By Eleanor Tresidder in 2022.
Psychomotor learning, put simply is the relationship between the brain and the body, or how neurological pathways are developed when learning a new physical task. As teachers of this new task it is helpful for us to understand the process our students are going through, recognise where they are at and in turn understand how we can be most effective in the students’ development process. There are three main stages in learning a new task which, can be easily identified. As instructors we see these stages in most of our students while they are moving through the beginner snowboarder process.
Initially, our students are plunged into the Cognitive or ‘Thinking’ phase of learning. This is characterised by jerky movements that the learner tries to control. For example you get them up to do their first side slip, at this stage your student is thinking to the max, fear is possibly involved here too, and they have a death grip on you. At this point they have dedicated all their concentration (hopefully) to processing the information you have given them; Working hard to convert verbal and visual information into their own appropriate movement.
As we know, sudden or choppy movements in this activity tend to have detrimental outcomes. Unfortunately for us, this is exactly what our learners will do in the early stages of learning any movement. We can help by simply communicating the gentleness of the required movement before reminding them of the actual movement “gently/slowly/gradually lower your toes” reinforcing how to implement the action that will make them most successful. As well as being there to offer hands on help where possible.
As the learner becomes more familiar with the task, their side slip performance becomes less jerky and more successful. These characteristics are part of The Associative or ‘Feeling’ phase of learning. Your student still needs to think about the appropriate reaction, but this happens more quickly in this phase because the links from the brain to the appropriate movement of the appropriate limb are becoming stronger. Our learners in this phase are feeling how the edge grips and how tilt affects the speed of their movement, rather than thinking overtime about how to move their toes. As your student moves through the Associative stage, they are likely to become more independent, their side slip will be looking smoother and they will able to manage most of the skill on their own.
The Autonomous or ‘Physical’ stage of learning is characterised by performances that have become consistent, and finely tuned. As instructors of side slips we have (hopefully) reached The Autonomous stage in this skill. Our side slip motor programme is so well established we don’t need to think about it, it happens autonomously. Getting this far into The Autonomous stage in any skill takes a significant amount of practice, and our learners don’t need to be able to side slip and sing the alphabet backwards all at once! Seeing our student side slipping in control and managing the trickier elements such as adjusting for steepness, or change in fall line is when we can assume they have reached the autonomous stage. This is when we introduce the next step, new information or movements that will build on this skill. In this case twist, and their ability to change direction while still using the side slip. This temporarily takes our student back into the Thinking phase of their process where they have to concentrate on the independent movement of their lower body to manage the new complexities presented to them. And so the cycle continues, and so, our learners progress.
To give an analogy, in the Thinking stage, new paths are being formed between brain and body, like finding your way through a forest towards an end point. In the Feeling phase we know the trail, and can start to take in the scenery while moving down it. Autonomy of a movement is when the path is so well worn that we can wander along it while completely immersed in conversation or a book or any other distraction because we know it extremely well.
There may be a number of different reasons for giving your students ‘the next challenge’ but recognising which stage they are at and how well they have developed those motor programmes will give you an excellent ability to advance them at the best possible time to keep them safe, having fun, and stoked on their achievements.