The Teaching Circle
The Teaching Circle in Martial Arts
Much of what I’m going to put down in writing below is likely in the “obvious” category for many of you reading this. Much of it, through the failings attributed to human nature, also fits into the “oft neglected” category, because despite having the knowledge, it doesn’t always carry over into practise – something I am most certainly guilty of on occasion. In the interest of helping some of our more fledgling instructors, and reminding some of our more experienced instructors, I’m going to lay down a few fundamentals, or “ABCs” of teaching martial arts, and despite the title of the article, they apply to teaching any subject matter.
Moving directly to the subject of this article, one can observe that there are several steps involved in teaching any subject. These can be summarised as follows:
- Set goals
- Plan and prepare
- Execute
- Assess and correct
- Revise and repeat