Home | Articles | Workshops | About | Updates

One of the big issues I had as a new fencing teacher was the habit of ‘overcorrection’, where after every repetition or two of the drill I step in and give a dozen corrections: “don’t do that with your foot, move your hand like this, get lower, etc”. This is an easy way to feel like you’re doing a lot as a teacher - you’re giving lots of direct assistance, you’re very involved with your students, etc. However, this actually makes it harder for the students to learn fencing. Giving less but higher quality feedback will help students improve quicker and develop their own independence in the ring.

The first step is simply to talk less. Any piece of feedback takes time to for the student to integrate into their fencing, so if you’re stopping them for a new correction after every repetition that’s much harder for them to do. At most, a one-word reminder of the piece of advice already given should be enough, like “lower” or “relax” or “hips”. But most important is just to make sure they’ve got time to repeat it and bring it into their practice. To implement this, there are two useful details: give feedback less often, and try to keep it shorter when you do give feedback See Loading screen feedback vs. Tool-tip feedback by Jack Berggren Elers..

Next is to pick one topic - and only one. Trying to consciously integrate feedback into your fencing is difficult even when there’s just one correction, and very few students will be able to effectively correct multiple aspects of an action at once. Ideally you want to focus on the most fundamental problem that they’re currently facing. For example, if someone is trying to do an action from too far away, leaning over too much and has a bad hand position, the most fundamental problem is probably the distance. Without adjusting that they will not be able to reliably correct the other points - when they’re too far away, leaning is a natural way to try and reach. You may also find that when the fundamental issue is fixed, the consequential problems resolve themselves without further action being required. If you’re not sure which problem is most fundamental, start with the feet.

Furthermore, make your feedback positive. This doesn’t mean “say things are great”, rather “explain what to do, not just what not to do”. For example, if a student is parrying too widely, the ‘negative’ feedback point might be “don’t parry so wide”. A positive version could be “aim your sword at their shoulder” or “begin to riposte the moment you feel blade contact”. By giving positive feedback, it becomes much easier for the student to do something which is closer to ‘right’ for solving the problem they’re having. Positive feedback can be either more technical or more tactical/objective based - both have their place, and will work well for solving different types of problems and with different types of students.

Next, provide external cues. Instead of telling your student what to do with their body directly (e.g. "move the hand first"), give them a tip which frames the movement in terms of something external to them (e.g. "reach for the target"). Framing advice in this way has been shown to improve motor learning Nick Winkelman, The Language of Coaching: The Art & Science of Teaching Movement, Human Kinetics, Inc. (2020).. External cues can be given in reference to anything outside the student: clothing, their weapon, the opponent and features of the room are all useful. You can also use analogy and imagination for external cuing - a great example I stole from Keith Farrell is to help cue arm extension by telling the student to imagine a pigeon sitting on their opponent's shoulder and instructing them to "hit the pigeon".

Lastly, make sure that your advice is within the student’s control. Depending on that specific student’s proprioceptive awareness and body condition, they may or may not be able to do a particular thing. Trying to help them relax a particular muscle won’t work with someone who can’t recognise if it’s tensed. This basically just needs judging on the fly - some students may require alternative cues for particular corrections, to try and get them to a similar result by finding something their mind is able to control.

A particularly destructive habit is to correct successful repetitions of an exercise - you should only praise success. If someone has just incorporated previous corrections and was successful for the first time, there's no need to give critical feedback about another detail. That will create a negative association in their mind with the skill they have just successfully demonstrated, making it much more difficult for them to apply it in future. Let their success boost their confidence.

In summary, the key to giving actionable feedback is “provide one concrete adjustment to make, then let them train it”. Incorporating this into how I gave advice to my students made a massive difference to how fast they improved and how easily they could take my feedback on board.

I welcome questions, comments or feedback on this article. You can reach me by email:

tea at fechtlehre dot org