Guidelines for teaching a muscular strength and endurance (MSE)/body conditioning component

• not reinforcing or praising participants’ performances • interacting only with a select few. Keep the participants focused on the exercise goal. Remember that participants look to you for support, inspiration and encouragement to reach those goals. Use positive feedback. Find something positive about an individual's exercise performance and point it out. If his or her exercise technique has improved, tell them. Use reinforcement. Keep the participants focused upon good exercise technique by reinforcing the key teaching points at regular intervals. This helps the participants concentrate on maintaining good form and avoids the tendency to resort to poor techniques when working hard. Be optimistic and enthusiastic about the workout. Instructors with these characteristics tend to put their own egos and concerns aside to see that the client is happy and enjoying the workout.

Teaching position

One of the key teaching issues when participants are performing the exercises is to maintain observation of the whole group so that errors in exercise technique can be identified and corrected. This requires walking around the group to observe technique rather than joining in with the exercise.

This is particularly important when using equipment such as barbells or dumbbells. Exercises which involve the participants lying either face down (prone) or face up (supine) on the floor or a bench must be demonstrated by the instructor whilst the group sit up and observe. Whilst the group do the exercise the instructor needs to be on their feet, observing from various angles, reinforcing teaching points, praising and gaining eye contact. They should not be performing the exercise with the group.

Class organisation

The instructor needs to take control of where the participants position their mats or benches. Telling the group which way to lie allows the instructor to position themselves in a way the whole group can see them.

Self spotting

Body conditioning classes may include exercises where a body bar or dumbbells are used as resistance whilst lying on a bench. For example, when teaching the chest press the instructor should encourage participants to keep the weight close to the hips as they lower into position. The same instruction will apply when returning to a seated position. This ensures that the weight is transferred safely, thus reducing the risk of injury.

Principles of planning and delivering group exercise | Manual | Version 1.0 © YMCA Awards 2018 59

Safe lifting technique

It’s the responsibility of the instructor to remind the group of safe lifting technique when they move equipment around. Teaching the dead lift is important when teaching a free weights to music class or using body bars.

Instructors can simply remind the group, “When moving light mats and dumbbells around the object needs to be close to the body, bending should be from the knees and hips and not the spine.”

Cueing

To keep effective timing the instructors arm can be used to mimic the exercise and to maintain pace. For example, raising the arm up and down whilst the class carry out abdominal curls. Use of body language can motivate the group as the instructor looks interested. Constant counting can become repetitive and results in not teaching or limited teaching.

Exercise demonstration

As previously stated, a common fault when teaching conditioning exercises is when an instructor performs the whole routine with the group. The problem with this scenario is that it is very hard to identify individuals who might be struggling to perform the exercise correctly when you’re down on the floor joining in. A couple of simple teaching strategies to overcome this problem are (a) demonstrate the exercise, cue the group in and stand up to observe the group performance and (b) coach the participants directly into the correct exercise position without demonstrating the exercise. Both approaches provide an opportunity to observe group performance, identify and correct individual or group technique, offer alternative exercise options and allow time for the reinforcement of key teaching points. Side demonstrations of some exercises ensure participants can see correct alignment during a demonstration.

Ideally, an instructor will explain the purpose of the exercise to the participants. Take the opportunity whilst demonstrating or teaching the exercise to educate participants about the exercise benefits and the muscles used.

Identifying the number of repetitions and sets allows the participants to gauge how much they need to do to meet overload. If they choose an easy position because they are not aware of how hard they will be working, this will result in an ineffective workout.

Exercise correction

If an individual is struggling to perform an exercise safely, for example when performing a curl up they pull on the neck, a simple rule is first to make a specific point to the group, such as “avoid straining the neck and pulling the head forward” or “relax the neck and allow the head to sit in the hands for support”. If the individual is still performing the exercise with poor technique, a walk in their direction whilst reinforcing the point to the group often has a powerful and positive effect on changing individual exercise technique. Alternatively, a quiet word in their direction as the instructor walks past might be enough. The key point here is to consider the client’s selfesteem. The emphasis needs to be on mastering technique and not highlighting their poor

Principles of planning and delivering group exercise | Manual | Version 1.0 © YMCA Awards 2018 60