Guidance, Feedback, Memory and Information Processing
Explain how performers perceive, decide, remember and refine movement using guidance and feedback.
How to study A-level Physical Education theory
Learn the mechanism, apply it to a precise sporting context, use quantitative or source evidence where relevant and reach a supported judgement.
Core concepts
Concept 1
Verbal, visual, manual and mechanical guidance differ in information channel, support and risk of dependence.
Exam cue: Choose guidance and feedback from stage, task, safety and information needs.
Concept 2
Intrinsic and extrinsic feedback may provide knowledge of results or performance and can be positive, negative, concurrent or delayed.
Exam cue: Separate what the outcome was from how the movement was produced.
Concept 3
Information-processing and memory models connect input, selective attention, decision making, output, feedback and schema formation.
Exam cue: Use Hick's law, reaction time, anticipation or schema to explain a decision-performance effect.
Targeted study blocks
Knowledge for written assessment
Secure the shared theoretical core
Secure guidance and feedback types, memory and information-processing models, reaction and response time, anticipation, selective attention and schema.
Apply and evaluate
Turn knowledge into a supported sporting judgement
Analyse an information bottleneck or learning error and justify a feedback or guidance intervention without turning it into a practical drill.
Risk pitfalls and guardrails
Treating negative feedback as necessarily harmful criticism.
Guardrail: Do not replace theoretical explanation with an activity-specific technique description or practical-performance instruction.
Giving more information than working memory can process.
Guardrail: Do not replace theoretical explanation with an activity-specific technique description or practical-performance instruction.
Confusing reaction time with movement time or total response time.
Guardrail: Do not replace theoretical explanation with an activity-specific technique description or practical-performance instruction.
Memory anchors
Knowledge of results
Knowledge of results reports the outcome achieved.
Knowledge of performance
Knowledge of performance reports movement quality or process.
Selective attention
Selective attention filters relevant cues from competing information.
Hick's law
Choice reaction time tends to rise as the number of stimulus-response alternatives increases.
Schema
A schema is a generalised rule updated from movement conditions, response and outcome information.
Checkpoint rule
Do the check-up only after you can summarize each concept in one sentence and identify one dangerous pitfall from memory.
Knowledge Check (after reading)
Short check-up to confirm understanding of this module.
Check-up Questions
Which guidance method gives a learner a visual model of the required movement?
Why should a demonstration be accurate and viewed from an appropriate angle?
Answer all questions to submit.
Next step personalized recommendations
Continue learning
Move forward only after this module is stable.
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