Motor Learning and Control Introduction

Week 1: Introduction to Motor Learning and Control and Classification of Skills

• Effective learning design needs a plan based on understanding the learning process, current situation, and available strategies.
• Motor learning studies the processes and factors influencing skill acquisition.
• Motor control focuses on neural, physical, and behavioral aspects of movement.
• Learning is a permanent change in skill execution, while performance is executing a skill.
• Motor skills are classified:
  • Gross vs. fine motor skills based on movement precision.
  • Discrete, serial, or continuous based on movement organization.
  • Open vs. closed skills based on environment predictability.
  • Multidimensional classification based on skill context and requirements.
• Individual differences affect learning effectiveness.
• Abilities and potential for skill are genetically determined.

Stages of Learning

• Fitts and Posner's stages of learning:
  • Cognitive: Basic movement pattern development.
  • Associative: Movement pattern refinement.
  • Autonomous: Virtually automatic skill performance.
• Gentile's two-stage model emphasizes the goal and the influence of task and environmental characteristics on the movement.
  • Stage 1: Understanding the movement goal.
  • Stage 2: Fixation (closed skill)/diversification (open skill)

Week 2: Information Processing and Reaction Time

• Perception (stimulus identification) is attaching meaning to sensory information.
• Response selection involves deciding what action to take.
• Response programming retrieves and executes the necessary motor plan.
• Reaction time is the delay between stimulus and response initiation.
• Factors influencing reaction time include processing demands, response choices, anticipation, psychological refractory period, and compatibility.
• Practitioners need to distinguish between slow movement initiation and the need to slow down movement.

Week 3: Skill Presentation: Instructions and Demonstration

• Hands-on vs. hands-off instruction approaches
• Hands-on: Verbal instructions, demonstrations, feedback.
• Hands-off: Focuses on movement exploration.
• Instructional considerations:
  • Keep explanations simple and concise.
  • Use appropriate terminology.
  • Focus learners' attention on critical skill elements.
  • Consider previous experiences and learning styles.
• Verbally guide learners' attention for superior learning.
• Demonstrations should consider content, model characteristics, organization, and frequency.
• Performing the entire skill demonstrates the movement pattern.
• Learners benefit from visualizations focusing on coordination.
• Visual aids for demonstration are useful for optimal viewing angle.
• Adapt demonstration to learners' understanding of the skill complexity.
• Manual assistance is permitted for safety and to convey skill requirements.

Week 4: Practice Schedules

• Constant practice on a new skill is initial.
• Variable practice, varying the task execution, is better for more complex tasks or skills.
• Open vs. closed skills:
  • Open skills benefit from inter-trial variability (varying non-regulatory conditions).
  • Closed skills benefit from constant regulatory conditions.
• Increasing contextual interference (switching between tasks) improves learning.
• Blocked practice (repeating one skill) is for initial learning.
• Random practice is useful when learners have proficiency.
• Shorter, frequent practice sessions improve learning.
• Distributed practice, shorter sessions more frequently, is best for novel and complex skills.

Week 5: Wearables in Sport

• Wearable technology collects data like heart rate, location, and movement patterns.
• This data aids in performance analysis and identifying strengths/weaknesses.
• Wearables support personalized training strategies.

Week 7: Real-Time Feedback and Performance Analysis

• Real-Time Feedback provides immediate feedback.
• Existing technology in sport assists by providing specific data relating to performance.
• Wearables provide various data types, including auditory, visual, and tactile cues.
• Real-time feedback corrects errors.
• Personalized Training: Tailored feedback to individual needs and performance.

Week 8: Motor Programs

• The original notion of motor programs had inherent problems in that it viewed skills as pre-set movements.
• The generalized motor program resolved these issues by representing a class of actions, which can be modified.
• The dynamic system theory emphasizes the interaction between the learner, task, and environment.

Week 9: Constraints-Led Coaching – Dynamical Systems Theory

• Dynamic System Theory: Movement emerges from the interaction between the learner, task, and environment.
• Three constraint categories: Organismic, environmental, task.
• Constraints-led approach: Learners search for optimal movement in response to these constraints.
• Practitioners identify and manipulate key constraints to guide learning.
• This approach focuses on movement as a product and highlights the interaction of the learner and their environment.