Helping Learners

1. Helping Learners Improve their Cognitive Understanding. 2. Help Learners Improve their Physical and Motor Fitness. 3. Help Learners Improve their Psychological and Social Skills.

Helping Learners Improve their Cognitive Understanding Your cognitive understanding of a movement situation contributes to your skillfulness because it can help you perceive more accurately what is going on, as well as help you formulate your intentions and design a plan of action.

Helping Learners Improve their Cognitive Understanding The following activities could contribute to the expansion of a learner’s cognitive understanding of a sport, dance or exercise form: Practice observing other people participating in the sport, both at the elite level and at the level of the learners.  Observation should have a specific focus, such as watching the footwork or the defensive positioning of one of the players. Keep a diary of personal thoughts about participation. Read books and watch instructional videos about the sport. Play computer games that simulate participation in the sport.

Help Learners Improve their Physical and Motor Fitness. Fitness is important in the learning and performance of skills. For example, if you do not have sufficient muscle strength, you may not have the physical capability to even try a certain skill, much less learn it. If you do not have sufficient endurance, you may not be able to practice a skill long enough to learn how to do it. Fitness refers to underlying physical/functional capabilities of your body. They are referred to as “underlying” capabilities because each fitness variable helps support the performance of a wide variety of movements.

Help Learners Improve their Physical and Motor Fitness. The following list of physical and motor fitness variables indicate specific capabilities that are needed for safe and productive participation in physical activities. Physical Fitness: Strength – the amount of effort/force that can be generated with one maximum effort. Muscular endurance – the ability of the muscles to continue to perform an action over an extended period of time. Aerobic endurance – the ability to sustain vigorous physical activity over an extended period of time. Flexibility – the range of motion of various joints in the body.

Help Learners Improve their Physical and Motor Fitness. Motor Fitness: Speed – how quickly an action can be completed. Agility – the ability to move quickly while making multiple changes in direction. Power – the ability to use muscle strength in an explosive movement that requires coordination. Balance – the ability to maintain equilibrium in both static and dynamic situations.

15/10/2012

Help Learners Improve their Psychological and Social Skills: Sport psychology provides a full exploration of the influence of various psychological and social variables of skill learning and motor performance.

Help Learners Improve their Psychological and Social Skills: a) Develop Learners’ Self-confidence The following specific coaching guidelines have been found to be particularly effective in promoting performer self-confidence in sport settings. 1. Accept responsibility as a “role model” for players.  You should set the example for the attitudes and behaviors you want them to learn. 2. Provide optimal challenges for learners,  This means that the activities included in the practice session are sufficiently difficult to encourage them to strive and improve, but not so difficult that they continuously fail or experience feeling of incompetence.

Help Learners Improve their Psychological and Social Skills: 3. Recognizing effort and hard work.  View mistakes as a natural and useful part of the learning process.  Do not over-react to initial difficulties in performance.  This will encourage learners to keep trying, even if they have some difficulties in learning a skill. 4. Enforce players’ adherence to a code of good sportsmanship. 5. Coach for mastery of skills rather than for results (winning).  Promote player enjoyment of participation by controlling excessive pressure to succeed and reducing players’ anxiety.

Help Learners Improve their Psychological and Social Skills: b) Teach Learners to Use Goal Setting The motivation of performing can be enhanced if they learn to define success in term of reaching or exceeding their own personal goals for performance, rather than surpassing the performances of others.

Help Learners Improve their Psychological and Social Skills: Performers can gain control over their own learning if they learn to set personal goals. 1. Set realistic goals that are challenging and will encourage striving, but are not so difficult that failure is inevitable.  This complements the setting of “optimal challenges”. 2. Evaluate progress toward personal goals regularly.

Help Learners Improve their Psychological and Social Skills: Goal setting is compatible with following step-by-step progressions in learning. Goal setting helps the learner feel more in control and responsible for his/her own learning. This sense of involvement and responsibility helps promote a positive learning environment.

Help Learners Improve their Psychological and Social Skills: c) Use Reward and Punishment Carefully to Motivate Learners When using a “reward” as a way to provide learners with motivational feedback, the following guidelines are suggested.

Help Learners Improve their Psychological and Social Skills: Notice that rewards are not usually material rewards, but rather are compliments or public recognition: 1. Reward the quality of the performance, e.g. the skillfulness, not the outcome of performance, e.g. winning. 2. Reward performance for their effort, even if they are not successful. 3. Reward small achievements on the way to the larger goal. 4. Reward the learning of emotions and social skills, not just motor skills. 5. Reward beginners frequently, and reward less as participants gain experience and can evaluate their own performance. 6. Reward as soon as possible after the correct performance (avoid delay if possible).

Help Learners Improve their Psychological and Social Skills: When using “punishment” as feedback, the following guidelines are suggested (never use physical abuse, but rather rules): 1. Have the learners assist in the development of rules and penalties for breaking the rules. 2. Once you are sure that the learners understand that penalties will be involved if certain rules are broken, give one warning (and only one warning) before administering the penalty for breaking that rule. 3. Impose penalties in an impersonal way, directed at the behavior, not the person.  Punishment is not intended to embarrass the learner. 4. Be consistent in administering penalties.  Every learner should feel the same standard is applied to all other learners. 5. Never penalize a performer for making errors in skill performance. 6. Avoid using physical activity, e.g. push-ups or running laps, as a means for punishment.  It can easily be interpreted as physical abuse.