Practice Conditions and Learning

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Practice Conditions and Learning

• KIN 340

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Physical Rehearsal Techniques

• Three types
• Simulator Practice
• Part Practice
• Slow-motion practice
• Error Detection Practice

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Part Practice

• Used to reduce the complexity of complex skills
• Fractionization
• Segmentation
• Simplification

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Activity

• Each student write the definitions of
  fractionization, segmentation, and simplification
• With the person next to you, compare your answers
• Pick a skill (sport or other). Discuss how you
  would use each approach to teach the skill.

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When does Part Practice work best?

• For serial tasks, where the actions (or errors)
  involved in one part do not influence the actions
  involved in the next
• Example
• Exceptions?
• High relationship between tasks-must make
  adjustments

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Organizing Practice Sessions

• Two possible practice sequences
• 1. Blocked practice
• 2. Random practice
• Commonality - same amount of practice time

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Possible Practice Sequences

• Blocked practice
• Practice one skill for whole practice session
• Random practice
• Equal amount of time devoted to each variation
  randomly presented for practice during each
  practice period

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Class Exercise Organizing / Varying The
Practice Session
Badminton Serve 3 skill variations Long Serve
(L) Short Serve (S) Driven Serve (D) 6 days to
practice 30 minute practice sessions following
warm-up and allowing time for cool-down
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Class ExerciseVarying The Practice Session
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Class ExerciseVarying The Practice Session
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Possible Practice Variations

• Which practice arrangement is best?
• Random better than blocked
• Why do we experience greater performance using
  random conditions? Discuss possible reasons with
  your group.

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Reasons for Greater Performance Using Random
Practice

• Contextual interference effect (CIE) (Battig,
  1979)
• Counterintuitive phenomena of human learning
  where poorer initial performance in practice
  leads to better learning
• explanation for learning during initial
  (cognitive) stage
• Why is this an important concept to communicate
  to learners?

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Reasons for Greater Performance Using Random
Practice

• Contextual interference effect conditions
• Low learner practices only one skill during a
  practice session (blocked practice)
• High learner practices several different but
  related skills during the same practice session
  (random and serial practice)
• High CIE leads to better skill acquisition and
  performance, higher retention and transfer
  performance

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Reasons for Greater Performance Using Random and
Serial Practice

• Reasons for high contextual interference effect
  on initial learning
• Increased cognitions required during practice
• Increased strategy required
• Explanations for high contextual interference
  effect on initial learning. With your group
  discuss the two reasons offered.

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Reasons for Greater Performance Using Random and
Serial Practice

• Explanations for high contextual interference
  effect on initial learning
• Elaboration View learner engages in more
  strategies in working memory and can
  compare/contrast variations so that each becomes
  distinct relationships between tasks
• Action Plan Reconstruction View learner is
  engaged in more active processing during practice

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Two Views of the Role of Errors in Learning

• Errors should be kept to a minimum so that the
  correct response can be experienced as often as
  possible
• Errors made during practice are beneficial for
  the learner, and although increasing errors
  during practice may lead to decreased practice
  performance, there will be a long-term benefit in
  retention and problem-solving techniques.

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Which View Do You Support?

• With another student discuss your view and why
  you feel it is correct.
• Now considering each others view design a
  practice using random practice conditions and
  discuss how you would handle errors to learning.
  Some of you may need to compromise.

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Activity

• In your group, complete question 2 on page 252.
• Share your responses

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Variable Practice

• Overview
• A variety of practice experiences is essential
  for learning both closed and open skills.
• Practice conditions should consider the
  characteristics of the test situation.

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Variable Practice

• Overview
• Relevant vs. non-relevant stimuli
• Relevant stimuli - movement related information
  that must be attended to or taken into account if
  the goal of the movement is to be achieved.
• Non-relevant stimuli - all other unrelated
  environmental stimuli

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Variable Practice andClosed Skills

• Characteristics of test conditions for closed
  skills
• Relevant stimuli are stable and relatively
  predictable
• Non-relevant stimuli are likely to be novel

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Variable Practice andOpen Skills

• Characteristics of test conditions for open
  skills
• Relevant stimuli are novel or variable -
  movements are seldom exactly the same
• Game situation variable
• Non-relevant stimuli vary

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Structuring Practice Sessions

• Form groups of 3-4 students and discuss the
  following
• How would you structure practice sessions for
  closed skills? Example?
• How would you structure practice sessions for
  open skills? Example?
• Elect one to write responses on board

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Structuring Practice Sessions

• How would you structure practice sessions for
  closed skills?
• Practice under same conditions as in test
  situations
• Relevant stimuli held constant while non-relevant
  stimuli should be varied
• Example

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Structuring Practice Sessions

• How would you structure practice sessions for
  open skills?
• Vary relevant stimuli in both practice conditions
  and test situation
• Vary non-relevant stimuli
• Example

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Overlearning or Overtraining

• Overlearning
• The practice time spent beyond the amount of
  practice time needed to achieve a certain
  performance criterion
• Intent of extra practice is to help develop a
  durable and accessible memory representation
• Some evidence that overlearning can lead to poor
  test performance

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Implementing the Overlearning Practice Strategy

• Know how much practice is needed to reach a
  criterion level or goal
• Add approximately 100 additional trials (safe
  bet rule)
• Useful strategy for skills that will be practiced
  and then not used for a while (e.g., fake punt or
  relief pitcher batting)

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Massed and Distributed Practice

• Massed practice
• The amount of rest between trials is either very
  short or none at all
• Practice is relatively continuous
• Distributed practice
• Amount of rest between trials and groups of
  trials is relatively large (practice, rest,
  practice)

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Massed vs. Distributed Practice for Learning

• Learning continuous skills - distributed practice
  better
• Learning discrete skills - massed practice better
• Reason massed practice not as good when learning
  a continuous skill - fatigue effects

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How Should We Teach Motor Skills?

• Beware of too long practice sessions
• Boredom
• Fatigue
• More frequent breaks better than fewer
• Time saved by massing may decrease performance
• What people prefer may not be best