Talent should be fulfilled,

and skills should be developed.

There is an endless series of gifted children who became average or below-average senior players and those who were average in everything in childhood and became exceptional seniors.

Where is the mistake in the first case and what is the secret of the second process?

To be able to understand this, we need to understand the difference between talent and skill, and how we encourage, i.e. inhibit their development.

We see the performance during the match, but we don't know to what extent it is the result of the fulfillment of talent, and to what extent the development of skill.

WHAT IS TALENT OR GIFT?

The word "talent" was introduced in Mesopotamia at the end of the 4th millennium BC and was normalized at the end of the 3rd millennium BC, and denoted the weight of gold divided into 60 minas or 3600 shekels. In the ancient Greek word "talanton" was a unit of weight, in gold and silver, which was used as legal tender in commercial transactions of that time, in the Old Testament it was a unit of weight, and in the New Testament, a talent was equivalent to 6,000 denarii (silver coins of that era).

Talent is a measure of the amount of gold or some abilities.

It is an innate ability or a natural inclination or a gift from God without being taught.

Coaches mainly act on this gift in two ways: by our actions, we encourage or inhibit the development of talents in players.

Ellen Winner thinks that the term gifted children can be used to describe children with three atypical characteristics:

1. Premature development. Gifted children develop before their time. They take the first steps in mastering an area earlier than usual. Likewise, they progress faster than average children in that area because they learn easily in it. 

2. Insisting that they play their way. Gifted children, in addition to learning faster than average or even bright children, learn differently and with regard to quality. They play in their own way: they ask adults for a minimum of help and mentoring in mastering the areas in which they are active because they mostly learn independently. The discoveries they make are exciting and motivating, and each such discovery takes the gifted child a step forward. These children often independently create rules within the activity itself and create new, unusual ways of solving problems.

3. Passion for mastery. Gifted children are truly motivated to understand the meaning of the area in which they show signs of premature development. When they are engrossed in learning in the field in which they are active, they experience states of "fluidity" - optimal states where they become completely engrossed and lose their sense of the outside world. A happy combination of obsessive interest in one area along with the ability to learn easily in that area leads to high achievement.

Such children generally seem to learn without much help or guidance from adults. All they need is access to a certain area of ​​knowledge and someone to answer their persistent questions. In addition to learning faster, these children learn and think differently from other children.

When faced with a problem they want to investigate, they persist until they are satisfied with the available information. When they are interested in something, they show great persistence and concentration.

These children have a high level of energy that allows them to concentrate intensively in challenging situations, but it can also lead them to hyperactivity when they are not sufficiently stimulated.

Unusually aware of their own problem-solving strategies, these children can use these strategies to solve new problems that may seem completely unrelated on the surface.

HOW DO WE ENCOURAGE AND INHIBIT THE FULLFILMENT OF TALENT?

"Hard work beats talent when talent doesn't work hard."

Team Notka

If we understand the listed characteristics of gifted children, it is not difficult for us to come to the conclusion that development incentives are the creation of content that encourages Branko to constantly independently search for new solutions and a positive emotional environment in which he is not criticized when he makes a mistake.

Tolerance for mistakes comes from understanding the learning process and our awareness that it is possible that Branko creates his own personal style of play that we do not understand.

On the other hand, braking is most effectively carried out by persistent repetition of simple content that is boring to Branko and constant criticizing or punishing mistakes. Not understanding that the source of these mistakes is his trying out new solutions is the basis of the process of molding into our frames and creating permanent frustration with Branko, which ultimately leads to his mediocrity if we are emotionally superior or simply more powerful.

Since talent is innate, it is important to know that Branko will realize it to a certain extent depending on his personality and our leadership.

WHAT ARE SKILLS?

When the father of a tennis player I coached, seeing how bad his son was, asked me:

"Is that what you taught my son?"

I answered him: "I didn't teach him that, that's what he learned."

- Toni Nadal -

Unlike talent, which is innate, skill is a learned ability, and it can be developed in Branko if he dedicates himself to that development. Time, effort, and leadership are key to skill development, and efforts should be voluntary and systematic.