Teaching The Forehand Volley

Most instructors have had students that no matter how many lessons they have taken, they just can't seem to get the feel for the forehand volley. Here is a tip that might give your students the breakthrough they need.
Take a folding chair or small stool to the court with you. Set it up inside the service box. Place your cart or ball hopper across the net from the chair.
Have your student sit sideways on the chair with her upper body turned about 45 degrees from the net. Have her hold the racquet in a position that mirrors the end of the volley preparation position; i.e., wrist cocked and locked, racquet face parallel to the net, laid back, and slightly raised. Either an Eastern forehand or a continental grip is acceptable. Feed softly hit balls to the student and have her try to clear the net and land the ball in your cart or hopper using a volley stroke.
There are a couple of things you can do to help your student obtain the feel for the volley from this sitting position. Have the student place her non-hitting arm across her waist with her hand under her hitting elbow; this will emphasize the use of the forearm only and minimize any over-swinging on the volley. Choking up on the racquet handle will make the stroke seem easier. Also, encourage the student to clear the net by several feet, using plenty of backspin.
Once the student gets the feel for hitting the volley in this way, have her stand up and hit regular volleys, again trying to put the ball in the basket. After a while, have her sit down on the chair again and hit volleys from there. Keep repeating this sitting and standing until the volley is grooved. In subsequent lessons, any time the feel for the volley weakens, have the student briefly resume the sitting position to reestablish the mechanics of the stroke.

Live Ball Volley Drill

Here is a great volley drill done with 2 or more students. It is a variant of the hot seat drill. I position one person on the tee, and one on the baseline on the deuce side of the court. I stand just inside the service line, directly in front of the person on the baseline. The focus here is on forehand ground strokes and forehand volleys. I begin by feeding a ball to the baseline person, who hits a controlled forehand ground stroke back to me. I volley this ball to the person standing on the tee, who volleys the ball back to me. I volley this ball back to the baseline person, who again hits a ground stroke back to me. We continue this way, trying to keep the ball in play, until someone makes an error. After several minutes, I rotate the two students.
If there are three students, I put two on the baseline and have them alternate their forehand hits as in a circle drill. I might also have them each stand on the baseline facing each other, one hitting forehands and the other backhands. After several minutes, I rotate the 3 students.
After 10 minutes or so of feeding and hitting on the forehand side, I shift over to the ad court and now focus on the backhand ground stroke from the baseline and the backhand volley from the tee.
This is a great drill for building confidence and quickening reaction time for net play for beginners and intermediates. For more advanced students, I try to hit more random volleys: high, low, hard, soft, forehands, and backhands.
I think the reason I love this drill so much is that it forces me to be very precise in my volleying and gives me great practice for my own game!

Groundstroke placement and coming around the ball

This will work on your stroke placement and force you to move fast on your feet to line up the shot. Also you will learn to bring your body around quickly to change from backhand to forehand and back again.
Two players start at the baseline on one side of the tennis court centered on the "doubles lane." Quite simply, start a rally to your partner but keep them in the "doubles lane". This might sound easy, but try it. You will be tempted to stay with either your backhand or forehand, and in order for you to change to the other side you must do some quick footwork to come about the ball. Set a total score of 11 points and see who can "win" this game by two points. I use this to work on my weak side until I start losing and then I switch to my stronger side. Remember, hitting the line is ok, but not outside your opponents doubles lane. Take turns starting the rally, or allow the "losing" player to start all the rallies. His "serve" must be a clean hit deep to his partner to start the play. You may have the players each hit twice before "play" to get a fair start. You may lob, approach, and use spin to defeat your partner, but remember to watch the lines when he overheads or sends you a drop shot and don't volley a ball that is going out.
This drill will cause you to focus on hitting on an exact spot on the court. It is a very small target frame, but will greatly increase your accuracy.
Because two players are using one side of the tennis court in one lane, it is possible have another pair of drillees on the other side doing the same thing. Let both "matches" play out 11 points and then switch partners, winners against winners and losers together. See who becomes the "Doubles Lane Champion."

Improve your reaction time on return of serve

Volley-to-volley drills are good for improving reaction times generally, but here's a good practice to help you improve your reaction times on return of serve:
Practise returning a friend's serve, but simulate a much faster serve by getting him to serve from the service line instead of the baseline. He'll need to place the ball in front of him and use a lot of wrist snap to avoid hitting the ball long, but he should get the knack after a few attempts. As for you - you may need to adopt a neutral grip (halfway between your forehand and backhand grips), you may have to adjust your waiting position and you may have to use an abbreviated swing. Don't play the point out. Return half a dozen from the deuce court, then half a dozen from the ad court, then the two of you can change roles. After a while, you can make it competitive by counting how many of the 12 returns land in court and your friend can try and beat your score.
The abbreviated swing is achieved by placing your elbows close in to the side of your hips instead of out in front of you. That way you'll shorten the radius of your backswing, making it faster.