00:00Hello and thank you for joining our STAR Assessments webinar. I am Joanne Nickel. I'm a judge and
00:13evaluator. With me is Leslie Rushton and our topic today is training tips for STAR 1 to
00:205 and STAR 6 to goal. We hope this information will help you with preparing your students to
00:26be successful with their assessments. Leslie is going to speak about some of her training
00:31strategies and you have so much experience as a coach. Can you give us a little bit of your
00:36background? Thanks Joanne for having me today. It's lovely to be with you again. I've been coaching
00:42since 1977. I started in my tiny little hometown club of New Lisford, Ontario and also Englehart
00:49and at that time it was called the CFSA, the Canadian Figure Skating Association and the
00:55Figure Skating Coaches of Canada, not our NCCP. Oh wow, that's a long time ago. That's aging
01:00yourself. It is, yes. So I've been now coaching with the Wanda Fuga Skating Club since July 1st,
01:072013. I'm the Director of Skating and also the Co-Can Skate Director of the Wanda Fuga Skating
01:12Club. I'm also a section level, sorry, Skate Canada Specialist and also Technical Controller
01:20and a Star 1-4 Judge and I'm also the Coaches Representative for the BCU Con Section.
01:26That's great Leslie and as Leslie just said, she is the section's Coaches Representative and what that
01:33means, she's your resource. If you have any questions about star coaching or anything about
01:38coaching, please contact the section office through the, by email, bcytsection at skatinginbc.com
01:47and your inquiry will be forwarded to Leslie. So it's great to have you on board. Let's start with
01:55some training tactics that you implement right from the beginning at star one.
02:01I make sure that the skaters are prepared to do the complete assessment for star one and also for
02:10star six to gold. I usually do small group lessons or semi-privates for skaters to learn the assessment
02:16process. I feel that the skater is ready for the assessment when they consistently demonstrate the
02:21standard of development at a strong silver or gold, which meets the criteria. Mock assessments are done
02:29for preparation. And once I feel they are ready, I contact the parent when the skater is ready to do
02:35the assessment so that they can go online and pay the Skate Canada assessment fee. And I also prepare
02:41all the star one to five assessment sheets. All the coaches in our club do that. And I also keep track
02:47on the summary sheets for my skaters with their assessments as well.
02:51So Leslie referred to the skater demonstrating a strong silver or gold. And that is the assessment standards.
03:01You can see the matrix here. This example is for artistic. Each of the disciplines has its own matrix, but there
03:10is a lot of crossover in the criteria and the standards of development that are expected. Last year, we did a webinar,
03:20that focused on the assessment criteria and the standards of development that are expected at each level.
03:28This is what should be used to determine if your skater is ready to be evaluated by yourself as a coach,
03:35star one to five, or by an evaluator, star six to gold. I also think it's really important that skaters know
03:44what the assessment criteria is and what is expected of them at every level. So Leslie, can you speak to
03:53what you do to train your skaters to understand what is assessment criteria and what they need to demonstrate?
04:01Absolutely. So the players box in our arena looks like a little mini office. I love to have all of my rule
04:08books in binders at the sideboards with all of the assessment sheets. I, for example, will have a green
04:15binder with the star one to five and the red binder with the star six to gold. The skaters will learn the
04:21criteria and understand the expected standards of the development. I also start all of this process at
04:28star one. I think it's very important that they understand the assessments right from the beginning.
04:33The children are allowed to touch the binders as well. And I remember you talking about having the
04:42them draw out turns and labeling edges going in and edges going out. So they're actually learning by
04:51drawing on paper what they need to do. That's correct. I do a lot of paper exercises with the children,
04:57especially when it comes to the dance patterns. They start to learn how to draw the teddy bear for the
05:02Dutch waltz on a piece of paper with a solid line. So they see the two ears, two arms and two legs.
05:08And then once they become comfortable with the steps where they go on the pattern, they will take
05:13a different color of pencil and they will draw on the outside of that bear shape and put all of the
05:19steps into place. I find that that's a fun teaching tool for them. And it's a great way that they
05:25start to understand the curves, the lobes right from Dutch waltz. Yes, correct. So can you tell us a
05:33little bit about how you teach those lower levels and the format that you use? Well, starting right
05:39from star one, I use the hockey line a lot. And that way they can do their progressive on each side of the
05:46hockey line. And I'm showing them the actual shape of the curve. And that way, we will make sure that we
05:52get the outside, inside, outside edges for progressives. And we do all of the star one
05:57dance steps on the hockey line. And then once they're onto the Dutch waltz and the higher level
06:03dances, I will also have the skaters shadow either with another coach or with a program assistant.
06:09Or sometimes we'll have a group of skaters and one is a little bit stronger on a dance and they will
06:15shadow a weaker skater. So what they're doing is they're working in groups and learning
06:20the shapes of the pattern and where the steps go on the pattern. And I like the shadowing,
06:25especially at the lower levels. It just gives them a little bit of a sense of confidence that
06:30they're working alongside with someone else. And when they do the assessment,
06:36so the Dutch waltz and canasta, do they use the shadow as well? I do. At the lower levels,
06:42I use the shadowing quite a bit. Usually what will happen is when they start to get a little bit higher
06:46up in the assessments, they don't want to have anyone shadow with them. But I feel the Dutch canasta,
06:52baby blues, especially really important that they're actually shadowing.
06:59Let's go on to spins. One of my favorite topics. So with spins,
07:06I'd like to understand how you teach spins, particularly to make sure that the development
07:16standard, which starts from star one, that they hit the basic position and it's held for two
07:22revolutions. So as an official at competitions, we often see that spins are the difficulty and it's
07:34because they are not getting low enough. The skater's not getting low enough. So never attains
07:39the basic spin position, or if they do, they do not hold it for two revolutions. And then as an
07:45evaluator for star six to gold, similarly, skaters are challenged to get that basic position and to
07:53hold it for the number of revs that they need to. So can you talk to us about how do you train spins
08:00and to make sure that they are ready for their assessment? One of my favorite phrases that I use
08:06quite often in coaching is, do one more revolution than what is needed. So if it's two revolutions that
08:12are required, practice three. And if three are easy to do, do four. I find that quite often in all of the
08:19assessments, the spins are so much weaker than the jumps. And I won't have a skater do an assessment unless
08:25they can do all of the spins. There might be a portion of the spin in the three little boxes
08:30with the assessment that isn't as strong as the other two areas. But again, I make sure that they
08:36can do all of the spins before we do the assessment. So you see that the jumps are stronger, they develop
08:42faster than the spins do, but you wait for the spins to catch up. Yes, absolutely. I think that's very
08:48important. And in group lessons, we do a lot of just little exercises. For example, I find children
08:55have a really hard time getting into that lower position on the sit spin. So we'll do a lot of
08:59two foot sit spins at the pre-star level, at the star one level, even the star two level if the skater
09:04still isn't getting down into that full sit position. And I talk about the elevator on that spiraling edge.
09:11If it takes you too long to get down into that sit spin position and you're at a competition,
09:17they don't start counting those revolutions until you're down on that bottom floor.
09:21Mm hmm. That's, that's for sure. So
09:27in our last, last year, when we did our webinar and talked about assessment criteria and standards
09:34of development, you spoke a lot about using hockey circles and the hockey lines to teach edges for
09:44dances and, um, and skills. So right from star one, skaters should be learning to skate on correct
09:52edges as a foundational skating skill. So how do you teach your students to always skate on a clean edge?
10:00I use the circles a lot. So for example, they're learning the star one spiral circles on a circle.
10:06So that just transfers over to all the spirals. I will teach a progressive, the 10 Fox progressive
10:14on a middle hockey circle so that when they're turning that left forward outside C step at the
10:20end of it, it's staying on that hockey circle. I use lines right from the beginning, as I mentioned
10:25before with star one, I want those dance steps all done on a good half a circle coming back to the line.
10:31Um, cross rolls. I found that the line is very effective. They have to hold that left forward
10:37outside edge until they get to the blue line before they do the cross roll. So we know they're striking
10:42the forward outside edge on the right foot at the completion of the cross roll. And I use the two
10:48foot to one foot on the line as well. And this is my favorite, the half a heart.
10:53Oh, the flying camel. So often the children don't, they just step across. They step over.
11:01They do. They step across. It looks like a waltz jump on the takeoff, or it looks like a sow cow with
11:06a three turn on the takeoff. And I always say to them, you don't put a three turn on the takeoff of
11:11a waltz jump or an axle. So why would you put it on the takeoff of a flying camel? So as my favorite
11:17little go-to picture with a half a heart, they're doing the learning the flying camel from a standstill
11:23on a hockey line and that left forward outside spiraling edge curves until they get to the line
11:28where they have to hit the toe pick. And even in a group lesson, I'll say, when we hit the toe,
11:33what's my favorite word? And the children will say torque. They want to hear that sound of pressure
11:39pressing on that toe pick. And then we talk about landing across the tracing and the little X's
11:45represent where the landing can be anywhere across the tracing.
11:48Leslie, you also talked a lot about how you use group lessons and the lines to teach
11:55turns. And in this case, I love this little diagram where you, um, you're showing how you teach
12:00brackets. Can you share, share what this is? Absolutely. Um, quite often I'll have many skaters at that
12:07star four skills level, because I find that that is a little bit of a speed bump because the brackets
12:13and double threes and back circle on circle are quite a challenge for that level of skating. So
12:18for example, sometimes I will have six, possibly even nine skaters in a group lesson working on the
12:23brackets. So we use the blue hockey line, the red hockey line, and quite often we'll draw a line in
12:28between the two lines. And I will have all the children face the lobby end of the arena, which is
12:33where our Canada flag is. And I'll say, okay, everybody right foot in front, right arm in front,
12:38we're doing right forward outside bracket and push, and they'll all skate the right forward
12:43outside bracket. And then they stop at the end of that half of that circle. And I'll say left foot
12:48in front, we're still facing the lobby in Canada flag. And then we do the left forward outside bracket
12:53going back. And then my group will turn and face the clock at the opposite end of the arena where our
12:58banner is. And we will put the right foot in front and the opposite foot arm in front, pardon me,
13:04and we will do the right forward inside bracket. And once that's completed, they stop in that same
13:09half circle and do the left forward inside bracket going back to the wall. I find it to be very
13:15efficient because the children have each other to look at as well, especially on my leading lines.
13:21If I put people that can actually turn a fairly decent bracket as a lead, the children that are just
13:27learning the bracket turns have someone to follow because quite often I'll ask for a bracket and I will
13:32get a three turn instead of a bracket. I see that in assessments even at star six and star seven,
13:40that they still haven't learned what, you know, what's a counter versus a rocker. Yes. So that's
13:47great. Thanks for sharing that with us. And that wraps up our presentation for today. Thank you,
13:53Leslie, for sharing all of your knowledge. We hope this information gives you some training ideas.
13:59Please, as I said at the outset, if you have any questions, email the BCYT section at skatinginbc.com.
14:07If you have a coaching question, that will get forwarded to Leslie. And remember, I want to promote
14:15our archived video where we talk about the assessment standards and, or the assessment criteria and
14:22standards of development so that you know when your skater is ready to be assessed. And we spent,
14:27in that video, we talked a lot about the common challenges that we see that are resulting in a
14:32retry. And of course, lots of training tips from Leslie. So thank you very much for watching. Thank you.
