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When I first started teaching classes, the single thing which helped me improve the most was making plans. Those first plans weren’t necessarily very good - there might be a couple of decent drills stolen from workshops at events, but the class would be incoherent and the feedback badly delivered. However, by planning the class and then reviewing what was good or bad afterwards, I was able to start to improve. The basic cycle I use is very simple but still effective.

Plan: This doesn’t have to be a good plan, it just has to be a plan. “I’ll a warmup, then these 5 drills for 15 minutes each, then it’s sparring time” is a perfectly workable basic plan. You should know what the point of your plan is - what will it do if it’s “successful” - and what you’ll be doing to actually follow it. With time and practice, your plans will get better and better. My previous entry on creating coherent classes might be useful it you’re struggling to come up with a plan for a session.

Do: Go teach it. Do your class. As far as reasonably possible, try to follow your plan - if it’s terrible, then you can ditch parts of it. While you’re doing it, try to make a mental note when stuff worked well or when you had to modify / discard things to make progress. Was an exercise too complicated to explain? Did a drill need specific prior experience? This stuff will be critical for the next step of the process. However, don’t get distracted by reviewing/re-planning: the purpose of this stage is still to teach the class, not to make the next class better planned.

Review: As soon as possible once you’ve done it, do a quick review. Mentally run through the plan you had and note down which bits worked and which bits needed adjustment. When something needed work, try to also note down a thought about how you might make it work better next time. If you abandoned the plan, why did you ditch it? Write this stuff down, so you can refer to it the next time you’re planning a class - whether on this topic or another topic. Getting your review done as soon as possible is really useful because the information is still fresh in your mind, so make it a part of your usual ‘end of class’ procedure, like packing away gear.

The great value of planning and reviewing is it allows you to capture any progress you make. If you’re trying new stuff regularly (which is probably a good idea) some of it will be good and some of it will be terrible. Using an iterative cycle like this means that the good stuff stays in your rotation and can be used in future, while the bad stuff is identified and dropped away. It doesn’t even have to be used for planning classes - you can apply exactly the same approach to your own fencing, to interpretations, to writing articles, whatever. Start with a loose version and repeatedly refine it by evaluating what works and what needs further fixes, and you’ll always be moving in a sensible direction.

This process does have one key limitation, which is that it is susceptible to ‘local maximums’. Because you’re iterating from your previous approaches, it’s hard to make a fundamental change to how you’re doing stuff. For example, if you start with a technique focused group class, this will tend to produce the best version of that you can reasonably create - but it won’t help you move to a problems/tactics focused class, or to primarily teaching through individual lessons. You can help address this by deliberately taking big jumps occasionally: try out an approach that’s radically different to your current model for a few sessions, see what works and doesn’t work about it.

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

tea at fechtlehre dot org