Assessment of Random and Blocked Practice Schedules on Motor Skills' Acquisition, Retention and Transfer Among Selected Senior High School Students

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to assess the influence of blocked and random practice schedules on acquisition, retention and transfer after teaching basketball skills among novice Senior High School students. Using a quasi-experimental design, a combination of simple random and purposive sampling procedures were used to select 60 novice participants who were equally assigned to a Blocked Practice Group (BPG [N= 30]) and Random Practice Group (RPG [N= 30]) respectively. After 9 sessions of teaching and learning of chest pass, overhead pass and sidearm pass, results for skill acquisition indicated that the BPG scored higher means than the RPG in all the three motor skills. For retention, improved performance for the RPG than the BPG in all 3 skills was noted. Similar results were obtained for the transfer phase. ANOVA test for retention produced significant mean differences between the three motor skills. However, the RPG recorded more superior values for between group analyses than the BPG. Independent sample t-test also revealed significant difference between random and blocked practices in terms of overall learned skills. Based on these findings, Physical education tutors and perhaps coaches should consider adopting blocked practice approach during isolated skill learning. Additionally, random practice scheduling should be used when the main objective is based on retention and transfer of knowledge regarding motor skills, especially during competitive milieu or other analogous related activities.