Guidance for Beginners and Elite Performers

Guidance and Feedback — Two Sides of Teaching Sport

Every sports coach has to answer two questions: how do I help the performer learn a skill? And how do I tell them how well they are doing it? The first question is about guidance — the instruction side of coaching. The second is about feedback — the evaluative side. Both are essential, but the most effective type of guidance or feedback varies depending on whether the performer is a beginner or an elite athlete. This lesson focuses on guidance; the types of feedback overlap closely (visual, verbal, intrinsic, extrinsic) and are explored in the same context.

Types of Guidance

There are four types of guidance: visual, verbal, manual and mechanical. Each provides information to the performer through a different sense or medium, and each is more or less suitable depending on the stage of learning.

1. Visual Guidance

Visual guidance is any form of instruction that the performer sees. The most common form is a demonstration: a coach or skilled model performs the skill, and the learner watches and forms a mental image of the correct movement. Beth Mead demonstrating cutting runs in the penalty area to a group of youth players, or a gymnastics coach showing the correct arm position before a balance — these are examples of visual guidance. Video analysis, diagrams of movement paths and highlighted zones on a pitch are also forms of visual guidance.

Visual guidance is highly effective for beginners because it gives a complete picture of what the skill should look like. Beginners have no stored movement pattern in long-term memory to draw on, so seeing the whole skill demonstrated provides the mental blueprint they need. It is also effective for elite performers when combined with video analysis: a sprinter watching slow-motion footage of their arm action, or a swimmer studying their underwater stroke from a poolside camera, can identify technical flaws that verbal description alone would miss. The key limitation is that a demonstration must be accurate — a poor-quality model confuses rather than clarifies.

2. Verbal Guidance

Verbal guidance uses words to instruct. A coach saying “bend your knees on the take-off”, calling “left foot forward” during a defensive drill, or giving tactical instructions before a match are all verbal guidance. Words can convey precise technical information, tactics and corrections quickly. Verbal guidance is extremely time-efficient and can reach a group of performers simultaneously.

However, verbal guidance has limitations for beginners. Complex movements — a butterfly stroke, a javelin release, a cricket drive — are difficult to describe in words alone. A beginner listening to a long verbal explanation of a tennis serve may struggle to translate words into coordinated movement without also seeing it. Verbal guidance works better for performers who already have a movement pattern stored in memory, because the words can activate and refine an existing mental representation. For elite performers, precise verbal cues (“drop the elbow earlier on the catch”) are highly effective because they already understand the movement context and can translate a single cue into a physical adjustment.

3. Manual Guidance

Manual guidance involves the coach physically moving or supporting the performer. A gymnastics coach manually guiding a child’s arms through a cartwheel, a swimming instructor supporting a learner’s hips at the water surface, or a judo coach physically positioning a student’s stance are all forms of manual guidance. By moving the performer through the correct pattern, the coach gives them a kinaesthetic “feel” for the movement that words and demonstrations cannot fully convey.

Manual guidance is particularly valuable for beginners learning a dangerous or technically complex skill. In gymnastics, manual guidance allows safe learning of skills that could cause injury if performed incorrectly — the coach’s hands on the hips during a round-off build the correct feel without the risk of falling. The main limitation is that over-reliance on manual guidance can create a dependency: the performer learns to rely on the physical support and struggles to replicate the movement independently. Coaches therefore phase it out progressively as the learner internalises the pattern. For elite performers, manual guidance is rarely used because they have established, well-grooved movement patterns; the physical input would more likely disrupt than improve their performance.

4. Mechanical Guidance

Mechanical guidance uses physical aids to support or constrain the movement. Swimming armbands keeping a learner buoyant, a harness and pulley system supporting a diver performing a new somersault, a resistance band guiding arm position in a backstroke drill, or a football target practice goal with reduced netting area are all mechanical guidance devices. Like manual guidance, mechanical guidance provides the performer with a physical sensation of the correct movement and removes the risk of injury during the learning phase.

Mechanical guidance is particularly useful when the consequences of an incorrectly performed skill are dangerous. A gymnast attempting a back somersault for the first time in a safety harness can experience the correct rotation without the risk of a head or neck injury. The limitations mirror those of manual guidance: dependency is a risk. If a swimmer becomes reliant on armbands, they do not develop true water confidence or correct buoyancy control. Mechanical aids should be faded out as competence grows. Elite performers rarely use mechanical guidance for their main sport skill, though they may use specialist equipment such as ergometers or resistance machines for specific conditioning drills.