Part 15 of 21 improvements BJJ has had on my life. This series was inspired by Tangled Triangle: 21 Days of Improvement. You can read my Part 14 here!
15/21 Improvements from BJJ: Being Clear
I did teacher training for 5 years, and within those 5 years, giving clear instructions was one of the hardest things to learn and teach. I was teaching a group of 50 year old women how to play a board game. It was simple, but I was totally shocked to realize they were doing it completely wrong. They were using one single token, they were all moving it together, doing the thing on the space, rolling, and moving together.
I also tried to teach a group of Ukrainian children how to play baseball. Thought I was clear until the kid hit the ball, ran to first, then the person at first base ran with him to second base, then the kids in the outfield ran in, and by the time they got to home base, all the children were running together. ::facepalm::
Ultimately, we all THINK we’re being clear. We tell students to do something, they don’t do it, and we get frustrated. I’m again linking to the Bullyproof Parents Preparation video by Rener and Ryron Gracie. Again, this video is 10 minutes long, but worth every moment. The entire video is available to watch here.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m1lnIzzLUrs]
On Reddit, there was a thread about student habits that drive instructors crazy. There were a couple comments that stood out:
If a student doesn’t understand what I am saying, I will occasionally grab their foot/hand/head/whatever and place it where I want it to be. Don’t put it back where it was before. Don’t fight me when I move it. Stop. Why would you do that? Just stop.
The most frustrating thing is when I say not to do something, they go ahead and do exactly that, and then ask me why they’re having trouble.
when you tell a student to do something while they are rolling and they ignore you or then get angry or frustrated with you for ‘yelling’ at them, fuck me for trying to help.
When I told her to use her hips to move to my side/behind me, she said “I can’t” and continued to struggle against my clearly not going anywhere arm. And I asked, how could you possibly not be able to move your hips? And she said, “I just can’t.”
My thought was they probably didn’t understand what you meant or wanted. Your words were likely leaving room for interpretation and confusion, despite you thinking you’re being so clear. In general, impatient teachers are not good teachers. It’s easy to dismiss someone as being dumb, or incapable of being taught, or disrespectful, but MUCH more uncomfortable and true to realize that it may come down to you not being as clear as you intended.
A new white belt gal started last week, and today I was her partner. We did a magic move – one where you do step 1, step 2, magic, and final position. Okay, it was from side control, and it was a spin out move from the bottom person – one that I could do fairly easily, but it looks super complicated. The person helping us was saying “Move your hips” and verbally trying to explain what to do. I could see her getting frustrated, and it comes back to Rener’s saying:
When you verbally correct the child, you leave room for interpretation and confusion. Language can be misinterpreted.
Does “Move your hips” mean wiggle them? Move it toward them? Away from them? It’s like a person saying something to you in a foreign language and when you don’t get it they just start saying it louder. When the teacher gets impatient, the student knows, and it can make them feel just as frustrated and dumb. It’s not their fault that you weren’t clear or that they don’t yet understand the vocabulary or what is expected of them.
Being a beginner at jiu jitsu helped me understand how vague our language can be, especially in my language classrooms. I’ve learned both through BJJ and through being a kindergarten teacher, exactly what it means to give clear directions, and that’s invaluable.
And by the way, just asking “Do you understand” is not a good way to check. a) They may think they understand. b) They may say “yes” just to move on. c) You may not be giving them enough time to ask questions. Instead, having them repeat it back or explain it to you is better. Like – saying “Step one” and having them tell you, “Step two,” etc.
Jiu Jiu’s Question: Please tell a story about you misunderstanding an instructor, or a student misunderstanding. What was the source of the misunderstanding? How have you learned to overcome this now?
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ok, I don’t do jiu jitsu (yet), I do karate. this one time my sensei was trying to explain a thing about pushing my hips forward in a stance and I couldn’t for the life of me figure out how to do it. I told him several times that I just didn’t understand how to get my body to do that. after having said the same thing louder a few times he eventually tried saying it a few different ways, still didn’t work. eventually my friend, who had been watching, came over to me and said “you’re supposed to feel it in your butt! right here. *pokes me* squeeze while you straighen your back leg.” that did it and I finally understood how to get my body to do the stupid pushmyhipsforward-thingy :p
another time, with the same instructor, I was working on this kick (still haven’t gotten the hang of it, but getting there. slowly….) and after doing it wrong about five times he came over to correct me. “no. snap. like this.” *waves arm to demonstrate ‘snap’ movement* I try it again. “no. like this.” *demonstrates again* I try it once again. this continues a few times until “no. like this!” *demonstrates by kicking* I try it again, still doesn’t work. he continues telling me what to do and I still don’t get it. eventually I get so frustrated that I practically yell at him “it’s not working! I know what it’s supposed to look like, but I can’t figure out how to do that. you’re not being helpful! it’s like telling someone that if they’re ever attacked by a shark it’s just to flip them upside down. it’s not just to flip them upside down! it’s not just to snap in this stupid kick! you need to try a different approach!!” he tried a different approach and eventually I told him “show me what it is I’m doing, ’cause I feel like I’m doing exactly what you tell me to. I don’t see what I do wrong.” he did and I understood it a bit better. that particular kick is still a mystery to me, but another time I was working on it with him he told me that when he quit taekwondo and started karate that was the one kick he couldn’t get the hang of either. it took him ages and that made me feel a lot better 🙂
Karate, BJJ, tae kwon do – it’s all cool! Welcome aboard.
I have had to had a few techniques – one is to demonstrate what I’m supposed to do vs what I’m doing. This can be done through (careful!) imitation OR through pictures/videos. Another is to touch the body. Don’t tell me which part I’m supposed to lower, actually do it so I can understand it. Part of the problem is when you literally can’t picture what’s going on with your body. Hint: it DOES get easier.
Though – as I mentioned in my most recent article, my instructors were saying while I was sparring “Get your hips down” and I didn’t know if they meant close to the mat or down my opponent’s body, closer to his hips. Two versions of “down.” The cool thing – eventually you figure out linguistic shortcuts and understand one another – as with any kind of relationship!
OK, SO I KNOW I JUST COMMENTED, BUT I JUST WATCHED THE VIDEO AND IT WAS SO WORTH IT! I’M GONNA GO STRAIGHT TO MY FAVOURITE SENSEI NEXT MONDAY AND TELL HIM ABOUT THIS! he’s the one who usually teaches the kids and one day he asked me how to teach them in a way taht motivates them. what I told him is a lot like this, but not quite and that video explained it so incredibly well. I know he already is really good at telling kids (and grown ups) that they’re doing really well (even when we’re not really), but I see that our kids could really benefit from this way of correcting. I’m so excited for monday now!
I am so glad to hear it! Please let me know what happens! That video really and truly did change how I taught, and while I didn’t mention it, it really did transform my classes. The class I was terribly frustrated with ended up performing MUCH better, was much more motivated, and in all my classes my students were performing for me SO MUCH BETTER. It was seriously awesome.
well, ok. I can’t tell you what happened with telling my sensei about that video, because I actually can’t quite remember if I even told him about it. I think I did, but I’m not sure.
on the other hand I think you’d be interested in hearing that I finally tried out jiu-jitsu for the first time on thursday AND I LOVED IT!!! like, I already knew I would, but I think I underestimated exactly how much I’d like it.
story time (this might be a bit long. is that ok?)!
a good while ago I was on a trip with my church network. it’s an annual thing, it’s great. that particular weekend I had two HUGE bruises on each of my forearms and I had injured my finger a bit and had to tape two fingers to each other. that lead to talking about martial arts with one of the guys there and turns out he’s part instructor in a jiu-jitsu club and I was invited to train with them whenever I visit halden. I regularly visit wait place because my grandparents live there and I do like to get in touch with our church here in the area whenever I visit. so that was one extra motivation to come to halden 😉
it took far too long, but I finally got here and got my first taste of jiu-jitsu. I’ve been bitten. I dunno how I’m gonna be able to go home and know I don’t really have the time and money to join a club in the are while still doing karate, but I know I have to try.
there wasn’t actually any class yesterday, but the guy who invited me held an extra class for my sake. I got to borrow a gi from his wife (who unfortunately couldn’t be there. they couldn’t get a baby sitter) seeing as a karate gi is not good for jiu-jitsu at all. I only have one gi and I’d rather not have them tear it 😉
it was me, another girl (well, woman. she has kids. she felt my age though and I’ve not quite gotten used to thinking of me as an actual adult), two guys and the instructor.
I was paired with the girl through class. learned a few very basic things. I think I did about a well as is possible for a first-timer. only thing that was unusually hard was the first thing I did. they focus on self defence, so we started with a scenario where someone tries to punch me. even though what I was supposed to do actually is in one of our katas I still had the wrong reflexes. I kept blocking her and almost punching her right back (luckily I’ve got bough control to never actually hit when I don’t mean to). she laughed a lot at that.
she was pretty new as well, so because I got some of it naturally and because she gave up a bit too soon sometimes I mostly “won” when we were supposed to resist. that was a nice little ego boost.
after class I got to roll with one of the guys. *laughs* way to get my head outta the clouds! xD I loved it. I was in way over my head, but he was keeping it playful. I think I managed to mostly tell when he was choosing not to go for submissions and when I actually miraculously managed to foil his plans. I had more than enough with trying to give as little as possible. I only knew two things after all :p two more things sort of came on their own accord. just to keep mu elbows tucked in when he was trying to grab my arms and keeping my chin down when he tried to go for a choke (and also, I think, somehow blocking the choke? I dunno what I did. it seemed to work, mostly :p)
really really had fun. talked with the two guys who were there for quite a while afterwards. the were very nice. one of them turned out to have done karate for seven (or something) years before changing art. I got their numbers and they got mine in case they had time and opportunity to train with me again before I leave (the instructor who invited me is going away for the weekend). and one of them guided me home when I remembered that I actually had no idea what direction home was (whoops).
so yeah, all in all it was a great experience and I kinda wish I lived here so I could not only keep doing jiu-jitsu, but also so I could keep training with this specific club.