Learning Stages - From Shoelaces To Driving

I remember teaching my children to tie their shoelaces. I had to slow right down and think back to how I did it. It surprised me how difficult it was to go back to the beginning and to consciously do something that I was able to do so unconsciously.

Then one day I was participating in the teaching of my daughter to drive and today was the day that she was ready for the bright lights of the city traffic. Double lanes, roundabouts, traffic lights, pedestrians, gutters, turning lanes and other drivers who were not always so compassionate in their driving attitude.

Up until now, the driving had been done in the country with quiet and wide roads and gentle corners. The gears were mastered - foot off accelerator, gently on clutch and brake, using both feet, change gear. Quite a complex action.

So we were coming down a hill, approaching a set of traffic lights, onto a roundabout. The Saturday morning traffic was busy as usual. We had picked up some eggs on the way home from the soccer match and my son had them on his lap in the back seat. My daughter had agreed to the drive home, but seeing the cacophony of activity ahead, as she sat at the wheel, she decided that evasive action was required.

I need to get off the road!

A side road appeared and I used my calm 'coach' voice. Indicate, foot on brake, foot on clutch, brake, brake, change down, brake, brake! The coach voice broke.

We swung around the corner at a rate of knots, on the other side of the road, and on two wheels.

The Stages of Learning

1. Stage 1. I Don't Know What I Don't Know. You are unaware of needing to know that there is something to learn about. A child is not even thinking of driving. Blissful ignorance.

2. Stage 2. Conscious Incompetence. We know that we want to learn it, but not yet how to do it. So the teenager is now aware that driving is a skill that needs training and learning. She may have seen her parents and others drive and consider that it is therefore something she can do, yet put behind the wheel it is obvious there is a lot to learn. Where is the clutch? What side are the indicators on? When do you use them?

3. Stage 3. Conscious Competence. This means that she understands the process, but she has to really think about applying it. The act of changing gears and indicating, while watching and thinking ahead are things that are really concentrated upon, as well as achieving smooth gear changes etc. However driving can be done. Distractions are not welcome. Practise, practise.

4. Stage 4. Unconscious Competence. This is where practice and embedding of the learnings has happened. At this stage, she drives and doesn't really think about the process - it has become automatic. She can have the radio on as well, and talk to passengers while noticing other things maybe outside. Sometimes she can't remember going past a certain point or along a particular piece of the road as she is driving automatically.

Some practices like martial arts call this Learn:Apply:Dissolve.

So learning new skills requires that we pass through these four stages. And to take the model a little further, mastery involves the continual looping back to the learning stage. Sometimes it is right back to Stage 1 as new skills or knowledge is needed to complement what is already an unconscious learning.

We don't know what we don't know

I love this statement. It is those who think they know everything that are most limited in growth of their knowledge.

How exciting to be able to learn something new. I got to experience this first hand when I first started to crochet. Being an avid knitter I figured it would be rather easy. So when my fingers behaved as if they belonged to somebody else and the wool was wound so tightly that it had to be cut off, I realised I had to experience the stages of learning. Remembering this certainly took the pressure off! After all, I was a learner so I let me spend the time learning.

So the car settled to a stop and on all four wheels. We were all pale and silent, in shock. Until my son squeaked from the back seat - 'I saved the eggs'. What a sweetie.

So when you are learning something give yourself the time and safe space to do so. Be patient - others before you have learnt so you will be able to as well. NLP is the study of how people have successfully learnt to produce their successful outcomes. And this can be learning of a skill, competency or values or beliefs. It can be learning to love yourself, juggle, crochet or anything!!