Coaching for Performance On the Soccer Field and In the Trading Room By, Dr. Ken Long

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote a short essay about the principles of Instructional Coaching and how I use that framework to develop the courses I teach traders. The framework places a strong emphasis—a central emphasis—on learning by doing in small chunks with an additional emphasis on good, precise feedback on the small tasks that make up large skills.

I experienced a learning moment this morning at a soccer camp, where I had to stop myself from overcoaching the young student campers. I needed to create space for my young assistant coaches to develop their own coaching skills. My personal problem is that I love coaching so much that I have a tendency to intervene in the assistant coaches’ processes. I must remind myself to stay back and watch them from a distance so that I give them the time and space to develop their own coaching proficiencies.

I apply this same principle to my 10-week workshops where a deliberate act of my will ensures that the accountability partners are mutually coaching each other. This helps the traders develop their own feedback—giving skills as well as improving their trading skills. Both of those bodies of knowledge help each person develop a robust learning mindset where you can be a good judge of your own performance after the fact.

This approach has you teaching your teachers how to teach. You teach your traders how to teach trading to others. You also learn to look like a coach in the way you perform. The multiple perspectives and intentions augment and accelerate your learning and your trading skills development.

If this kind of approach to learning, coaching, teaching, and mentoring appeals to you, I would encourage you to join us for the Foundation Course starting July 1st to gain deep knowledge on our approach to trading and learning, as well as learning to master two of our foundational fractal trading patterns.

Fractal trading patterns are standard frequent robust trading patterns that apply in all time frames from one-minute charts up to monthly charts. We have identified a number of patterns that have utility across all time frames and because the alert, interpretation, and execution of the trades are standard, learning these basic patterns can support every style of trading that we have experienced. Two basic patterns form the core of a robust trading strategy across all time frames.

New Insights

Our updated course in Foundations includes new insights from our current cohort of students to ratchet up our collective learning.
To get an experience of what Foundations is like, you can watch several sessions from this month where we reviewed questions from the course participants.
This short (13 minutes) video captures the concluding FAQ session from this semester’s course. The student cohort was satisfied and deemed Foundations a success. Most of the students are staying on with the program to continue to refine their understanding and explore either Day, Swing, or Hybrid trading.

June 20, 2021:
https://youtu.be/3Z0ahFgwtng

This session is a more extended participant Q&A that took about 90 minutes. This session along with the written answers to all of the posted questions have now become part of the upcoming course.

June 12, 2021:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UBswd6ehNpU

Last Sunday evening’s strategy podcast was fairly typical at about an hour-long with an analysis of about 15 framed trades ready for the open on Monday. We also reviewed the following essential ideas:

  1. How to address the paradox of “trying not to try” when cultivating a healthy, useful trading mindset.
  2. How to systematically frame trades with fractal patterns in all time frames to develop an integrated trading plan.
  3. How to assess opportunities and insights from reviewing your closed trades like a football coach studies “game films.”
  4. How sharing charts with your learning insights in public frees you to experience even greater learning.
  5. How to use “market health checks” to frame the opportunities in individual stock and sector trades.
  6. How to improve your performance by learning to look at your trading “through the eyes of your coach.”

June 21, 2021 Sunday evening podcast:
https://youtu.be/UNn43FK9oS0

Keep your risk measured and your powder dry!

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