Rethinking Physical Contact in Adult Kayak Instruction

In Canadian paddlesport, we talk a lot about skill progression: edging, strokes, rescues, rolling. But skill isn’t the whole equation. How we coach matters just as much as what we teach. Coaching is not just technical transfer; it’s stewardship of safety, consent, and personal agency.

And here in Canada, where Safe Sport is now a national standard, that stewardship matters more than ever.

Let’s start with the heart of it.

Consent is the Foundation

Every paddler has the right to feel safe, respected, and in control — physically, mentally, and in their identity.

That starts with consent.

Clear boundaries, active consent, and respect aren’t extras — they are the standard. Good coaching isn’t about taking over. It’s about ensuring your safety, your boundaries, and your trust come first.

You should always know what to expect: coaches who lead with respect, ask for consent, and maintain clear professional boundaries. You should feel free to say yes or no — and trust that your choice will be honoured.

And that choice goes both ways. Consent isn’t permission for unsafe practice; it’s a framework for clear communication. When both paddler and coach uphold their side, the whole group moves forward with trust intact.

Let's break down some examples

Re-entry Practice

In most re-entries: T-rescues, scoop rescues, heel-hook variations the only physical contact is with the boat, not the paddler. You deserve to know what the coach is about to do, how your kayak will be handled, and what position they expect you to take. None of this should ever come as a surprise.

But there is are exceptions worth naming clearly: the Hand of God (HoG) rescue or a Scoop

The Hand of God is a safety-critical rescue used when a paddler is unconscious, panicked, or unable to wet exit. It is inherently a physical-contact rescue. The coach must reach across the paddler’s torso or PFD to right the kayak and bring the paddler back to the surface. There is no hands-off version of this rescue. The physical contact is structural, not optional.

Even in that context, consent still applies, it just takes a different form:

• The paddler should know before the lesson begins that the Hand of God involves direct contact with their upper body.
• The instructor must explain the purpose, where the contact occurs, and why the technique is built that way.
• The student must actively agree to participate in practicing it.
• The practice should be done in clear view of others, with slow, predictable steps, and with the learner in full control of how far the scenario goes.

The contact in a Hand of God rescue is necessary to teach the rescue safely and accurately but nothing about that necessity removes the coach’s obligation to ask, explain, and get consent before initiating it. The rescue may inherently require contact, but the lesson does not require surprise contact or forced participation.

In other words: Even when contact is necessary, the learner’s autonomy stays your main focus.

Rolling

Rolling is one of the few skills in sea kayaking where the paddler’s body position, comfort level, and emotional state all intersect under pressure. That makes rolling a uniquely vulnerable learning environment , which is exactly why consent matters even more here. When learning to roll, you choose how you want to approach it. That decision belongs to the student, not the coach. There are multiple pathways to a successful roll, and none of them require haptic manipulation as the default:

• Floats and buoyancy aids: paddle floats, or bow support allow you to learn the movement pattern without a coach entering your personal space.
• Verbal cues and body-language coaching: many paddlers benefit from clear, calm instructions while they build confidence at their own pace.
• Demo-based learning: observing your coach, seeing the timing, watching the setup, and visualizing the arc is often more effective than being physically positioned.
• Hands-on (haptic) support: this can help some paddlers feel the movement, but it is never the default and should only occur when the paddler explicitly asks for it.

Even at the highest levels of instruction, rolling does not require physical contact to succeed. Hands-on support can be helpful in some niche cases, but it should never be assumed, expected, or presented as the “proper” way to teach a roll. And the power dynamic here is real: A paddler upside down in the water, disoriented, sometimes afraid, is in one of the highest-vulnerability states in all of paddlesport. If rolling instruction normalizes close physical manipulation, it unintentionally creates the conditions where boundaries can be blurred or misused. This is why the consent standard for rolling must be even clearer than in most other skills:

• Contact should be opt-in only, never implied.
• The coach should offer multiple pathways to success before any physical assistance is discussed.
• Every option should be explained upfront so the paddler can choose what aligns with their comfort and readiness.
• Any hands-on support must happen in open view, slowly, predictably, and with the paddler able to stop at any time.

Rolling is a powerful, transformative skill, for may people it is their dream but the only way to preserve its value is to teach it with the same respect and boundaries we apply everywhere else in sea kayaking.

High Pressure Scenarios

In high-pressure scenarios, psychological consent matters as much as physical consent. You should never feel pushed further than you agreed to go. We are developing a coaches manual that will be ready in 2026, this will go into depth on this nuanced, complex topic.

That’s how safety, dignity, and growth are protected. And that’s how the water stays a place where everyone belongs.

Safe Sport in Canada: What Applies to Adult Instruction?

It’s common to assume Safe Sport standards only apply to youth programs. That isn’t correct. In Canada, the Universal Code of Conduct to Prevent and Address Maltreatment in Sport (UCCMS) applies to all participants: minors and adults, whenever an organization, certification pathway, or instructor–student relationship exists.

Physical contact in instruction must always meet three criteria:

• Transparent and interruptible
• Not intimate or open to misinterpretation
• Clearly for the participant’s benefit

Canada’s sport landscape is explicit about power imbalances: teachers, evaluators, and certifying bodies hold structural authority. Because of that, consent must be proactive, not assumed, and must never rely on social pressure or tradition.

Where Canadian paddling organizations differ is in policy specificity:

• NCCP emphasizes athlete-centred, consent-based coaching, but doesn’t outline exact paddlesport contact scenarios.
• Paddle Canada references Safe Sport values, but does not publish clear adult-specific guidelines for instructional contact.

This isn’t unusual, many national organizations focus heavily on youth protection, while adult instructional environments receive less detailed policy attention. It reflects a broader pattern in sport: as soon as the participants are adults, the assumption is that contact is less complicated, consent is easier to navigate, and risk is lower.

But in practice, adult learning environments have their own vulnerabilities.
Power dynamics still exist. Certification still creates pressure. Adult learners can still feel unsure about setting boundaries with an evaluator or senior coach.

When policies leave these nuances unaddressed, a natural vacuum appears and in that vacuum, tradition tends to set the standard. Not because coaches are negligent, but because coaching cultures evolve informally. Skills are passed down from mentor to student, who later becomes a mentor themselves. Over time, practices become normalized simply because they were “how we were taught.”

Without clear adult-specific guidance, these inherited traditions can unintentionally overshadow newer research in motor learning, contemporary Safe Sport expectations, and evolving understandings of consent-based coaching. The result isn’t misconduct, but it can introduce inconsistency. Across Canada, you will naturally receive different advice from different operators — all of it well-intentioned, all of it coming from a shared spirit of wanting paddlers to succeed, but shaped by different pedagogical lineages and coaching pedigrees.

These differences are not signs of negligence or harm. They reflect the reality that sea kayaking in Canada has grown through diverse schools of thought, regional practices, and mentorship traditions. In many ways, this diversity is a strength. But without a strong, unified framework for adult-specific contact guidelines, it also means that each organization must interpret Safe Sport principles on its own.

Stronger governing guidance doesn’t eliminate individuality or the artistry of coaching — it simply creates consistency. It ensures that all coaches, regardless of background, are working from the same ethical and evidence-based foundation. And it gives learners a shared expectation of what safety, boundaries, and consent look like across the paddlesport community.

This is where risk enters the system: not because anyone intends harm, but because undefined boundaries create room for misunderstanding.

Clearer guidance helps everyone. It supports coaches by giving them a framework to rely on. It empowers learners by making expectations transparent. And it ensures that the values of Safe Sport — safety, dignity, autonomy, and respect — are applied consistently across the adult paddlesport community.

What Motor Learning Science Actually Says

Motor learning research, including Canadian sport science, doesn’t support routine hands-on correction for adult recreational paddlers.

Evidence against physical manipulation

• Reducing errors with physical guidance slows learning, because errors drive motor adaptation.
• Most haptic guidance studies show no improvement or worse long-term retention.
• Rhythmic, continuous tasks (like kayak strokes) do not respond well to being physically guided.

Where there may be narrow benefits

• Timing-critical skills show limited benefit for brand-new learners.
• Even then, guidance must be faded quickly.
• “Guidance-as-needed” outperforms continuous hands-on correction.
• Giving room to detect and correct is often a more useful pathway for adult learners.

The key insight

Positive results for physical guidance mostly come from rehabilitation, where participants already know the movement pattern but cannot perform it physically. Adult paddlers are the opposite: capable but inexperienced.

So routine physical contact isn’t just unnecessary, it’s often counterproductive. 

Understanding the Power Dynamic

Some coaching streams create higher-risk environments. The teaching culture around them normalizes unnecessary contact.

Rolling is the clearest example

• The learner is vulnerable: upside down, disoriented, often anxious.
• The environment is semi-private — water, noise, immersion.
• Historically, rolling instruction normalized close haptic manipulation.
• The instructor is positioned as gatekeeper of an “elite” skill.

These factors match what safeguarding literature identifies as a high-risk instructional environment. This doesn’t make rolling unsafe to teach, it means we must modernize the approach. Canadian coaching trends now emphasize:

• opt-in contact
• flotation aids instead of hands
• demonstration over physical manipulation
• learner-chosen progression

The goal isn’t less rolling,  it’s rolling taught without unnecessary risk. I welcome the debate here as I am sure this will cause some friction in the coaching community.

A Better Standard: Opt-In, Not Opt-Out

A simple, Canadian-aligned best practice:

“I’m going to stay hands-off. If you want physical assistance, you can invite it.”

This approach:

• removes implied consent
• neutralizes power imbalance
• aligns with UCCMS principles
• protects both instructor and student
• keeps contact exceptional, not routine

This article reflects my own coaching philosophy, and it’s the approach we use to guide our instructor team at Kayak Ontario. Our coaches believe in these principles, we talk about them often, and we hold ourselves accountable to practicing them on the water. It’s a framework built on respect, clarity, and evidence; it's also built on real-world experience. We’ve seen how well it works, how much confidence it builds, and how consistently our students succeed while still having fun.

That doesn’t mean tradition has no place. If traditional methods are familiar, comfortable, and safe for you, there is nothing here saying you must leave them behind. Sea kayaking has a wide range of teaching lineages, and many of them serve their communities well. What we’re offering is simply another path: a modern, consent-based approach informed by Canadian Safe Sport standards and current motor learning research.

This is the model we believe in, and the one we have chosen for our school. It has created a learning environment where people feel respected, supported, and empowered. And if you’re looking for a space where boundaries are clear, consent is active, and growth happens through partnership rather than pressure, we’re proud to offer that space.

1. Winstein, Pohl, & Lewthwaite (1994) - The smoking gun

• Directly tested physical guidance vs. verbal feedback
• Found physical guidance = worst retention
• Published in Research Quarterly for Exercise and Sport

2. Schmidt (1991) - The foundation

• "Frequent augmented feedback can degrade learning"
• Established the guidance hypothesis
• The theory everyone cites

3. Maas et al. (2008) - Clinical application

• Shows physical guidance slows learning even in rehab
• Great quote: "Manual guidance becomes part of the regulatory features of the task and the participant becomes dependent"
• Published in American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology