Keep the stoke high: engagement, performance, progression

Team Canada went for full froth with their clinic this afternoon; smashing some Levi hot laps with their trainers Adam, Dom, Mellen and James. They focused on how to build engagement in lessons and how they train their instructors to build the stoke.

The idea here was that getting your crew buying in right off the bat is key to getting them progressing through the lesson. We looked at some ways to get this happening; giving something to focus on when setting up the lesson. For an example we thought about when we’re loading up the snowboard during a warm up lap through the park. From then deciding how to build the lesson based on the answers given by the students and how they’re riding. We took the crew onto some crispy Finland groomers tried out some of their tasks they use to get the board deflecting across the hill before dipping off trail as the snow started to build up.

From then on we looked at balancing between technical focus and riding time with students as the lesson runs during some guided mileage to keep engagement high and manage the stoke.

Some really clear similarities to our safety – fun – achievement model where we encourage fine tuning the amount and type of all three for the group in front of you, as well as working with a guided discovery teaching style. Like lots of the clinics this week it was really cool to see a slightly different approach to achieving the same things we aim for and get the wheels turning to find new ways to introduce these concepts on our courses.

Thanks to the CASI crew for a fun session!

Adam Gardner playing with loading up the board.

Rich Waldie
SBINZ Tech Team