Thomas Hawkins

The development of motor competence is critical for a child’s holistic development and engagement in physical activity across the lifespan. As physical education becomes more marginalised in school settings, efforts are needed to enhance the quality of movement skill learning environments. One such approach is through the optimisation of task design, instruction and feedback which engages learners in key attentional (external focus of attention) and motivational (enhanced expectancies and autonomy support) processes. This paper aims to provide practical examples of how these key attentional and motivational factors can be applied by teachers in physical education lessons to optimise the learning of motor skills and motivation to create a physically literate learner.

The development of motor competence is critical for a child’s holistic development and engagement in physical activity across the lifespan. As physical education becomes more marginalised in school settings, efforts are needed to enhance the quality of movement skill learning environments. One such approach is through the optimisation of task design, instruction and feedback which engages learners in key attentional (external focus of attention) and motivational (enhanced expectancies and autonomy support) processes. This paper aims to provide practical examples of how these key attentional and motivational factors can be applied by teachers in physical education lessons to optimise the learning of motor skills and motivation to create a physically literate learner.

The development of motor competence is critical for a child’s holistic development and engagement in physical activity across the lifespan. As physical education becomes more marginalised in school settings, efforts are needed to enhance the quality of movement skill learning environments. One such approach is through the optimisation of task design, instruction and feedback which engages learners in key attentional (external focus of attention) and motivational (enhanced expectancies and autonomy support) processes. This paper aims to provide practical examples of how these key attentional and motivational factors can be applied by teachers in physical education lessons to optimise the learning of motor skills and motivation to create a physically literate learner.

In an insightful interview, esteemed golf coach Jim Christine talks directly about his use of a “clock analogy” - a metaphorical clockface on the ground representing horizontal launch angle with 12 o’clock as the line to the target - “to get over that idea of the starting direction of the ball, and therefore the line of the path of the swing” (p. 11). He provides the example of asking players to “to keep the ball within one o’clock on the clubface” (p. 11) and, in discussing the application of the coaching method, references the control and shape of ball flight, environmental constraints (trees and out-of-bounds) and wanting players “to think about swinging the club in the right direction” (p. 16). Jim Christine’s application of the clock analogy coaching tool, and his description of it, draws attention to the effect of the player’s movement (club, clubface, ball flight) rather than the internal mechanics of the swing itself. Directing attention in this way has empirical and theoretical backing. Attempts to experimentally manipulate attention through instruction and verbal feedback to the effects of the movement (external focus of attention) rather than to the movement itself (internal focus of attention) have generally led to superior performance outcomes.1 The benefits of an external focus are explained by the constrained action hypothesis.2 In the context of the golf swing, the constrained action hypothesis suggests that directing attention internally to the mechanics of the movement is likely to cause players to attempt to consciously control parts of their golf swing. This can have a constraining effect on how the movement is organised, and ultimately, the effectiveness and/or consistency of the outcome. Alternatively, directing attention externally to the effect of the swing “allows the motor system to self-organise more naturally” (Wulf et al.,2 p. 1144) and benefits performance. The purpose of this commentary is to provide support for Jim Christine’s clock analogy coaching tool by presenting empirical research, pertinent to golf, on the relationship between external focus of attention instruction and performance, with specific emphasis on research that has considered the underpinning concept of self-organisation.

The relationship between focus of attention instructions and motor performance is a topic of significant research interest. It is widely accepted that attending to the mechanics of the movement when performing a motor task (internal focus) yields poorer performance and less effective movement organisation than attending to the movement outcome (external focus). Specifically, an external focus is suspected to promote more flexibility in the motor system, inducing more effective muscular activity and movement kinematics, which are mechanisms directly responsible for organisation of the resulting movements. However, no review has systematically assessed the influence focus of attention instructions have on muscular activity and movement kinematics. The purpose of this systematic review was to examine evidence on the effect that focus of attention instructions have on the underpinning mechanisms of movement organisation. Adhering to the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis (PRISMA) guidelines, a comprehensive electronic literature search yielded 36 research studies. Using a narrative methodological approach, the findings were thematically analysed and synthesised. Generally, external focus of attention instructions resulted in muscular activity and movement kinematic profiles that reflect more effective movement organisation than those resulting from the provision of internal focus instructions; thus, supporting a central tenet of the constrained action hypothesis.