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Principles of Learning Motor Skills
Principles of Learning Motor Skills
“Motor learning” is a term widely used in relation of learning of new skills, and gives the
impression that motor learning is a specific form of learning. This may be seen in usual
definitions of motor learning such as “Motor learning is the process of improving the smoothness
and accuracy of movements” or “A motor skill is a skill that regards the ability of an organism to
utilize skeletal muscles effectively”.
Such definitions imply that human behavior may be divided in sensory and motor parts
the latter one being the object of motor learning. However, we may ask what really is trained in
motor learning situations. In fact, the object in the training a motor skill is not the ability to
perform specific contractions of the muscles with associated movements of the limbs, but rather
the accomplishment of certain behaviors of acts.
COGNITIVE STAGE
This stage begins when the learner is first introduced to the motor task. The performer
must determine the objective of the skill as well as the relational and environmental cues that
control and regulate the movement. The performer is more concerned with what to do than how
to do it.
ASSOCIATIVE STAGE
The learner is now concerned with performing and refining the skills. The important
stimuli have been identified and their meaning is known. Conscious decisions about what to do
become more automatic. The performer concentrates more on the task (getting better) The
performer seems less rushed.
AUTONOMOUS STAGE
GENTILE’S MODEL
Initial Stage:
Develop a movement coordination pattern for successful performance; learn to
discriminate regulatory and non-regulatory conditions
Later Stages:
Adapt movement patterns to specific demands of any performance situation
Perform skill with economy of effort
Closed skills require fixation and open skills require diversification
Presenting a Skill
Demonstration:
• Very little research
• Modeling: Use of demo to convey information about how to perform a skill,
same as observational learning
• Beneficial when the skill being learned requires the acquisition of a new
pattern of coordination
• Demonstrator needs to perform skill correctly
Verbal Cues
Subjects consistently make corrections in the proper direction only when error
information is provided. Simply saying “good job, bad job or right/wrong may be
sufficient to act as a reward or provide motivation but it is not sufficient to promote
learning. The teacher/coach must communicate what behavior was “good, correct, right”
or what behavior was “bad or wrong” along with
exactly what corrections should be implemented.
K R Knowledge of results — information received concerning the extent to which the
response accomplished the movement goal.