Private coaching

[LunarSkater]

The usual lesson time is thirty minutes, but I some skaters do an hour. It depends on the skater, the coach, and the availability of ice, the time slots, etc. Price varies by coach. Our skating director is phenomenal and her price reflects it. My coach is $30 for a thirty-minute lesson, so about average I think.

My rink/skating program also has this rather lovely little thing called Booster Lessons. They're a 20-minute private lesson for people in LTS as an introduction to the private lesson concept on freestyle ice. The ice time is included in the price. It's a wonderful thing for beginning skaters.

[Query]

I'm generally too slow a learner to pick up much in 15 minutes. I'd take for an hour or two if I could afford it.

But at one point, one rink arranged 15 or 20 (?) minute lessons with their coaches, and I took one. I found it useful, because my principle coach didn't speak English well, and there was something I didn't understand that she helped me with.

When another rink made a deal with my ice dance coach for him to push his competitive students to offer 15 minute lessons to people who took his ice dance class, I tried all 3 of his seriously competitive female ice dance students. Shame on me: I switched to one of those students, the one who worked best for me... She was female, so could dance with me, and my then coach was not - and she spoke English better. I didn't know at the time that switching coaches wasn't considered cool. I hope he didn't get mad at her because I switched. (It's not like I was the type of very competitive student he preferred. But he was new to the area, and didn't have enough students to fill his schedule.) But it showed me how much difference it can make to find a coach who works well for me. She wasn't the best ice dancer of the group, but she communicated better with me, and was able to adapt to my learning and movement style best.

I would take 2 or 3 of those 15 minute lessons in a row (I think), so I really took 30 or 45 minute lessons from her.

I think that if a coach arranges his/her own lessons, it wastes his/her time too much to arrange 15 minute lessons. But if the rink does the arrangements, it can make sense for the coach. It might also make sense for the coach if an ice session doesn't have quite enough minutes to fit another 30 minute lesson with someone.

I think a lot depends on how much money and time you have, and whether you have found the coach yet who teaches the way you want.

[Nate]

I do 30 and 40. 40 seems superior to 30 in every way. 30 minute lessons leave me rushing through everything, and clock watching. The extra 10 minutes feels like an eternity and really help establish a better pacing for the lesson.

I used to do 60 minute lessons, and it was heaven. I never felt the need to be prescriptive with lessons when I had that much time to work with.


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[Clarice]

My private students all take 30 minute lessons, but I often run over without charging extra if I have the time. I myself take a 30 minute lessons from coaches at my home rink, but I also travel a couple of hours to another rink and take hour lessons there simply because I've come so far. I do find it difficult to remember everything, and generally make a point of writing things down when I get off the ice.

[Neverdull44]

Usually 30 minutes.  A 60 minute lesson would kill me, unless it was on figures.

If there is Learn to Skate program, do it to sample the coaches.  You can sample all the coaches, just let them know in advance that you are sampling them to see which one fits.    Stern coaches work best with the lazier ones that can handle criticism.  But, others that can't handle criticism doled out by a tougher coach would be crushed by a stern coach.  Then, there are coaches that 'click' into that particular skater's problems.  And, there's coaches that are technical AND psychological masters.  Find out which one works.  I've never met a coach that I couldn't learn anything from, but have met coaches that I knew wouldn't be a fit for the long term.

[Gabby on Ice]

I do two 30-minute lessons a week. Most people do 30 minutes at a time, which I also think is enough time to cover a lot of things.

[rd350]

I do 45 minutes, once a week.

[amy1984]

The only time I see 15 minute lessons is for very, very young skaters, because they don't have the ability to focus on the coach much longer than that, even if they have the stamina.

15 or even 10 is common where I am but you'll have several spread out throughout the session.  For example, if a coach has three kids on the ice you'll often see each get 10 min dance, 10 min skills, and then 20 min free skate.  It's just because skills and dance are half an hour each so broken down between three students, it's 10 minutes of each of those and if free is an hour, you'll then get 20 minutes.  One of my coaches books this way.  The other does things in increments of 15 meaning she may not have time for you in all three disciplines if she's got more than 2 skaters on the ice.  I have zero preference on which is better.  But if a coach was to give, say, a half an hour dance lesson, she would have zero time in dance for anyone else.  Our coaches are so booked up here that we rarely see this outside of free skate.  As an adult I can safely say she's not doing shorter lessons because I can't pay attention

[FigureSpins]

I prefer 20 minutes for younger skaters but a lot of parents schedule 30 minutes, so I have to do play-learning for the last few minutes with kids who don't have the attention span for the full 30 minutes.

I'm not a clock watcher, so that habit drives me crazy when skaters count down the remaining minutes for no good reason.  Unless they have somewhere to be, they should be focused on their skating lesson, not the time clock.  What's really funny is that the rink uses the scoreboard clock because the little wall clock hasn't worked in a long time.  When I want to distract kids from counting down to the end of the lesson, I look at the broken clock and say "Oh, you have plenty of time."  It befuddles them and gets them to focus a little longer. 

Otherwise, my skaters take 30-minute lessons.  The higher-level skaters who can only do once a week prefer a 45-minute lesson.  If we're working on a program or a Moves test, 45-60 minutes is perfect - not on a regular basis, but when starting out new or polishing for the test/competition.

[Meli]

60 minute lessons here. It takes me a while to pick up physical skills, so I don't like to feel rushed for time. I usually have to try things a few times, with mini discussions/critiques in between. Also, I'm slow as molasses in winter when it comes to doing MIF patterns, so if I want any work on jumps or spins, I have to do the hour.

[Christy]

One of our coaches gives 15 minute lessons because they only have a limited time and a lot of demand. Some of the other coaches give longer lessons, but it depends on how many of their students are attending a session. I know some people get annoyed when they take on new students and reduce the time for their current students.
Personally I would like 30 minute lessons because it's hard to do more than one thing in 15 minutes.

[VAsk8r]

I do 30 and 40. 40 seems superior to 30 in every way. 30 minute lessons leave me rushing through everything, and clock watching. The extra 10 minutes feels like an eternity and really help establish a better pacing for the lesson.

I really liked 40 minute lessons for the same reason. I guess my coach finds the 30-minute chunks easier to deal with, though, because that's usually what we do. I try to do two 30s every week. When we work on axels, we usually take the last 15 minutes for that, and that's usually the longest 15 minutes of my week.

I've done 60-minute lessons before, and I know my coach has 8-year-old students who do 60, but I lack the attention span. I find myself chatting more and skating less when we do the 60s.