This is the sort of thing I was talking about in the
Belt Rank Progress thread when I wrote:
"It still bemuses me that black belts and other advanced ranks are expected to be teachers.
Martial arts are a specific skill. Teaching is a different skill which (typically) requires instruction to learn. An effective teacher of martial arts must have two skill sets: Martial arts and Teaching." Kirk
I got thrown into teaching during a period of relative instability and uncertainty of my school's future, at 17, as a first degree black belt. I had a lot of what the instructors called, "Natural Talent," and I was basically always, "karate-ing," as my mother liked to say. Compulsively, and Obsessively, were words used. I prefer to think devotedly and diligently, but ok, whichever. Long story short, I zoomed up through the ranks, passing everyone around me, got a dark piece of fabric a good deal sooner than I wish I had, and got a reputation of being really good and never messing up. (Which was not true, I was just sneaky and fast at fixing mistakes!)
When the Saturday teacher's health declined, I was the highest rank in regular attendance at that class, and the head instructor asked me to step in as a teacher. I've been teaching for about 7 years now, and I have been teaching multiple classes a week for most of that time, and at this point, I like to think I give pretty reasonable instruction. I'm pretty sure I spent about 3 years giving absolutely crud-tastic classes, full of confusing explanations, non-sequential training, lack of control of any children who showed up for class, and just general BAD teaching. Now, I'm willing to say that I had and still have pretty good technique. It takes a long time to figure out how to get that technique across to a single, focused adult student, let alone a mixed class of everybodies and anybodies.
That hectic, chaotic, generally unsuccessful account is also coming from a school where we start having students lead warm-ups at green belt, require they attend lower-level classes at red belt to help out, and where I was used at the co-pilot type assistant instructor for some classes at our probationary Black Belt rank. I can't even imagine the utter destruction of all order and goodwill towards men that would have occurred had I just jumped in cold...
Which is my long-winded way of agreeing completely with mister Kirk, and of saying that teaching is something that you can't just DO, just because you have the material. Certain techniques took me a few years to figure out a good breakdown for teaching them effectively, and that's assuming a one-on-one situation with a student who really tries. Teaching is a skill set of it's own, and it completely changes, whether you have a class of attentive adults, or parents and ducklings, or just children with two hyper-active kids with Asperger's thrown in for good measure.
I would ask your instructor to give you teaching instruction. Maybe let you assistant teach a class for a year or so, gradually giving you more control of the reins. That's how I wish I had started.
