Teaching Methodology. The 4 Tools of Teaching Flashcards
What are the 4 tools of teaching?
Instructions
Demonstration
Observation
Adjustments
What is the PRIMARY way of guiding a class?
Instructions
Why do we teach yoga?
To develop awareness
Instructions: what should we ask our students?
We should invite students to practice with an alert awareness and friendly and compassionate mind.
Why do we develop awareness?
We develop awareness not to judge or punish ourselves but, through observing and understanding, making the transformation
How should our voice be when we instruct?
loud but soft and melodious (adjust your volume to the size of the group and the venue)
What should we do to avoid sounding monotone?
We should use different intonations.
Maybe speak louder to encourage the students during a difficult posture, and softer during restorative postures and meditation).
Instructions tips:
Choose your focus (depending on the focus of the class): alignment, flow, awareness
Give suggestions for inhalations and exhalations, especially for Vinyasa Flow classes
Sometimes, just don’t speak – silence is very beautiful!
Integrate indications, benefits, contra-indications
When we talk about alignment, we should start from where?
start from the feet and work your way up
When going into alignment in a very detailed manner, what should we be aware of?
how long the students are standing in the posture. We should be aware of how long the students are standing in the posture.
If you do not have the strength to use your muscular energy properly, what could happen?
There is a chance that they damage their ligaments and tendons
Slowing down the class can benefit both beginners and advanced students. How so?
It makes it less confusing for beginners and challenges advanced because they have to go slow which develops stamina and muscle strength.
We don’t want to demonstrate TOO much. Why?
Demonstrating whilst teaching prevents you from walking around and being available for the class and your students. It may also be challenging for the students to hear you properly (try giving clear instructions while in downward facing dog ).
Also, if you are demonstrating you can’t properly observe what is going on, you can’t adequately adjust your students.
When teaching a class what should I remember?
That this is NOT my own practice!
Always combine demonstration with..?
instruction
In demonstration, we should..?
Mirror! Especially in twists, inform the students that you are mirroring to avoid any confusion.
When observing, what should we do if we see a student wandering?
We can ask them to gently come back or simply include a more challenging balancing posture. That usually works
What can we do while observing the breathing patterns of students?
gently invite or guide the group or individual student to breathe calmly
When observing we try to observe the musculoskeletal alignment. Why is it tricky as a beginning teacher?
You might look but not actually see what is happening.
When looking at the musculoskeletal alignment what can we keep in mind?
Scan the body from feet to head. Sometimes something seems ‘wrong’ in the torso or hip area, but that can very often be ‘corrected’ by adjusting the feet
What is the purpose of the posture? For example in a downward dog we want to lengthen the spine, so look for that. Then adjust the feet or knees, or arms, or hands to achieve that
When it comes to awareness, what should we remember for beginner students?
Most beginners have very little bodily awareness.
What can we do for kinesthetic individuals)?
We can come and fixes them in the proper position so that they can memorize how the pose feels. Manual adjustment!
Manual adjustment is done when and why?
his step is done last so that you don’t need to spend a lot of time adjusting everyone if you have done the steps prior to this one. Just spot the people that still don’t “get it”.
Before you adjust anything, what should we check?
We check that the base is stable – adjust from the ground up
Instead of pressing down on anything, what should we rather do?
We should rather apply pressure in a specific direction that is appropriate for the necessary result
What is the difference between compression and tension?
The force that tries to elongate a body or an object is called tension. … The force that tries to shorten the body or an object is called compression
