R and M have been going to fencing class most of the summer. I’ve blogged about it before. I think the timing was somewhat inspired, to be honest. Here’s why.
Turns out that the Fencing studio does a lot more business during the school year (go figure!), and that class attendance drops to almost zero for the summer months. That meant that, while M and R were just starting out, they got to do all their crazy, clumsy, how-do-I-do-this-again? stuff in relative obscurity. Everyone else, who’s been fencing longer, was on vacation. R and M had the instructor all to themselves for ten weeks uninterrupted.
So. Now, the rest of the students have returned. They’re picking up where they left off, but there’s a new kid in each respective class. And – surprise! surprise! – these new kids know a wee bit about the sport!
In both M’s class, and in R’s class, it’s the Johnson kids who seem to regularly get used as examples of what to do. It’s the Johnson kids who pay the best attention to the instructor. It’s the Johnson kids (R, specifically) who have the basics down enough to elicit public praise from the instructor.
This is a darned good thing. Especially for R.
Last night, for example. There are four boys in R’s class. Zach, the instructor, drilled them on parry-riposte for the first half of class, then had them spar with those same drills to finish class. In R’s case, he was consistently outscoring the other boys. Now, I don’t mean to take away from R, but it wasn’t so much that he was all that good. Rather, he was just not making mistakes. The other three were making technique mistakes all over the place. All R did was do the drills correctly, wait for a mistake from his opponent, then take the easy touch when the mistake happened. And, like I said, the other three made enough mistakes that R didn’t have to wait very long. Interestingly enough, when the other boys sparred with themselves, with both sides making lots of mistakes, the sparring seemed evenly matched. It wasn’t until they sparred with R that their overall weakness in the drills became apparent.
So, Zach debriefed each of the four after sparring. To each boy he asked the question, “How did you get touched during the drill?” and each boy did a self-analysis of the mistakes they made. R was last in this process. Zach turned to R and said “How did you get…No, strike that. How was it that you so easily made all those touches?” Zach took R’s answer and used it as a lesson for the other three. Part of Zach’s lesson: in fencing, the point often comes only because your opponent made a mistake. if your mistake comes after theirs; it won’t matter. Because their mistake got you the point.
Then, after dismissing class, Zach made a beeline to me, saying “If R keeps fencing like he did just now, none of these other three will ever touch him. When he just listens and does what I tell him, good things happen.”
M’s class is different, but the theme holds. M is, by far, the smallest in her class. And last Tuesday was her first time with the full class of children. A couple of the other girls – a little older and feeling well-established in the class – did a little bit of verbal putting down of M. That didn’t last long. Zach jumped right in, defending M by saying that “she knows quite a bit about fencing. She’s been coming all summer while you’ve been on vacation.” A bit later, Zach used M as an example to the rest of the class for good footwork.
I can’t help be feel quite proud of my kids. as they both gravitate toward this unexpected sport. It’s something else to watch them both delight in getting suited up. M wears this little plastic breastplate under her jacket. R wears knickers now, as well as a jacket. They take very little prodding to get ready for fencing. They are clearly very self motivated by the sport. And it’s a lovely thing.
Looks like the last remaining piece of R’s gymnastics equipment has been sold. I have two interested buyers. The transition seems to be complete imminently. M auditions for Nutcracker in three days… wish her luck.
