Within any coaching session, the teacher/coach will facilitate learning through providing appropriate guidance, the correct practices and worthwhile feedback to the participant. The actual methods of guidance, practice and feedback will vary depending on the participants’ stages of learning or the types of skills and activities being taught. For example, somebody in the cognitive stage of learning will receive different guidance, practice and feedback from someone in the autonomous stage.
Guidance refers to any information we give learners to help them develop their skills. The type of guidance used is affected by several factors:
There are 3 basic forms of guidance that a teacher/coach may use to transmit information:
A netball player has just carried out fitness tests on speed, agility, cardiovascular fitness, flexibility and leg power. She has discovered that her leg power through carrying out the vertical jump is below the team average. She now needs to specifically develop this component of fitness.
| Types of Guideance | Advantages | Disadvantages |
|---|---|---|
| Visual | Learner can see accurate performance. Demonstrations can be repeated. With video ‘slow motion’, can help individual learn skill accurately. Useful in all stages of learning. Helps to form a mental image of correct performance. | Problems if no accurate image available. |
| Verbal | Effective questioning by coaches/teachers can enhance learning and understanding. Effectively combined with visual guidance to paint a more accurate picture for learner. It is immediate. | Some verbal instructions are too long and complicated – beginners often have short attention spans (limited capacity to process information). Some movements cannot be accurately explained. |
| Manual/Mechanical | In potentially hazardous activities it can be used to prevent learner making inaccurate movements. In dangerous situations it can help a performer deal with fear by providing a safe environment. Helps individual to develop kinaesthetic awareness (the feel) of the motion. Useful in early stages of learning when teacher/coach can position limbs/body parts of learner, e.g. correct hand position on ball when shooting in netball. | Should not be overused as performers can become dependent on support. Can give learners an unrealistic ‘feeling’ of the motion, e.g. they do not take their full body weight and can therefore experience failure on removal of manual/mechanical guidance. |
| Types of Guideance | Advantages |
|---|---|
| Visual | Very effective in cognitive stage of learning but useful in all stages. When using video in associative and autonomous stages, demonstrations can be slowed down to highlight points of detail, e.g. looking at the different phases of a gymnastics vault. |
| Verbal | Explanations should be brief and to the point, especially during cognitive stage of learning due to limited capacity to process information. It is more useful in later stages of learning when attention capacity is greater. |
| Manual/Mechanical | Very useful in cognitive stage of learning, in helping learner to experience the ‘feel’ of the movement. Gymnastics uses a lot of manual guidance when learning more difficult moves, e.g. supporting a gymnast learning to perform a flic-flac. In some activities, manual/mechanical guidance is used by more experienced performers because of safety issues, e.g. rock-climbing. |
1. How might the methods of guidance provided by a teacher or coach vary when an individual is at:
Methods of guidance
Features of cognitive phase guidance: max 3 marks
Must be specific, just stating visual/verbal is not sufficient.
Features of autonomous phase guidance: max 3 marks
(2 x 2 marks)
As stated previously, the types of practice used in a training session will be linked to the stage of learning the performer is at. Furthermore, the type of practice provided would also be associated with the type of skill that is being covered within the session. In order to use the most effective type of practice the classifications of skills must also be taken into consideration. For instance, for a netball match, variable practices must be used to simulate the open nature of the game. Only doing closed repetitive drills or practices with no opposition will not prepare the participants for the game.
To optimise learning, teachers and coaches must create the best possible practice conditions. The following factors should be taken into consideration:
The decision of whether to use fixed or variable practice depends on the nature of the activity being practised. When the activity contains a lot of open skills and interaction between performers, practice should be varied so that performers can come into contact with a range of different experiences that relate directly to performance in the full activity. This is because relevant experiences are stored in the long-term memory and the motor programmes can be drawn on in future situations. The learner practises the same task in a number of different ways. With closed skills it is important that practice conditions closely resemble the actual performance situation. Closed skills are predominantly pre-learned. Therefore fixed practice is preferable. Fixed practice can also be used to improve open skills.
The structure of a practice session is important when considering the most effective way of teaching skills. In massed practice, the skill to be mastered is repeated over an extended period of time, e.g. two players in rugby kicking the ball back and forth continuously for 30 minutes. In distributed practice, the skill to be mastered is interspersed with other training or rest. The ‘rest’ intervals could involve activities unrelated to the main practice activity or could involve use of mental rehearsal.
In the whole method, a skill is taught without breaking it down into parts or sub-routines. Generally, it is best to learn a skill using this method as the learner experiences the true ‘feel’ of the movement. The part method is often used when the skill is low in organisation and can be split up into sub-routines. Each part is practised separately and the parts then joined together. It is also useful for learning complex skills as it allows a learner to achieve initial success before moving on to the more complex movements. There are many combinations of whole and part learning:
Whole - part- whole – where first the whole skill is attempted, then if there are errors, those parts of the skill containing errors are practised in isolation before attempting the whole skill again. A swimming teacher might ask a student to demonstrate the whole stroke, they might identify weaknesses in the arm action, which would be practised in isolation, then they put it all back together in the whole stroke.
Progressive part method – where the parts are progressively built upon until the whole skill is performed, i.e. learn part 1, learn part 2, perform parts 1 and 2 together, learn part 3, then perform parts 1, 2 and 3 together etc. This method is often used when learning a dance routine.
In mental practice, the athletes visualise themselves performing a skill. There is no actual physical movement involved. Research has shown that mental practice can result in improved performance; unfortunately it cannot replace physical practice! It is generally believed that a combination of mental and physical practice is most useful to sports performers, but that physical practice is the more important. There are many explanations as to how it works:
| Type of practice | When to use | Advantages/Disadvantages |
|---|---|---|
| Fixed | When learning closed skills. Promotes overlearning. | + Repetitive practice allows moments to be grooved, e.g basketball set shot. - It does not always prepare performers for when things go wrong. |
| Variable | When learning open skills, i.e. when there is a lot of interaction and decision making involved in the competitive performance. Allow learners to practise in situations more realistic to their sporting activity. | + Allows learners to practice in situations more realistic to their sporting activity. - Can be difficult to simulate appropriate competitive situations. |
| Massed | Useful when learning simple skills. When practice is needed to simulate performing in ‘fatigued’ situation that would be experienced in competition. When available practice time is short. When performers are experienced, fit and highly motivated. | + Good for ‘grooving’ skills. + Good for learning discrete skills of short duration.? - Can lead to fatigue and boredom. |
| Distributed | When learning a new or complex skill. When there is a danger of injury if performer is fatigued. When performers have short attention spans, e.g. in the early stages of learning. When performers have low motivation. | + Good for learning most skills. + Gives time to recover physically and mentally. + Good for potentially dangerous situations. |
| Whole | When the skill is continuous and cannot be broken down into sub-routines. When the skill is low in organisation. When learning serial and complex skills. | + Performer gets to know the ‘feel’ and timing of the whole movement. + Learning can be quicker. - Unsuitable for complex skills. |
| Part | When the skill is low in organisation. When learning serial and complex skills. | + Provides early success. + Safer. + Allows teacher/coach to focus on particular parts of the skill. Some - Performers experience difficulty in putting parts back together. - Continuity of skill is lost. - Reduces kinaesthetic awareness. |
| Mental | Can be used in potentially dangerous situations as a safe way of practising. To improve confidence of performers. Can be used during a warm-up to aid focus and decrease anxiety. | + Improves confidence of performer. - Is not as effective as physical practice when used on its own. |
Don’t forget to make the connection between the different types of practice and the type of skill being developed, e.g. closed skills are best developed using fixed practice.