What a Coach Can Teach a Teacher, 1975-2004: Reflections and Reanalysis of John Wooden’s Teaching Practices

This paper revisits a 1970s study of Coach John Wooden’s teaching practices in light of new information. The original study reported discrete acts of teaching, including the number of instructions, hustles, praises, among other instructional moves. Using qualitative notes recorded during the original study, published sources, and interviews with Coach Wooden and a former UCLA player, we reexamined the 1970s quantitative data to better understand the context of Wooden’s practices and philosophy. We conclude that exquisite and diligent planning lay behind the heavy information load, economy of talk, and practice organization. Had qualitative methods been used to obtain a richer account of the context of his practices, including his pedagogical philosophy, the 1974-1975 quantitative data would have been more fully mined and interpreted.