This past Saturday, our fearless refs The Tank and Om Nom Chomsky put together the second of two rules practices organized for the league. The first went over the basic rules of derby in terms of the game's structure and the second focused on penalties. Both referees fielded questions and worked intently to help the league's players understand key details of the game we love.
Some skaters understandably might balk at the idea of a rules practice: there's an assumption that if you play, you must know the rules implicitly. But Saturday particularly was kind of a revelation: multiple times, I heard skaters say variations on "Oh, so that one infraction is pretty much all of my penalties ever. Ah. I see."
Roller derby is a complicated sport and there's no shame in not having things completely figured out, so long as you're trying to learn. The more you know about the game, the smarter you'll be able to play, and the less time you'll spend sitting in the penalty box (as our refs pointed out on Saturday). Not only will your performance improve, but you'll probably have more fun and certainly more skating time.
I've written before regarding how a rules test should be mandatory alongside a skills test to mark skaters as ready to play. But how, as leagues, do we encourage our players to learn? Cracking a book and wading through the rules can be intimidating, but it's essential that we get players to do so and in turn realize that the sport's rulebook isn't just a quagmire of big words and sub-clauses. The rulebook is actually pretty user-friendly, but the trick is helping users to get friendly with it.
Rules practices are godsends to players in need of some explanation. Getting referees to lead players through the rules and explain them will clear a lot of confusion. Our refs decided to encourage players to obtain their own copies of the rules and follow along. A combination of explanations, questions and clarifications shed a lot of light for players new and old. The cupcakes and cookies probably helped as well. When organizing a rules practice, it's important to stress to players that this is also part of derby, that this is as much an investment in their success as doing pack drills and also to trust your referees to lead the practice. They know their stuff.
Other resource ideas include starting up a league "Ask a Zebra" Facebook page or message-board thread, depending on what kinds of intra-league communications your league primarily uses. LOCO's Ask a Zebra page on Facebook took a little while to get started, but once players realized how useful it was, it's become busy doling out answers that other players can learn from too. Another resource is Roller Derby Rule of the Day, also found on Facebook. Of course the mother lode is WFTDA's Rules page, combining Q&A with PDF resources.
The truth (about roller derby) is out there. Help get it closer to home by making sure your league's skaters have multiple ways to access it, discuss it and learn from it.
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