Discuss the differences between skill, ability and technique and explain how you would structure practices to enhance these components of fitness.

AS and A Level Physical Education (Sport & Coaching)

Gemma Rix

When discussing skill it is vital we understand the differences between skill and ability but also see how they link to create technique.

In sport we use skill as more of a concept than a word. Obviously there are skills that exist within a sport, e.g. a penalty shot in lacrosse, or sport itself is often seen to be a skill.

A definition of skill is ‘a co-ordinated act, involving complex movements brought together in a consistent and smooth manner.’ Obviously everyone has their own interpretations and ideas of what a skill is and what makes someone skilful in how they act and perform but this will be due to our own experiences and performances. A professional sportsman would have a different view from a performer who is a novice on whether something was skilful.

A perfect example for a skills practice is a penalty shot in lacrosse, as it requires the same technique each time as they will be identical with the only thing changing being the hash mark from where you would have to shoot from. As just mentioned a certain degree of technique is needed when performing this skill showing that skill and technique are closely related.

The only thing that can interfere with our shot is the goalie therefore making this

an interactive skill. This is when there are direct interactions with someone else

which could affect your execution of the skill. The one advantage you have is

the goalie has no idea where you’re going to shoot, so wont know where to react

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an interactive skill. This is when there are direct interactions with someone else

which could affect your execution of the skill. The one advantage you have is

the goalie has no idea where you’re going to shoot, so wont know where to react

to. So for your practice continually shoot into one spot over and over until every time your accuracy is perfect. Try this from different hash marks as you don’t know which one you will be awarded a penalty from. Once your technique and accuracy is perfect put a goalie in the goal and practice penalty shots against them each time shooting into that specific area. Remember to do this from different hash marks. Hopefully 9/10 shots will now be going in, so you now need to practice under game pressure situations and have defenders running and screaming at you. Continually do this until your shots and you work efficiently under this pressure.

A concept of skill is: - ‘A learned ability to bring about pre-determined results with maximum certainty, often with the minimum outlay of time or energy or both.’

Knapp 1963.

There are a number of different types of skill: cognitive, perceptual, motor and perceptual motor skills these should all try and be incorporated into your performance.

As just mentioned in the quote from Knapp skill is a learned ability, showing that in order to perform any skill, ability is required.

Ability is innate but can be developed to a certain degree through practice and experience. Specific abilities that are required to play sport include: hand –eye co-ordination, flexibility and speed, without these abilities it would not be possible to learn many skills, e.g. tennis serve.

Co-ordination is a gross motor ability and is needed in pretty much every sport especially in racket games. In tennis hand eye co-ordination is vital. The following practice will help your hand eye co-ordination, so you learn to hit the ball at the right time which means you also need to move the racket at the right time. To start with, practice just throwing the ball up to yourself and hitting the ball. When that is perfect and you can hit the ball with control get someone to bowl you an underarm ball at about waist height. Make sure you’re sideways on with your racket ready to do a ‘C’ swing. When you have got hitting the ball with accuracy back to your partner perfected, practice placing the ball. This means you will need to hit the ball at different times, finishing with your racket in different places, so you will need to learn to co-ordinate your eye to hand movements for this.

This practice is best suited for a mediocre player, someone who is nearer a novice rather than a professional.

A perfect quote for ability is ‘We all have ability. The difference is how we use it.’

Stevie Wonder

This shows that we may have to over come obstacles in order to reach our goals and we use our abilities to get us there.

Technique is a term which is often associated with skill and ability. This is because there is a strong link between the three. ‘In order to perform a particular skill in sport, we must learn the required technique. In order to learn this technique fully, we must have the necessary abilities.

SKILL = ABILITY + TECHNIQUE

You can’t have a high standard of one without the two.

A sport which requires a technique for a high level to be achieved is high jump. Every high jumper has a slightly different way of jumping. However the basics are the same for everyone when doing a frosbee flop: shoulders and head over first,

land on shoulders,

push your hips up as you go over,

flick your legs over last.

A good practice to perfect this technique is to stand next to the mats in the middle of the bar, facing away from the mats. Then practice getting the explosive force needed to push yourself over the bar and practice landing on your shoulders, pushing your hips up to give you more height and then flicking your legs over. When you do this the bar will need to be on a low height as you won’t have much momentum as you don’t have a run up. Once your landing technique is perfect, practice your run up and taking off and add your frosbee flop on to the end. When you do your run up, run in a curve and as you go over the bar push your arms up to help give you more height.

Start with the bar low and slowly higher it while you build up confidence. When you take off do so from about the middle of the mats so you don’t hit the poles and also remember to take off from one foot. Continually using explosive force will tire you out quickly so take short breaks every now and then.

This type of practice I believe from experience works best when taught as pure –part method, this way the performer will practice and perfect each part before moving on.

"Great athletes train their minds as well as their bodies. There are various mental conditioning techniques many use when preparing for an event. Perhaps the best known technique is visualization, creating a mental image not only of the desired result (the gold medal, a new world record, a hole-in-one), but also of every move that will be taken en route to the ultimate goal."

Unknown.

So in order to be good at sport you can get away with just having a bit of skill and hardly any ability but to be a star you need great skill which comes from innate ability and a fantastic learnt technique.