Deep Practice: From Novice to Expert

Coyle, in his article The Sweet Spot, writes about the process of learning effectively through
deep practice. This quest led Coyle to visit different places from tennis court in Moscow to a
vocal studio in Dallas, Texas and to a soccer field in Sao Paolo, Brazil in course of 14 months.
During this period he concluded that irrespective to the field a person is engaged to such as
soccer, music, aviation, etc. and their geographical location, there is one common process of
learningeffectivelyin achieving what he callsas Everest-size amounts of talent.
The process of learning effectivelythrough deep practice depends on a series of action of
attempting, failing, thinking and reattempting the task at hand until we achieve mastery over it.
As he quotes in page 18 Deep practice is built on a paradox: struggling in certain targeted
ways-operating at the edges of your ability, where you make mistakes-makes you smarter
conveys this very argument. He has clearly explained this through the examples of an 11 year
old Brunio and 24 year old Jennie who tried, failed, thought over their error and tried again and
again till they were successful in their task (page 13). Actually they have tapped the
neurological mechanism which is responsible for building certain skills and without realizing it
they entered a region of accelerated learning.
Coyle also believes that deep practice is much more efficient than passive learning. As he
quotes on page 16 The best way to understand the concept of deep practice is to do it. to
which I agree completely. Doing thing ourselves, even the smallest thing, causes us to struggle
through it and complete it thus allowing us to learn a lot than with the aid of someone or
something and have a lasting impact on our memory. He gives the example of remembering the
words with blanks (page 16), remembering someone's name in the party (page 17) and
demonstration given by the cabin steward while on airplane(page 17) to support his evidence
for deep practice.
Coyle also shows that talent is not born but its grown which is the essence of this book The
Talent Code. This is similar in ideas to the book The Brain That Changes Itself by Norman
Doidge. He takes the example of Edwin Link's flight simulator which clearly showed that good
pilots can be made as against the belief that good pilots are born, not made. As Coyle quotes
Robert Bjork sayingon page 19, Its all about finding the sweet spot. Theres an optimal gap
between what you know and what youre trying to do. When you find that sweet spot, learning
takes off. Coyle takes the example of futsal where players are operating at the edges of their
abilities and shows how this odd game gives theplayer a taste of deeppractice. He tells us that
futsal is played using a ball, half the size of the football and double its weight, and is played with
only 5 to 6 players as against a standard team of 11 players. Also he mentions that futsal player
are touching the ball more often, around six times more often than other player(page 27) thus
learning at faster rate. This enables a futsal player to play a game of football very easily
comparatively. In Dr. Emilio Mirandas words on page 28, No time plus no space equals better
skills.proves that deep practiceinvolved in futsal.
As Coyle has mentioned in the page 12, about his expectation of world class speed, power and
grace which were met but only half the time. During the other half he witnessed something
very different: moments of slow, fitful struggle and continued the chapter on this half of time.
However, he did not mentionthat half of the time where his expectation weremet. He did not
mention what was their learning process. Was it different from the other half or was it the
same as the other half on which his whole chapter was based.
Overall, Coyle has presented his approach to the learning process in a fine way, also by
providing enough examples some of which include day to day ones. He also engages readers in
thought by asking questions in between which actually develop interest in his readers to seek
out the answers.This article also encourages the reader to face their problem with bold
strength and learn how to grow their talents.