Movements Afoot’s Blog

by Lesley Powell

I just returned from Japan where I was teaching a variety of Pilates workshops and Bartenieff Fundamentals(TM). My Japanese students are so excited by Pilates and somatic practices. We had full workshops for PilatesDancing, Pilates Upright, Bartenieff Fundamentals and advanced Pilates workshops.

It is very interesting to teach where English is not always understood. I do have a translator. My observation and teaching changes to get my ideas across.

I am always fascinated in my travels about the expressiveness of a culture even when you don’t understand the language. Each language has its own music, rhythms, textures of sounds and common expressions of greetings which sound like a chorus of a song. Then the gestures come to reflect the music of each language.

When you don’t understand the language, your senses sharpen. When teaching besides the translator reinterpreting your words, you use more visual and tactile cueing. Everyone understands the words “vacation” and “work”. I talk about the bad habits going on vacation and point to where needs to work. I have the students touch me as I do an exercise to feel how the muscle feels.

Then there is “good” or “bad” version. I demonstrate how the exercise should look. Then I show the worse version depending on the theme of the exercise or class. It is the versions that led me to be able to teach in Japan. At Movements Afoot, I have had many foreign students visiting where English is their new language.

In observing teachers in Japan, it is fascinating how my intuition comes into play. Since I do not understand what they are saying, I watch how the client responds.

• How does the teacher places themselves when they are cueing
• how does the client moves to the cueing
• the textures and rhythms of the language for efficient cueing.

One of the problems that I see with the teachers is not using the cues for how the clients like to learn. If the client does not respond/move well, how do you need to change your cueing. For instance, I saw teachers verbally cueing every detail of an exercise. Too much information can freeze up your client.

The example I gave the teachers is cueing for standing.

• A overly detailed of every moment to get up from a chair to standing or
• just say “stand up

A new student can only take so much information. If the choreography is new, give the student the opportunity to experience the timing and coordination of a new exercise. Then, give a deeper cue to refine the form and repeat the same exercise again.

To be a successful teacher, one has to understand how clients’ learn, how to cue well and lead different teaching situations from privates to group classes.

Dr. Martha Eddy once led a class on the nervous system and learning. We were to learn a simple hand phrase.

1. We copied her phrase
2. counted it
3. gave names/images to each movement
4. sounds to each movement
5. use tactile cues such as using the floor, wall or our bodies

Then we talked to each other which method helped us learn the phrase. Everyone had different answers! I am such a visual learner and assumed others were the same. This class really taught me to try to understand my client’s preferences for learning.

My teaching in Japan deepens my observation skills and how to communicate even when there is not the same language.