RE: [Paddlewise] teaching styles and gender

At 07:12 AM 3/10/01 -0800, SNStone wrote:
>People learn differently. Some people can watch someone else do a stroke or
>manever one or two times and emulate it immediately. Some people need a
>detailed step-by-step instruction. Others need to understand the theory
>behind the stroke.  A good instructor must be able to adapt themselves to
>these varying styles.
>
>A good instructor must also be able to take into account an individual's
>capabilities and help that individual adjust/modify techniques to fit there
>ability.  One size does not fit all! John pointed out a good example of
>Nigel Dennis teaching varying rescue techniques. Nigel's approach was to
>provide people a variety of techniques to accomplish the ultimate goal of
>getting a capsized paddler back into their boat. One I found interesting was
>a scoop rescue oriented to people with limited upper body strenth.

I found that interesting as well.  I believe that he also mentioned that it
would be a good rescue for someone that has dislocated a shoulder.

>Here's an interesting example of a coach needed to adjust to a student. When
>I took my BCU Coach 2 assessement we invite people to come as students. They
>are promised they will learn sometime and have a good time (FUN). Three
>students were assigned to me for about one hour of training. 

A friend of mine (Mike P.) also took that BCU Coach 2 assessment and had
an interesting experience.   One of his "students" was extremely talkative.
  Mike
would try to explain something and she would interrupt and start talking
about 
how she paddled and on and on.   At one point he had to say,  "Please, I am
supposed to be the instructor here".   He said that he had never enountered a
situation like it before, and while one might want to blame the student for
his
failing the assessment,  he learned a lesson about what it's like to deal
with a 
"difficult" student.  The lesson was that the instructor does not get to
choose
their students and one must learn how to teach easy students as well as 
difficult students.   

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