... so that they can go watch and learn.

All of you can do the math.

Correction... did I write "three?"

As of earlier today, it is now SEVEN.

[Allen Lorentzen]

For the record, the 2009 World Championships is in Rome Italy. I already have more than THREE referees who have contacted me about sharing our (paid for by Joanie and my $$) apartment... so that they can go watch and learn.

All of you can do the math.

Correction... did I write "three?"

As of earlier today, it is now SEVEN.

If you've got room in your suitcase make that EIGHT

[THX-7.3]

For the record, the 2009 World Championships is in Rome Italy. I already have more than THREE referees who have contacted me about sharing our (paid for by Joanie and my $$) apartment... so that they can go watch and learn.

All of you can do the math.

Correction... did I write "three?"

As of earlier today, it is now SEVEN.

If you've got room in your suitcase make that EIGHT

NINE

[LABertocci]

For the record... and I am being completely ingenuous, here are some details.

Depending on how big a house we rent, and how the bedrooms are shared, you are probably looking at a housing cost of somewhere north of 500 Euros per week. There are many apartments with three bedrooms... there are fewer bigger places, certainly none near downtown. The event itself has the first game on 19 July and the final championship game on 1 August... this is two weeks. We will surely arrive the day before the first game and not leave until after it is over. If the number of people who want to share with us exceeds the capacity of the place we rent, someone else will have to take over renting a second place... and either way, I am not going to be the tour-director. We will rent the biggest place we can find (bigger is cheaper per bedroom) and go from there.

So... you are looking at somewhere north of 1000 Euros for housing, dinners out most nights (eating at home some nights), airfare probably around $1000 that time of year, and tickets (not sure if there will be only daily tickets or a full-event pass, figure at least 25 Euros per day for tickets). I think you need to expect the entire thing to cost somewhere north of $3000.

[LABertocci]

I want to take this opportunity to commend the current Instructor Corps.

Russ Thompson (aka Superman aka Iceman aka Aquaman)
Don Holbrook
Mark Maretzki
Jack Horton
Mike Reid

Yes, I wrote the content. But just as a great instructor can bring Hemingway to life and a lousy instructor can beat him into the ground, this group is a paragon of value to the water polo community. The next time any of you see any of them, thank them for their role in bringing monolithic instruction to the water polo community.

Bravo gents ! ! !