Lesson video

Hello there and welcome to this lesson on mental preparation with me, Mr. Broome.

And this is from the Sports Psychology: Mental Preparation for Performance unit.

I think this is a great lesson coming up because it has real world applications you can start using them from today.

So not only are we going to learn how athletes mentally prepare, but how you can mentally prepare to help you lower your stress levels when you get into stressful situations or help give you a confidence boost when you need it.

And so really useful, as I said, real world applications.

So we have a look.

Okay so by the end of today's lesson you should be able to identify and use a range of mental preparation techniques.

We've got a lot of keywords in this lesson with long definitions.

So they're split onto two slides.

Let's have a look.

We have mental rehearsal, imagery, selective attention.

Pause here if you want to have a look at their definitions.

But as I said, we have a second slide here, positive thinking and mental preparation.

So there's your definitions of those.

Lots of keywords or particularly long definitions, but the lesson itself isn't a hugely long one.

There are two parts and the first part is called using mentor rehearsal to improve performance.

So let's have a look at that.

Jacob's question to you is, What do you think the term mental rehearsal means? Have you ever come across it before or perhaps if you think about the two words mental rehearsal, you might be able to come up with an answer yourself.

So let's put the word on the screen and we're going to have a look first of all at mental.

Okay, so mental refers to anything related to the mind to thinking, to cognition or psychological processes.

Okay so all those things that are going on in your mind can be labelled as mental.

What about rehearsal? Have you ever come across the word rehearsal? So rehearsal is practise or repetition of a performance to prepare for an actual event.

Now, I've come across that word many times when I hear it used in the world of theatre where people rehearse for a performance, it makes it to means they're gonna practise for the performance leading up to the real performance when the audience actually arrives to watch.

Now here we have a basketball player and a basketball player is about to take a free throw.

Now, just in case you don't know what a free throw is, it's essentially like a penalty in football.

Somebody was fouled while they were shooting and the referee awards the team some free shots at the basket, no opposition allowed to get in the way.

So before they take their shot, the basketball player imagines themselves scoring.

They might see themselves taking the shot with great technique, the ball flying through the hoop.

Perfect.

And that is mental rehearsal, okay? That imagining themselves taking the shot and scoring.

Then once they've performed their mental rehearsal, they then take the shot because remember, rehearsal means practising before the actual event.

And here's a an image to represent that.

So they're imagining that ball going through the hoop.

Perfect.

Now Izzy says, what is the point of doing that? She's probably thinking, why doesn't he just take the shot without worrying about having to do all that mental rehearsal? So what do you think? Well, by imagining success, his confidence levels increased and it reminds the performer of the correct technique.

So while they're picturing themselves taking the shot, they can also remind themselves of how the technique should look.

It helps 'em to increase their focus and their concentration.

'Cause if you look in the background of that picture, there's a lot of people watching.

There's a big crowd and so there might be a lot of distractions.

And so increasing the focus and concentration by just thinking about what the shot should look like is gonna help block out some of that crowd and that will also help to reduce any stress or anxiety that they're feeling.

Okay, so in response to Izzy, there are lots of good reasons to do mental rehearsal.

Here's example, a javelin thrower is imagining themselves performing the technique.

And so this technique, it enables the performer to picture themselves performing the skill perfectly and imagine the positive outcomes before attempting the skill.

In the case of a javelin thrower, it would be getting the run up absolutely perfect, releasing with the perfect angle of release and the javelin flying perhaps further than it ever has before, and landing perfectly as well.

Now this technique can be used by any level of performer to help improve their performance.

That's an important thing to say here, is that lots of people associate this with the top athletes like elite performers, but there's absolutely no reason why mental rehearsal wouldn't benefit somebody even at the beginner level.

There's a check for understanding.

Based on what we've just discussed, is this true or false? Mental rehearsal is only for professional athletes.

That's false, isn't it? And we've just discussed that.

But why? Well, anyone can benefit from mental rehearsal techniques.

They can help all of us to improve our performance, whether we're a beginner or an elite.

Okay? This is an interesting sport.

BMX racing, it's one of the Olympic sports.

Now the riders in A BMX race will visualise themselves completing the track before the race.

They'll picture themselves at the start line and they'll imagine all the different bends and turns and jumps.

This allows 'em to familiarise with those bends and jumps before they go and do it for real and therefore feel more confident that if they can picture everywhere they need to go and everything they need to do at the right time, then when it comes to doing it for real, they'll be able to perform it.

And that helps 'em to feel a lot more confident about their chances of getting round the track successfully.

Now, lots of skills suit mental rehearsal, but one in particular I would say is kicking in rugby.

And rugby players are renowned for their mental rehearsal routines, especially those who kick for goal.

So why do they use these mental rehearsal routines? Well, it helps 'em to concentrate.

And we said that with the basketball player, didn't we, earlier.

It also helps 'em to get in the zone.

Getting in the zone means you're just at the perfect mental place.

You're focused, you are confident, you're feeling great, you've got no stress or anxiety just flying.

And it can also help to block out distractions such as the crowd.

Now this picture doesn't show a crowd, but imagine him performing that skill in front of 70,000 people in a stadium full of fans.

Well, then there's gonna be lots of distractions and lots of noise and destruction from the crowd there.

Okay, here's a real world example with the England rugby player, Owen Farrell.

Now when he kicks for goal, he's described how he imagines a line.

He actually draws a line in his mind from the ball to a point in the crowd.

And that point in the crowd could be a seat or a person, but it's where he wants the ball to go.

So then he just concentrates on kicking that ball along the line that he imagined.

He doesn't even think about the posts that he's trying to kick it through because he knows that as long as he kicks it along that line, it's going to go through.

Lots of rugby players have mental rehearsal techniques like this, okay? I remember a guy called Johnny Wilkinson, he played for England in the early 2000s and he used to imagine that an old lady was sat in the crowd eating an ice cream and she was sat in the perfect place for him to kick the ball if it was going to go through the posts.

And then he focused on kicking that ball so that it hit the ice cream outta the old lady's hand, which is a rather interesting and unique mental rehearsal technique.

However, he was very successful with it.

It was very, very effective.

Jun has a question for you related to the picture on the left there.

And he says, Imagine putting the ball to win a game in front of all those people.

How would you feel? Well, how would you feel? Have a think about that.

Chances are with lots of people watching you perform a skill like this in very close proximity, you might feel a little bit anxious or stressed, and sport does create lots of stressful situations.

Mental rehearsal, therefore before you perform the skill, can help us to reduce that stress and anxiety.

Quick check for understanding which of these is not.

Note that it says not there a benefit of mental rehearsal.

Is it A, increased confidence? B, lowering concentration levels? C, reduced stress? Or D, familiarisation with the skill? Well done if you said B, lowering concentration levels.

In fact, it does the opposite, doesn't it? It heightens our concentration levels and well done, therefore that you recognise that A, C and D are all benefits of mental rehearsal.

Alex says, Let's recap all of the benefits of mental rehearsal we've discussed so far.

And that might be a nice idea, Alex, because there have been several haven't there? So things we now know about mental rehearsal, it can lead to increased confidence, familiarisation with the skill, reduced anxiety and stress.

It can help block out distraction such as a crowd.

It helps us to get in the zone and it helps us with increased concentration and focus.

So lots of benefits of going through that mental rehearsal technique isn't there? And you're going to need those for this task.

Develop these statements to identify different benefits of mental rehearsal on performance.

So what's gonna happen here is you'll get the beginning of a statement and I'd like you to develop the statement and finish it.

But first of all, I'm gonna show you one on the left hand side, so here's an example.

A dancer replace their routine in their mind before going on stage.

You are going to get four similar statements like that which need finishing, okay? But first of all, I'm gonna show you my example to give them confidence and reduce anxiety before going in front of the crowd and performing the routine perfectly.

So what I've done there is I've taken the start of the statement, the dancer replays their routine in their mind.

That's the, we know she's mentally rehearsing, don't we? But I then go on to say what's the benefit of that and how's it gonna help performance? So the benefit is to give them confidence and reduce anxiety and the impact on performances that they're going to go out there and perform the routine perfectly.

And I'd like you to do the same thing for these four.

Let's have a look.

Number one, a football player imagines herself taking a penalty.

Number two, before putting the ball, a golfer mentally rehearses their putt.

Number three, a long jumper takes time to imagine themselves leaping into the sand.

And number four, before a race, a formula one driver dot dot dot.

Now over to you to finish those four statements.

Remember, identify the benefit of mental rehearsal and how it's going to impact performance.

Pause the video here, write your four statements out and I will see you in a moment.

Okay, things you might have said, let's go in order.

Number one, the football player visualises herself taking a penalty and I said that that would increase their confidence in their ability to score and place the shot where they want to.

Number two, before putting the ball, a golfer mentally rehearses their putt, which reduces stress and allows 'em to play their shot calmly and accurately.

Number three, a long jumper takes time to imagine themselves leaping into the sand, which gets them in the zone and allows them to time their take off well and put maximum effort into their jump.

And number four, before a race, a formula one driver visualises the racetrack to ensure they are focused and allows them to drive the track along the perfect racing line.

Now of course yours won't have word for word matched mine.

But what I want you to do is check through your answers and make sure that you've recognised how mental rehearsal will benefit the performer.

Whether it's an increase in confidence, a reduction in stress, a reduction in anxiety, getting in the zone, blocking out the crowd or something, and then finish it off by saying how it's going to help their performance.

Well done if your four statements have achieved that.

And that brings us onto the second part of today's lesson called identify other mental preparation techniques.

Because mental rehearsal is just one of the techniques you need to know about.

So here we have an athlete preparing for a race and they're saying, I am strong and fast and I will win this race today.

Now just to be clear, they're saying that to themselves, they're not actually saying that to somebody else.

In fact, they might just be saying it in their head.

They don't actually need to say it out loud necessarily.

And what was happening here is the athlete is taking the opportunity in the moment before performing to use something called positive thinking.

Okay? So again, they, they could be saying it to themselves out loud or they could be saying it inside, but they are thinking positively as he has very, very positive, isn't he there? About feeling strong and fast and that he's gonna win the race today.

What's the benefits of doing this positive thinking technique? Well, it helps us by increasing our confidence and reducing stress and anxiety.

Okay? Give you a boost in your confidence.

And it's a technique that can boost confidence in many situations.

Let's imagine you are rock climbing and you say to yourself, I'm going to figure out the best way up here.

You might be finding a little bit difficult, but you're saying to yourself, I am going to figure out the best way up here.

Okay, you're positive about how you are going to solve the problem that you have.

Second example, okay, let's imagine that you are in the midst of a fitness programme, finding it hard work, but you say to yourself, it's hard work, but if I keep being consistent, this is going to be worth it.

Okay? Telling yourself that it's worth the effort, alright? And that things are going to improve if you keep being consistent.

Again, both of these statements are very positive.

They're about, yes, I'm going to achieve what I want to achieve and it's gonna help to increase confidence.

So over to you with a check for understanding.

Which of our three characters, Lucas, Sam, or Jun is thinking positively? Let's have a look.

Lucas is thinking, don't mess this up.

Sam is thinking, try not to fumble the ball.

And Jun is thinking, I practise perfectly for this moment.

Which of those is using positive thinking? Well done if you recognise that Jun is our positive thinker, Lucas, don't mess this up.

And Sam with their statement, try not to fumble the ball are both feeling kind of negative, aren't they? They're both thinking kind of negatively.

They're trying to avoid making mistakes, which is not a positive way to think.

Whereas Jun on the other hand is saying how he's perfectly practised for this moment.

So he is helping himself to feel really confident and prepared for whatever it's he's about to do.

Well done if you said C.

I just got another technique for you to use and you could have a go at this now, why not? So close your eyes and imagine yourself somewhere calm and relaxing.

Why don't you pause the video maybe and give it a try? I've chosen a nice tropical beach there.

Isn't that a classic example of somewhere calm and relaxing.

How did that make you feel? Or if you didn't do it, how'd you think it would make you feel? This is a technique called imagery.

Okay? And we might use imagery by creating a mental picture of success or happiness.

Okay? We take ourselves to a happy place, whether it's imaginary or somewhere you've actually been.

And the benefits of doing that are that it reduces stress and anxiety.

It can help us to block out other distractions while our eyes are closed and we're in our happy place.

We're not going to be able to be distracted by the things around us.

And that can help to lower arousal levels also.

Okay, so lots of benefits of imagery.

Check for your understanding.

True or false? The techniques of imagery and positive thinking can both be used to lower anxiety levels.

Is that true or false? That's true, isn't it? Why is that? Well, high arousal levels can be caused by stress and anxiety when we're in high pressure situations.

And by using these techniques of imagery and positive thinking, we can lower anxiety levels and relieve stress.

Both of them can be used for that purpose.

Okay, Andeep is asking you to imagine all the different stimuli this footballer could focus on here before taking the penalty.

What's all the different information that are coming into his senses that he might choose to focus on? Let's have a look.

So the lights or the animation of the adverts around the side of the pitch, whatever the goalkeeper's doing might be trying to put you off.

There's lots of noise and crowd movement.

There's a big crowd there, isn't there? There's gonna be lots of movement, lots of noise.

There'll be noise from your teammates and opposition players who have stood behind you.

You might get distracted by your own thoughts and your own emotions.

You might be paying attention to the condition of the pitch.

You might be really wet and slippy and making you feel a bit anxious about slipping over when you take your penalty.

Okay? So lots of stimuli.

Now some of them, as Andeep rightly says, are important but many of them are not.

If we go back to our list, lights and animations of adverts aren't important.

What the goalkeeper's doing is the noise and movement from the crowd isn't important.

In fact, the noise from your teammates and the opposition players isn't really important 'cause you've got one job to do and that's score a penalty.

So you should try and block that out as well.

You should pay attention to your thoughts and emotions 'cause you want to manage them and you should probably pay attention to the condition of the pitch if you think it's going to cause a problem.

Okay, as you can see, three of our stimuli there are important and should be focused on and three of them are not.

So what we're talking about here is something called selective attention.

And that means that you focus only on the important stimuli and you ignore any distracting stimuli.

So the best action that footballer could take is focus on those three that we said were important.

And ignoring the three that we said were not important.

If you're successful at that, you might describe yourself as being in the zone.

You're focusing on all the right things.

You are, you are blocking out anything that is irrelevant or distracting and that makes you in the zone.

You're in the perfect level of attention.

But let's have a look at an example together.

And here we have a golfer about to take a tee shot.

And let's think about the different ways that they might mentally prepare before they hit their tee shot.

Think back to the lesson, maybe pause a video here if you like, and perhaps have a think about how you would mentally prepare before hitting a tee shot.

Well, they could use mental rehearsal, couldn't they, from at the beginning of the lesson.

And that will help to increase focus and block out destruction.

So they could go through in their mind what the perfect technique should look like.

They might use positive thinking to increase confidence.

They might tell themselves what a great golfer they are and how well they're going to perform today.

They might use selective attention to help them get in the zone.

So they might block out any distractions that are around them and just focus on the really important stimuli such as the ball and their stance, for example.

And they might use imagery just before they take the shot.

They might go to their happy place in their mind and help calm any nerves and help 'em to relax.

And some athletes will use a combination of all four of those.

There's no reason why this golfer couldn't use all four of those in the lead up to taking the tee shot.

Okay, a task view in this second section of the lesson, and I'd like you to look at this volleyball player and I'll give you some context.

And that is that the volleyball player is about to serve for the match in a very important game and she's feeling anxious as a result.

There are three parts to this task.

Number one, I'd like you to fill the speech bubble with something she might say using positive thinking to increase her confidence.

We've seen a few examples of it.

We've seen a few examples of it during the lesson.

So what might she say in her mind to help her think positively and increase her confidence? Secondly, how might she use imagery in these moments and why might that help her? And thirdly, I'd like you to identify three stimuli which might be distracting, and two, which she should focus on by using selective attention.

So what around her might be a distracting stimuli and what around her should she focus on? Pause the video here, complete the three parts to that task and then come back to me and I'll give you some suggested answers.

Okay, things you might have said.

Number one was to complete the speech bubble.

And this is what I said for this volleyball player.

You've done this perfectly a thousand times before and will do it again now.

Okay? So very positive, hopefully a confidence boost to her just before she takes the serve.

Hopefully, yours is something like that.

It's positive and will lead to improved confidence.

Second part of the task ask you to discuss how imagery could be used.

Now, imagery could be used to lower her anxiety and arousal levels by picturing yourself in a calm, relaxing place.

This could bring her to optimal arousal and in the best place mentally to perform the skill.

Okay? Can help reduce her anxiety and stress.

And the third section was related to selective attention, wasn't it? So distracting stimuli could include the crowd movements.

We could see some crowd behind her or noise from the crowd or the opposition players trying to be off-putting, or maybe even a game being played on a different court.

In some places you'll find multiple games being played in big arenas and so that could be a distraction too.

So if she selectively attends to the right stimuli, she should focus on things like the ball and the area of the court that she wants to serve into and nothing else, essentially.

Well done if you answered the three parts of that question similar to mine.

Okay, that brings us to the summary for today's lesson.

Let's read through it together, shall we? So there are several techniques we can use to help mentally prepare for performance and manage the stress we feel in certain situations.

Mental rehearsal means picturing yourself performing the skill correctly or with the desired outcome.

And this raises confidence, blocks out the crowd and gives you reminders of how to perform the skill effectively.

Selective attention can also be used to ensure only the relevant stimuli are focused on.

We also looked at positive thinking.

So positive thinking is another method of increasing confidence while imagery can be used by a performer to help relax, calm nerves and lower anxiety levels.

Thanks for joining me today's lesson.

I really enjoyed that and I hope you got a lot out of it.

As I said at the beginning of the lesson, some of these techniques are really useful and they are things you could apply to your own life from today, from now.

Next time you have a test or you've got a performance in music or drama.

And of course lots of applications in sport as we should, well and truly know by now.

So give them a try and I look forward to seeing you in another lesson.

Bye-bye.