B12 Festival Reflections from Marlo

July 12 | Boulder

As movement instructors, we have an ongoing responsibility to ourselves and our students to DIG, critique, question and grow our knowledge and techniques as movers, physiologists and educators. Some very wise words on teaching from Marlo Fisken's reflections on the B12 Festival.

No matter how advanced the people in the room are, detailed observations, tips, and tasks lead to better learning than vague cues and mimicry.

Beating people up to make a point about hard work doesn’t really make the point. It just leads to injured people whose performance dwindles. You cannot transform someone into an ‘athlete’ in 2 days. Offer perspective and motivation, not a beating.

A huge amount of NEW material is less valuable that a few solid perspective-changing patterns and ideas.

Always make time to allow students to INTEGRATE the old (how they moved when they arrived that day) with the new (what was covered in class). Guide them into lengthy explorations with clear and specific directions that help them trust fall their way into less familiar patterns."

If you don't know about Flow Movement and what Marlo does, check the flava here ASAP.

One of the most important topics that I think movers and instructors need to dig into is stretching. Also known as "mobility", "range of motion", "flexibility", etc etc. Stretching is so often under taught and misconstrued leading to bad habits, poor mobility and injuries. A great place to start learning about basic stretch knowledge is this article on physiology of stretching. Keep digging and learn more!