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Old 08-26-2009, 10:55 AM   #1
CarrieP
 
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Location: Michigan
Join Date: Dec 2007
Posts: 100
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Neat teaching techniques: teachers and students

I saw something pretty neat in my aikido class last weekend, and was wondering if others have similar types of stories.

Our sensei was doing some focus on forward rolling techniques at the start of class, because we have a couple newbies in class, and some of us "former newbies" still have some very rough edges.

He was trying to teach us about being rounded, creating a space between the rolling arm and the body.

We train in a shared space, a big community room, and there happened to be some big party balloons, still inflated, lying around, from some shindig earlier in the week.

Sensei took the balloon, tucked it beween his arm and his torso, and did a roll. The balloon stayed right there, didn't pop, didn't even get squished. Then he had a few of us see if we could do the same thing.

It struck me as a really neat idea, to use a prop during teaching, spontaneously, and one that was seemingly perfect for the lesson. The balloon gave the sense of space without adding any weight or impeding the roll, and it gave direct feedback on technique--if it popped, you weren't keeping enough space there.

Just wondering if others would like to share any interesting teaching techniques they've used or observed.
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