tennis - 8 year olds

[andtheyallwenttotheirhomes]

Thinking ahead to days of freedom! DC started a new tennis class in Sept and it is mostly games, not with a racket, with a bit of kids hitting ball at each other with rackets (badly) - not much of being fed balls to hit by teacher. Last teacher was opposite - a bit of playing games but mostly the teacher feeding the ball to the children so that they practised forehands and backhands endlessly. Does anyone know what is normal - what percentage of a lesson would you expect a teacher to be feeding the balls to the kids, ie the kids lining up and taking it in turns to hit forehands and backhands. The non ball games are good as they help the kids learn to move in the right way, but there is a lot of them and so little ball hitting,over the months dc's racket skills have deteriorated quite a lot. He has played for 2 years. Any experts out there? Thanks!!

Which does he enjoy more? The racquet skills or the games?

I've done a lot of tennis.

In all honesty if you know a little, then the best thing for his skills is you buying enough balls to put in a bucket and throwing them at him, bucket of forehand, bucket of backhands, alternate them, do them randomly. Do the same with volleys.
If you can hit a little backwards and forwards that's even better. You can play games together-things like what's the highest number you can hit backwards and forwards, hit across court, and down the line. Put the racket cover on the floor, and see if he can hit that, try playing a game where you need to try and get it (down the line) only in the trams.

If you have more than a couple of children, and especially if they're all at different levels, then it very quickly goes to child care and keeping them exercised rather than tennis skills.
Yes, they will improve, but less than if you bring them down for an hour a week to hit balls against you.
Any playing is better than none, and having the discipline of a set hour of lesson means you get down there, which is why a lesson can be good.

If you have a blank wall in your garden, then hitting (gently) against that can be very good. It teaches good movement and control. I spent hours at about your ds' age hitting against the wall. Sending it over the top of the house is great fun but not recommended especially if you have an open chimney

Thank you witchend - in fact, I saw your a similar post by you a while ago and I followed your advice and bought a bucket of balls and dc really loves me chucking them at them - ie did before lockdown and we will hopefully get to do it again over the summer.

But what I really wanted to know was - which method is more common in lessons? in the old lessons it was the same number of kids, but she spent more time feeding the ball so that the kids would practice forehand and backhand - is this more usual in tennis lessons with groups, or is what the current teacher doing - very little feeding of the ball more common?

nuffsaid dc loves racket skills and also loves games doesn't want to just do games

My experience is that at that age it's normally about 10 minutes warm up games without a racquet. About 10 - 15minutes doing a warm up game with racquet - that will normally involve the coach feeding to the children one by one.
Then introduce the stroke you are concentrating on, and give them an exercise to work on in pairs. The coach should go round and take time with each child and give them some individual pointers, which would involve them feeding to the child.
If there is time at the end, play a group game, normally this again will involve feeding to the children. A popular one is feed to the children one by one, if they get it over and in they stay in, if they miss they are out and join the coach. If they catch a ball they are back in (and the hitter is out)
Or the running game where you hit the ball and run round the other side of the net.

As they get older I would expect more emphasis on strokes and techniques, so very little non racquet stuff.

Thank you... that describes how the last teacher did it, but with the current teacher about half the lesson is warm up games, kids enthusiastic at first but then waning, then a quarter hour with the kids playing against each other and then about a quarter hour the teacher talking.

You are so helpful with your tennis advice by the way! Though - I agree whacking a ball over the house while fun might be dangerous - we'd have no windows left, balls down the chimney would be least of our worries!