When You Least Expect It
BY BRAD JOHNSON HEAD TRAINING DIRECTOR SNOW SPORTS NORTHWEST

A funny thing happened on the way to ski season last year. A wake up call if you will. A vivid reminder of the effects we all have on our students and beyond.

It all started simply enough. It was my eight year old daughter Ashley’s first soccer game of the season in September. She had switched to a different team that season, so she didn’t know all of her new team mates yet. I knew hardly any of them, and I certainly didn’t know any of the parents. We arrived at her assigned field early and I started warming her up with a few passes and practice kicks. As other players showed up, they all joined in with the warm up drills. Eventually, the coach showed up, and took over. So far, so good.

After the game (I see why they don’t keep score at that level, it wasn’t pretty), the coach came over and asked if I’d ever played soccer. Ya, but it was only for a couple years back in elementary school. Then she asked if I would be willing to come and help with their goalies at practice. Well, I really don’t know the game all that well but I’ve had a little experience working with kids (25+ years teaching skiing), so I thought “Couldn’t hurt”. I agreed, and spent the next couple days thinking about what I saw at the game and what I could do with their goalies.

The next practice rolled around a few days later, and I showed up with my daughter, ready to make goal keeping machines out of these girls. I greeted the coach, told her I was at her disposal, and just to let me know what she wants me to do. Then I got out of the way while she and the assistant coach started running drills with the girls. 10 minutes. 20 minutes. 30 minutes. I was starting to think the coach had forgotten I was there. Then about 35 minutes into the practice, the coach yells out, “Brad, I want you to work with ‘Megan’ on ball handling skills”. Every team has a ‘Megan’.

Every class has a ‘Megan’. There always seems to be that one person (male or female) that’s a little slower, a little larger, and a little, shall we say, ‘less focused’ than the rest. That was my assignment. Not something I’d prepared for in the least. I thought my job was going to be goalies. Well, not today. Today my job was to help Megan control the ball (no small task considering she didn’t seem to like running much).

I looked over at Megan, and she was looking between me and the coach with that terrified “Who the heck are you?” look in her eyes. Seeing this, I was reminded that the coach hadn’t bothered to introduce me, and virtually none of the girls knew who I was, Megan included. Nobody learns anything in the Terror Zone, so we needed to diffuse this situation immediately. I walked over to meet her, got down on my knees so I was just a little below eye-to-eye and said “Hi Megan, my name is Brad, and I’m Ashley’s dad. I’ve been watching you and your team play, and I think I might have some ideas that could make things a little easier and more fun for you. Would you like me to show you?”

At lease she didn’t look terrified any more. Still apprehensive, but that’s normal. And I thought I could use her heightened sense of awareness from her apprehension to help communicate some new ideas to her. So we started working on some very basic things. Some physical, but mostly mental. The magic for Megan was when we changed her focus from the players to the ball. The details are not really important. What was important was that she had mentally shifted gears. Over the next 10-15 minutes that we worked together, there was improvement. SIGNIFICANT improvement. So much so that the coach noticed, her mother noticed, and most importantly, she noticed. We’ve all seen this in our classes on the snow. You have a student that seems anchored on a plateau, and then some magic combination of words and events flips a switch, and suddenly they breakout to a new level. It’s not perfection, but it’s a quantum leap of progress, and it’s a ginormous motivator for both student and instructor. So was the case with Megan. The rest of the practice she was back with the team, controlling the ball, making tackles and steals, and generally surprising her teammates and the coach.

After practice, I was walking back to the parking lot with the coach. Megan came running (RUNNING! Megan doesn’t run when she doesn’t have to) up to me and said “I used to hate practice, but today was FUN!!!” Then she RAN off to catch up with a couple of her teammates.

This was of course very personally satisfying for me, as it would be for any instructor or coach. But this by no means is the end of, or the point of this story. As we continued to walk, the coach turned to me and said, “That’s the happiest I’ve seen Megan in a couple years. She’s had it pretty rough. Did you know that her mom has terminal cancer?”

WOW! I certainly didn’t see that one coming. What do you say when someone drops a bomb like that? After being dumbfounded for a few steps, all I could say was, “I didn’t know. I’m really sorry to hear that”.

Over the next few weeks, Megan continued to make steady progress. Her skills were slowly improving and she was definitely contributing to the team. But more importantly, she was happy and having fun. I would still work with her on occasion. Just little tips here and there to fine tune her new skills. Megan’s mom was at almost every practice. She usually sat in a folding chair with blankets wrapped around her, cheering Megan and the rest of the girls on from the side lines. One day, about four or five weeks into the season, I was carrying the folding chair back to the parking lot for Megan’s mother. We were chatting while strolling toward the car as Megan ran ahead with her teammates. Her mom casually said “You know, you’re her favorite coach. She’s happier now because of what you’ve done for her. And that makes me happy too.”

I could see in her eyes that she really meant what she had said. In her condition, she was looking for any happiness she could bring to her daughter. I assured her that I was not a coach, just a helper, but I was pleased to help Megan and the rest of the girls in any way I could.

The season eventually concluded in mid November, just enough time for me to frantically switch to skiing mode and spool up for instructor clinics (or at least as much as possible given the dismal snow cover in the in the Northwest last season). There was a post season pizza party for the team that was held at Megan’s house. It was a nice opportunity for all the girls and parents to get together. The girls all got personalized trophies, and the parents got an opportunity to visit in a warm, dry environment instead of on the cold damp sidelines of a soccer field.

That was the last time I saw Megan’s mother.

Last spring, we got word that Megan’s mom had lost her long battle with cancer. And I later learned that Megan’s uncle, her mother’s brother, had passed away within 24 hours of her mother from the same form of cancer. Although neither passing was unexpected, I can only imagine how difficult this must have been for Megan.

The Rest of the Story

Fast forward to September 2005. I was asked to help with the soccer team again this year. On my first day back at practice, I was very pleased to see that Megan was back. She was a little rusty, not quite as fast, and not quite as focused as she was at the end of last season, but she was back. After what Megan had gone through, I didn’t know if she would feel like or want to play soccer again. But she was back. Her father told me that she wanted to come back. She wanted to keep playing with the team she had become a part of.

Why, you may ask, am I compelled to share this story? It’s quite simple really. We, as coaches, teachers, and instructors, have all helped others to achieve new levels of performance at one point or another. Our motivations for doing so may vary, but I would be willing to bet that we all share a common satisfaction when a student gets that “I get it!” smile. What most of us don’t see (at least as snow sports instructors) are the farther reaching effects we may have. We send our students home at the end of a lesson, and we don’t see them for a week. We don’t see them excitedly telling their parents or their friends about the steep run or the bumps they rode, or that their instructor is teaching them this really cool new trick. We don’t see the parents’ reaction of pride and pleasure in the accomplishment of their child. We don’t hear the parents sharing their kid’s accomplishments with their friends and neighbors. We rarely ever hear that the accomplishments we helped our students to achieve, or the personal interest we took in our students has given them added self confidence and self esteem.

But I was fortunate. I got the chance to see how a little personal interaction ripples beyond just the student. I saw that we can have huge affects on circumstances we may know nothing about. And I again confirmed that some of life’s most vivid lessons come when you least expect them.

The point? - I share this story to serve as a reminder for all of us to consider how many lives we may touch when we teach. Take a moment to think about your interactions with your students. Look at it from their perspective. We all know that unintentional but thoughtless comments or actions can have devastating effects on students. Those can and often do find there way back to us through students’ behavior or phone calls from parents. But we need to remember there is a flip side to that coin we should never take for granted. We have the opportunity every time we teach to have tremendous positive influences that can extend far beyond the student and the snow. We may not see all the effects, but we need to trust that they can and do exist. And every once in a while, if we’re a little lucky, we may catch a glimpse of the ripple effect…the bigger picture. The picture that shows how our connection with students affects their world. For me, this picture is the ultimate inspiration to provide each and every student with the best experience possible during our time together.