Describe "Fitt's and Posner's" phases of learning and explain how you would structure practices to enhance performance.
Describe “Fitt’s and Posner’s” phases of learning and explain how you would structure practices to enhance performance.
The Fitt’s and Posner’s stages of learning are a series of practices and learning exercises that will help people to learn specific skills by viewing others doing so.
‘Learning is a more or less permanent change in performance brought about by experience’ – Knapp 1973
Practice is the rehearsal of a performance in order to learn or improve a skill.
The two above definitions of learning and practice show that they are both linked. You cant learn without practice, and if you practice, you will learn. If you practice an exercise correctly, your performance should reflect this, but jumping from learning a skill, to being able to perform it expertly every time, is impossible, and this is where Fitt’s and Posner’s phases learning come in to play.
The Fitt’s and Posner’s phases of learning are split into 3 different stages, the cognitive, associative and autonomous stages. The three stages must follow each-other in sequence, so a stage must be learnt before moving onto the next one. It is possible to move up and down a stage, for example, if someone moves from the cognitive stage to the associative stage, but still cant quite perform the required skill, then they have obviously not perfectly learnt the cognitive stage, and must attempt to learn it again.
A learner will need to start off with the cognitive stage of learning. This is where a mental picture of the skill must be learned, in order to perform it. This mental image can be created by viewing the skill being performed by someone else who knows how to do it. If the learner doesn’t get the correct image into their head, the skill will be performed wrong, so it is essential that they get the right. The more complex that the skill is, the longer it should take for the learner to get the correct image in their minds of how to perform the skill.
A good practise session for cognitive learners must be well structured by the coach. A warm up should be performed to start things off, and get the muscles in working order. A simple skill to pick up for a learner would be the side-foot pass in football. The learner must view the coach performing the pass, and the coach should talk through the actions so that the mental image of the skill is imprinted in the learners mind. Once the learner thinks that they have the correct mental picture, they must practice the skill with a partner, or with the coach, who will give feedback as to where the learner is going right or wrong. Once this phase has been mastered, it would be time to move on to the next phase.