Swen Nater - You Haven’t Taught Until They Have Learned: John Wooden’s Teaching Principles and Practices

Swen Nater , BS, is an assistant sporting goods buyer for Costco Wholesale. Along with his wife, Marlene Nater, he is a Phono-Graphix reading therapist and trainer. They have a private practice in which they teach children to grasp the concepts and fluency of reading, spelling, and mathematics at all levels. From 1997-2003, he directed the Costco Wholesale corporate Employee Outreach Program, training Costco volunteers to help struggling readers in elementary schools across the United States and Canada catch up to their required grade level of reading. As a basketball player, Swen was a community college All-American in 1970 before playing behind NCAA Player of the Year Bill Walton under Coach John Wooden at UCLA, where he was a member of two UCLA national championship squads. He went on to become an NBA first-round draft pick in 1973 and the ABA Rookie of the Year in 1974. He led the ABA in rebounding in 1975, the NBA in 1980, and the Italian League in 1985. He still holds the NBA record for defensive rebounds in a half with 18. After his playing days, Swen taught algebra, sports psychology, and exercise psychology at Christian Heritage College while also serving as the schools athletic director and mens basketball coach from 1985-1995. In 1990, he and co-head coach Ray Slagle led Christian Heritage to its first NCCAA national championship. Swen and Wooden are co-authors of John Woodens UCLA Offense (to be published in March 2006). He and James A. Peterson coauthored The Complete Handbook of ReboundingFundamentals and Drills. He has also produced three instructional basketball videos, Rebounding: Simple and Effective , Unstoppable , and Not in My House. Swen and Marlene, his wife of 32 years, reside in Enumclaw, Washington, and have two daughters: Alisha Yvonne (27) and Valerie Ann (26).

Ronald Gallimore , PhD, is Chief Scientist for LessonLab Research Institute and Distinguished Professor Emeritus at UCLA. He earned his BA from the University of Arizona and his PhD from Northwestern University. He taught psychology at California State University, Long Beach, and the University of Hawaii before joining the psychiatry faculty at UCLA in 1971. In 1966, he was appointed Research Psychologist at Princess Bernice Pauahi Bishop Museum to co-direct a five-year field study in a native Hawaiian community. In 1970, he and Roland Tharp designed a laboratory school (Kamehameha Elementary Education Project), which they co-directed for 10 years. For this work and their book Rousing Minds to Life , he and Tharp were presented the 1993 Grawemeyer Award in Education. In collaboration with Leslie Reese, Claude Goldenberg, and Estela Zarate, Ronald directed a 17-year study of immigrant Latino students and their families. He has collaborated with Goldenberg and Saunders on longitudinal studies of school and teaching improvement from 1985 to present. In 1992, he received a University of California Presidential Award for research contributing to the improvement of public schools. In 1993, the International Reading Association presented him and Goldenberg with the Albert J. Harris Award. In 1998, he and Jim Stigler founded LessonLab, which is devoted to the improvement of teaching through research and direct action in schools. Ronald co-directed the 1999 TIMSS Video Study and currently oversees research conducted at LessonLab (a Pearson Education Company: http://www.lessonlab.com). He has published five research monographs and more than 120 scholarly and scientific papers. Ronald and Sharon Gallimore were married in 1963, and have lived in Santa Monica since 1973.

Every book has a history. Like any history, a book emerges from many sources and it is difficult to fix a single origin point. This book is no different. The immediate origin was a phone call. Swen was working on the idea for a book about his experiences as a student of Coach John Wooden and how Coach had taught. After drafting some material, he called Coach Wooden for guidance, and he suggested that Swen contact Ron, which he did in September 2003.

After some conversations and exchanges of chapter drafts, we (Swen and Ron) decided that using two very different perspectives on Coachs teaching was a workable concept for a bookone detached and impersonal perspective (Ron as the researcher of Coach Wooden), and one intimate and personal perspective (Swen as the student of Coach Wooden).

Another origin of this book was Roland Tharps suggestion to Ron in 1974 that they conduct a research study of Coach Woodens teaching practices. With Woodens permission, Ron and Roland attended practices during the 1974-75 season, developed a systematic coding scheme, coded more than 3,000 acts of teaching, and drafted an article for publication. Before sending the manuscript to the publisher, Ron and Roland sent it to Coach Wooden for comments. But he never wrote back. The article was published, and except for a few inquiries, it remained for the authors a pleasant memory.

There were other critical points in this books historyCoachs invitation to Swen to join the UCLA team, and a phone call in 1948 that came too late. After coaching Indiana State, John Wooden had two job offers, one from the University of Minnesota and the other from UCLA. He wanted to bring assistant coach Eddie Powell with him to his new job; UCLA agreed, but the Minnesota representative needed to get approval, and promised to call back the next day. Wooden favored the Minnesota job, but promised UCLA he would decide and provide it with an answer by the next day. By the next morning, a blizzard had destroyed the phone lines in Minnesota, preventing the schools representative from being able to call when promised. So when UCLAs representative called that day, Wooden, being true to his word about having an answer, accepted the offer from UCLA. When Minnesota got its phones back in order and the phone call was finally placed, it was too late. John Wooden and Eddie Powell went west and started a legendary chapter in the history of college basketball, and made this book possible.

Some special teachers are also a part of the history of the formation of this book. For Swen, there was Mrs. Rochte, Don Johnson, and Tom Lubin. Like most everyone, Swen remembers Mrs. Rochte as an exceptional journalism and poetry teacher he studied under at Jefferson Middle School in Long Beach, California. Innovative and organized, she taught with only one objectivethat all students learn. Don Johnson was Swens first basketball coach at Cypress College in Cypress, California. An All-American under Coach Wooden, he taught basketball as if he were in a classroom. His explanations and demonstrations were clear and helped Swen, a novice in the sport, grasp the basic concepts of basketball, which ultimately helped him earn an athletic scholarship at UCLA. Tom Lubin, the nephew of Olympic great Frank Lubin, passed on Franks hook shot and the fundamentals of post play to Swen. Though Swen was very rough around the edges, Tom never gave up. He, along with Mrs. Rochte and Don Johnson, continued to teach until Swen learned.

After completing his years at UCLA and playing 12 years of professional basketball, Swen began to teach college mathematics, physical education, and mens basketball at Christian Heritage College in El Cajon, California. While studying the game and teaching, he realized he had excellent models in his past and began to draw from the experience and knowledge of Don Johnson, Tom Lubin and Coach Wooden.

Two of Rons special teachers were John Haberland and Lee Sechrest. John picked Ron to be a teaching assistant in an undergraduate class in statistics at the University of Arizona and was the first to suggest graduate school in psychologyand in particular Northwestern University, where John had earned his PhD. At Northwestern University, Lee was Rons professor and mentorand still is more than 45 years later. Lee is now, coincidentally, Professor Emeritus at the University of Arizona.