Beginning to Teach

Greetings, Benginning to teach can be one of the scariest endeavours a fencer can put themselves through. Just like all other aspects of fencing it is a skill which needs to be learnt. The decision to teach really needs to be a voluntary one and not something which is forced on the fencer. There has been a great deal said about teaching and the process of teaching, some of this will be of use to the beginner teacher, but there are some things which have not been said. Preach What You Practice The expression "practice what you preach" is most useful for correcting your own techniques, but there is also a situation where the reverse of the process is actually more useful for the fencer who is beginning to teach. The skills which the fencer uses in bouting are the ones which they will know the best. They understand these particular techniques and subconsciously understand why they work. This is where the teaching process should start from, hence "preach what you practice". The skills which you have honed over your time fencing are those which you will know the best. It is of little use attempting to teach things that you do not know so the best thing is to start with those things that you do know. For example, a fencer who does not use a great deal of blade engagement techniques should not be attempting to teach these, more he should be looking at how he manages and teaching this, possibly teaching absence of the blade or something similar. This is the sort of thing that you should be looking at when you begin to teach. The Basics Each fencer will have been taught the basics at some point in time. This may have come from a more qualified teacher, or it may have actually come from another fencer. The basics are those lessons which we have drilled the most in our fencing careers. Footwork and the simple elements of defence and attack are perfect examples of the basics. This is a great place for the beginning teacher to start teaching. The basics should keep your prospective students occupied for some period of time. These particular formative lessons are some of the most important lessons a ....

The rest of this article can be found in Un-Blogged: A Fencer's Ramblings by Henry Walker, which is available in paperback from:

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Blogged-Ramblings-Henry-Leigh-Walker/dp/098764470X
Booktopia: https://www.booktopia.com.au/un-blogged-henry-leigh-walker/book/9780987644701.html
Among other places...

It is also available in electronic format (pdf) from: https://buy.stripe.com/fZecP419c7CB9VKeUV

... or direct from the author.