How To Teach Skills on Zoom

Teaching online tests the mettle of any teacher, instructor or coach.

You can’t fudge things so easily when you’re online.

I remember years ago watching Master Alexscovery Teacher Peggy Williams in my Sydney Studio at Milson’s Point, using her hands deliberately and expertly to bring about tremendous changes in her student.

At one point – while working with a trainee – I watched her place her hand in an unusual place. 

“Why are you putting your hand there?” I asked.

She looked at me mischievously, a little pixie smile on her face - tinged with guilt - and replied:

“I don’t know.”

It wasn’t a ruse. She really didn’t know. 

And I think there are a lot of teachers of Alexander, Music, Yoga, Pilates, Exercise, Sports, Weight-training etc. etc. who also don’t know why they do what they do.

On Zoom, that won’t work.

Precision is the name of the game in online teaching, coaching and guidance. Words matter, because touch is unavailable.

What is available is the ability to analyse, experiment and gather information – providing you can understand what your student is doing. The base of this understanding is knowing your movement system.

You can’t breathe without using your movement system.

You can’t talk without using your movement system.

You can’t think without using your movement system.

So how well do you understand it? 

How well do you understand these ideas that govern movement analysis?

- all movements combine foundational and specific components;
- there is a sequential order to a movement which dictates its efficiency;
- disruptions at a proximal level will exponentially disrupt distal precision;
- unless weight-bearing, first utilise joints closest to the action;
- coordination needs positive directions for functional accuracy.

And so on. 

All these concepts – and a whole lot more - are covered in BodyChance’s BodyThinking Online course. Everything I discovered and learnt from my 45 years of studying the work is distilled in these 66 videos, which covers three areas of Study.

It looks like an anatomy course, but it is not. It is a guide for anyone teaching movement arts – or for anyone who wants to increase their self-knowledge. It is about how everything works together, not about parts.

The insights will change the way you think about moving – and will give you the skills you need to help others on Zoom. Also, you get access to teachers with a combined experience exceeding two centuries teaching online. BodyChance put together a Symposium in May:

“How to Teach Online (by example)” with Cathy Madden, Greg Holdaway, Malcolm Bald, Lucia Walker and others. It’s a superlative example of Master teachers working in the new medium of Zoom.

All this, and more. You can read about and buy it on this page:

BodyThinking Online + “How to Teach Online (by example)”

https://bodychance.mykajabi.com/store/oTZvjLye