The Art of Teaching: Learning!

Viola Moriarty, Denver CO

“Learning is finding out what you already know.
Doing is demonstrating that you already know it.
Teaching is reminding others that they know just as well as you.
You are all Learners, Doers, Teachers.” –Bach

It seems that each TCC class I teach I learn so much. There is the student who is over eighty and he comes every week, session after session, without fail. He says he doesn’t understand all this “TC stuff” but he comes for the exercise and to be with people. Lately he says TCC has improved his posture. There is the student who tries too hard and gets so discouraged and eventually drops out. Some people learn the movements easily and quickly and some don’t, but what they get out of it seems to be much more related to showing up consistently and being willing than to how well they perform the movements. It has been interesting to see how adults listen and learn and how differently people respond to help or correction. So teaching TCC has been growth producing in terms of learning to teach, but it is also helping me to look at my own learning and listening. What kind of student am I? Am I showing up and being open to what my teacher has to offer? Steve Ridley told me once that people learn a lot from teaching and he was right. I feel very grateful both for my personal practice and for the opportunity to learn from sharing TCC with others.

Also, I found this in some papers I had saved and found it relative to Teaching TCC. I don’t know who wrote it, but here it is:

“Imagine that you are a midwife; you are assisting at someone else’s birth. Do good without show or fuss. Facilitate what is happening rather than what you think ought to be happening. If you must take the lead, lead so that the mother is helped, yet still free and in charge. When the baby is born, the mother will rightly say, “We did it ourselves!”