Thoughts on teaching movement to beginner fencers

I have no official expertise in this subject, but I have done a variety of movement activities in my time (renaissance dance, various other forms of dance, military parade ground drilling, a bit of tai chi) and taught some of them (renaissance dance, parade drill) as well as teaching computer programming professionally for some time, so I think I might have some useful thoughts and ideas to share on both teaching and movement.

I wrote this up because someone I know was talking about how much trouble she was having teaching a new fencer footwork and parries. At the time of writing, I am a new fencer myself, and I've been learning the same things, and talking about what I've learnt and *how* I've learnt both with the person who's primarily training me, and with others.

So, on with the show...

People learn differently

First thing to remember as a teacher is that different people learn things differently. You should try to keep this in mind when teaching fencing moves, and try explaining each concept multiple different ways until you find one that "clicks". Here are some examples of how people differ:

Some can follow a verbal description, some need to be shown
Some learn best by doing, some by thinking, some by a combination of the two.
Some people remember things much better if they see it written down.
Some have a good idea of spatial relations and geometry, and can instinctively grasp things like "keep your feet at 90 degrees" or "you're trying to form two sides of a triangle with your intagliata". Others just won't get it.
Some people can follow a mirror image, others need to see something the same way around. If someone can't follow what you're doing when you're facing them, try standing on their left (assuming you're both right-handed) so they can match their movements to yours without the mirror image effect. (Downside: it's harder to watch them)
Peoples' backgrounds influence how they think of things. Find out if your student has any experience with martial arts, SCA heavy combat, dance, modern fencing, etc. Familiarise yourself with the main positions/movements of each of these (perhaps get your student to show you) so you can tell where they're coming from, and adjust your teaching to their existing knowledge.
Try using different ways to describe physical positioning: relative position ("in front of your leg", "parallel to the wall"), points of the clock ("at about 4 o'clock"), shapes ("form a triangle"), and others. Think about all the different ways you could describe where your hand is in a normal en garde position, and if someone's looking at you blankly try describing it a different way.
Some people pick up jargon terms quickly, some don't. Determine how quickly your student is picking up the terms, and don't race ahead of them. If they look blank when you say "inside line" or "supinated" or something, define the term again (and again, and again) until they're comfortable.
Learning curves vary. Some people will steadily improve, some will be utterly crap for ages and then suddenly "get it".
The ability to string together complex movements varies between people. Some will be able to remember and perform quite complex sequences, others will need to break it down much smaller.
Some people can't get a move down unless they have a sword in their hands. Some people can't get a move down unless they have another person doing the other half of the move (for instance, attacking them so they can parry -- parrying the air might not work for them)

As you read the list above, you will probably think of other ways in which peoples' learning techniques vary. The point is that you should keep an eye out for these differences and adjust to them if possible.

Onto movement stuff

The first things that are usually taught to a beginning fencer in the SCA are stance, footwork, and holding the sword in an en garde position. While some people pick this up really quickly, some take a while for it to click, and others never really get it at all.

In my short while fencing, I've noticed that the main hurdle people have to overcome while learning the basic moves is simply that they're not used to moving, or thinking about moving.

Most SCA fencers work in sedentary professions and even those who do physical activity may not do the sort of activity that requires them to think closely about how they move. Many sports and physical activities don't need you to think too closely about how your body is working until you get up into serious levels of competition. Activities which *do* require a high level of body awareness include:

Martial arts, including fencing and SCA combat
Dancing
Yoga, Tai Chi
Weight training (free weights, not machines)
Gymnastics
Swimming (this one's borderline)

If a beginning fencer has done any of these activities, they are ahead of the game. While they might have to unlearn certain movements or techniques, they do at least know *how* to do that. On the other hand, if someone's never done any of these, or worse yet hasn't done any physical recreational activity since school age, they are going to have to play catch-up to get used to moving around.

Getting used to moving

The most basic fencing footwork movement, a simple advance step, is actually quite complex if you try to explain it from scratch. As well as the positioning of the feet and the actual movement taken in the step, the posture itself takes some explaining. This is a lot for someone to learn all at once if they're not used to it, and it's made even worse if they just don't know how their body can move or aren't used to the sensation of movement.

If you're teaching basic moves, and someone's just not getting it no matter how often you say "toe out!" or "your weight's on your back foot", and especially if they are stiff and look uncomfortable, then perhaps they need to get more used to basic movement. Here are some really basic exercises to help someone get used to moving around.

Talk to your student and say "You look a bit stiff and tense, let's loosen up a bit. Follow me." Now lead them in doing any or all of the following:

skipping, hopping, jumping, side-slipping up and down the room or around in circles
squats and lunges (not fencing ones, just exercisey ones)
swing arms in circles from the shoulders, forwards and backwards
holding arms loosely at sides and with feet apart, twist the body around from side to so the arms flap loosely around.
holding a sword in the hand, swing the arm around making circles and figure 8s with it (watch out for bystanders!)

Balance and posture

Another thing they'll probably need help with is balance. Here are some simple balance warmups:

jump up and down in place
hop on each foot
hop/bounce on alternate feet, kicking each foot out in front in turn
standing on one leg
stand on one leg and raise the other leg repeatedly, either to the front or side
standing with feet at shoulder width, squat in a controlled manner and rise again
standing on one leg, raise up onto the toe in a controlled manner and lower again

If they have trouble keeping balance (and they probably will) then you may need to help them improve their posture too.

My favourite posture teaching technique is the "puppet" thing, which I learnt in the context of either tai chi or renaissance dance or both (doesn't matter much, the posture is similar for those and fencing). However, not everyone groks this puppet posture thing, so see above on how people learn differently, and think about how you can teach this in other ways too:

Grab a strand of hair at the top of their head, and tell them "you're a puppet on a string. I'm the puppetteer." Get them to "hang" from the string (without hurting their scalp!) so the axis of their body goes straight down from the string. Their centre of balance should be directly below the string. You should be able to raise and lower them by the string, and their torso should stay where it is relative to the string and just their legs bend underneath them. If you can get a puppet to demonstrate this with, so much the better.

Once you've demonstrated the basic principle, get them to hold their own "string". Once they're more used to it, they will start to be able to just pretend that someone's holding the string.

Now, in puppet mode, you can do some of the balance and movement exercises again:

bounce up and down
walk
stand on one leg and raise the other
sideslips

Once they've got the posture right and can do basic stuff in that posture, you can get back to doing actual fencing drills, and if/when their posture goes wonky, they'll have a better idea of what "right" is and how to get there. Which leads neatly into...

Body awareness (proprioception)

The final point about being comfortable with movement is actually being aware of how you move. That is, having your brain know instinctively where each bit of the body is, and how it has to move to get to where it's going. The technical term for this skill is "proprioception".

To demonstrate proprioception: close your eyes and touch your forefingers together. The awareness of where your body parts are and how they move, even when you're not watching them, is proprioception. The goal is to be able to perform fencing moves with the same instinctive confidence (and, ideally, to extend your proprioception to include your sword).

Some (non-fencing) ways to improve proprioception:

Lie down comfortably with your eyes shut. Visualise your body. Note the position of your limbs, fingers, toes, head. Note the angle of your elbows, knees, wrists, ankles, neck.
repeat any of the movement/balance exercises above slowly, with your eyes shut, paying close attention to where your body parts are. You can do it near a mirror, so every now and then you can open your eyes and check that your mental image matches reality
do the same thing with ordinary everyday activities. Notice how your body parts move when you're walking, typing at the computer, making a sandwich, standing waiting for the bus.

Some easy proprioception-improving fencing drills:

Do some slow advance/retreat footwork with your eyes shut. Try and feel the angle of your feet, the length of your steps, etc.
Think carefully about where your hand/arm/sword are in en garde position. Try to memorise it. Then shake your arm out, and with your eyes shut try to return to the exact same position. Open your eyes and see whether you got it right.
Do the same thing for your inside parry position, and for low parries or any other guard or parry position.
Do the same thing (moving SLOWLY) for the movement between one position and the next, for instance from your en garde to inside parry, or en garde to low parry. Notice the movement of your hand/arm/sword from point A to point B, the curve traced by your hand/elbow/tip/quillions/etc, and try to repeat it without looking.
Do wall drills (poking at a spot on the wall) first *slowly* with your eyes open (paying close attention to your movements), then with them shut. Open your eyes when you make contact with the wall, and see whether you hit the spot, and whether your hand/arm/sword/etc are where your mind visualised them as being. Repeat for different types of attacks.