Chapter 10

Question 1

What types of behaviors are likely to be displayed by individuals referred to as “coachable” athletes?

Answer 1

1. Listening attentively
2. Picking up after practice
3. coming when the whistle is blown
4. practicing on their own

Question 2

In a sentence, what does the Long-Term Athletic Development Model (LTAD) include?

Answer 2

seven stages of child to adult development and corresponding guidelines for helping individuals to enjoy participation in sports and to learn to perform their best

Question 3

Briefly state two preliminary considerations for teaching sport skills

Answer 3

1. Determine and be sensitive to the developmental level of the beginners
2. begin at the athletes level

Question 4

List three preliminary steps for teaching sport skills.

Answer 4

1. Prepare task analyses of complex skills to be taught
2. Prepare checklists to assess current performance and monitor progress
3. set mastery criteria

Question 5

Define task analysis.

Answer 5

1. breaking skills into component parts
   
   1. Cornering
      
      1. Find and choose line
      2. point head and shoulders towards said line
      3. adjust pedals to avoid striking
      4. lean into the corner
      5. turn bars
      6. corner
      7. exit corner

Question 6

Define mastery criterion for a sport skill.

Answer 6

1. a requirement for practicing a skill such that when the requirement has been met, there is a good chance the skill has been learned
2. Basketball player must make 8 out of 10 successful free throws for three consecutive practices. Once the player meets this criterion, they have demonstrated mastery of the free-throw shooting skill under practice conditions.

Question 7

Briefly list four guidelines for instructing beginning athletes about skills to be mastered

Answer 7

1. Combine modeling with instructions
2. Describe consequences of correct and incorrect performance
3. Ask questions to test for understanding
4. Ask athletes to role-play skills

Question 8

Briefly describe two strategies for ensuring that beginning athletes understand what it is that the coach wants them to do.

Answer 8

1. combine modeling with instructions - while modeling the skill, the coach should describe in great detail, specific movements and subtleties the beginner might otherwise overlook
2. Describe consequences of correct and incorrect performance - give the reason for doing such a play in a game ie. trap a player with the ball. what benefits should be coming from certain drills.

Question 9

Distinguish between programmed reinforcers and natural reinforcers.

Answer 9

1. programmed reinforcers - reinforcers that are deliberately manipulated
2. natural reinforcers - unprogrammed reinforcers that occur in the normal course of everyday living

Question 10

Describe two types of natural reinforcers. Give an example of each.

Answer 10

1. sensory feedback inherent in the performance of a task - the satisfaction/feeling of getting a good corner
2. “natural” (unplanned) reaction of others - people congratulating you after winning

Question 11

What are two reasons for encouraging coaches to capitalize on natural reinforcers?

Answer 11

1. the more the beginner experiences the natural reinforcers, the more likely they are to practice on their own
2. important for programming generalization of a skill from practices to competitions

Question 12

Briefly list eight guidelines for using deliberately-programmed reinforcers to teach new skills to beginning athletes.

Answer 12

1. Frequently reinforce athletes desirable behaviors
2. make sure reinforcers are reinforcers from the athletes POV
3. Use contingent versus noncontingent reinforcement
4. Use prescriptive praise
5. use shaping to reinforce correct approximation of a new skill
6. use chaining to reinforce a consistent sequence of stimuli and responses
7. reinforce desirable performance when it occurs to correct cues in the environment
8. after a behavior has been well developed, wean the athlete from the initial schedule of reinforcers

Question 13

What is a recommended guideline for the reinforcers-to-reprimand ratio to be used with beginning athletes?

Answer 13

4-1 = should favor 4 or more positive for every 1 negative

Question 14

Distinguish between contingent and noncontingent reinforcers.

Answer 14

1. contingent - when the reinforcer is dependent on a behavior
   
   1. properly doing all 10 minutes of the efforts means we get a break after, if its not done well enough, there will be no break/playtime
2. noncontingent - when a reinforcer is presented at a random time indifferent of behavior
   
   1. you’ll get a break whether you try hard during the effort or not

Question 15

Distinguish between prescriptive praise and regular or nonprescriptive praise

Answer 15

1. prescriptive praise - the coach identifies the aspect of the athletes performance that was desirable or indicated improvement
   
   1. Nice job keeping your eyes on the ball
2. Regular - positive comment
   
   1. Good job
   2. Nice work

Question 16

Define “shaping”

Answer 16

reinforcement of successive behaviors from the initial to the final desired behavior

Question 17

what is shaping used for and what is chaining used for?

Answer 17

1. shaping is good to modify the form, topography, frequency, duration, latency, and quality of a behavior
2. Chaining used to teach a specific series of steps that are linked together

Question 18

Define stimulus control

Answer 18

1. term that refers to the degree of correlation between a stimulus and a behavior (good = strong corr. between the occ. of stimulus and occ. of response)
2. The tennis player throwing the ball up and the behavior of hitting it once it starts coming back down.

Question 19

State four reasons why a coach should continue to dispense deliberately- programmed reinforcers to beginning athletes, even after their athletic skills appear to have come under the control of natural reinforcers.

Answer 19

1. reinforcement from the coach during practices can help sustain the effort and performance during repetitive practices
2. competitive situations may contain punishers (parents yelling at), coaches continuing to give positive reinforcement can help maintain the skills needed
3. there is always something to improve, the coach should provide reinforcers for slight improvements to encourage individual players to continually improve and refine their skills to a higher level
4. intermittent schedules of reinforcement influence individuals to work consistently, occasional deliberately-programmed reinforcers from the coach will have that effect.

Question 20

List the six characteristics of effective behavioral coaching

Answer 20

1. emphasizes specific measurements of athlete performance, and also the use of these measures as the primary means for evaluating the effectiveness of teaching strategies
2. recognizes a clear distinction between developing and maintaining behavior, and positive behavioral procedures are available for accomplishing both
3. help athletes improve against their own previous performances
4. use behavior modification procedures that have been experimentally demonstrated to be effective
5. the behavior modification techniques can also be used to change the coaches behavior
6. use social validity assessments to ensure that the athletes, parents, and others involved in the program are satisfied with the target behaviors that were identified, the coaching procedures that were used, and the results that were obtained.