Stepping into the role of Sifu

     I have been busy the last few weeks teaching a beginner's Shaolin Kung-Fu series through Free Arts of Arizona.  It has honestly been some of the most rewarding time I've spent in my life. There are 10 kids raging in age from 10 - 16  and they all seemed enthusiastic.  I gained a new appreciation for all my teachers. Especially my own Sifu.  He has often made teaching seem effortless, apart from being an amazing martial-artist he is also a very good teacher. He is great at building a rapport with his students as well as being explain and demonstrate the finer aspects to his students. 

I've ran classes before, I've filled in for my instructor a number of times. I teach groups of beginners regularly at my kwoon. One thing I've noticed about teaching martial arts is that you truly have to understand the material you are teaching. When you are going through a form or an individual technique, your body has to go through the movement and you have to be able to describe what you are doing as you are doing it. Hand Placement, Stances, the targets you are striking to while you are performing your movement. You can't go off of a pre-packaged lesson plan written by someone else.

     Teaching also allows you to work out your own questions with your movements. Try going through your techniques mentally. Perform any simple movement - i.e. A round-house kick, A horse stance, A straight punch, A joint-lock. If you've done it any number of times before, executing the move will be seamless you won't need to think about it.  Then try and perform the movement slowly and try to talk through it as if you are teaching an absolute beginner the movement for the first time. I gaurantee you that you will probably stumble a few times if you don't completely have it down or if you haven't really thought about it. Teaching will also give you a deeper level of understanding of your art. This is why I'm more than happy to help my fellow students before during and after class because I'm also deepening my own understanding of the art so I'm grateful to them for giving me that opportunity.

      There are also the things you teach without words, the things you do by your actions while in a training session. Do you show discipline and focus during your class time. Are you giving your students the deeper lessons of Kung-Fu? As I sat for the first time in front of the kids I was tasked to teach, I realized what an awesome responsibility that was and I was extremely nervous. I am also learning how to be a better teacher, I have learned to spot when I am losing my students' focus and attention. When to provide positive encouragement and when to provide firm discipline. The importance of a lesson plan for each lesson. Which students require a little more instructions to be pulled out of their shells. Its still a work in progress but hopefully one day I'll get there.