chas1022 said:
This question is for the instructors on this site. What is the best way u have found that a student gets the most from your lessons?Should u ask questions or just do what a instructor tells u to do? I think I should take notes and really focus on what the instructor says or does. If I'm not sure of something ask questions about it. Any advise would be appreciated.
Focus on understanding not what, but why. If your instructor tells you "you should move your right leg a little forward in your stance", he will probably tell you why: "you're not balanced in your stance; because your right leg is so far back, you're leaning a lot of weight on your bridge hand, which causes extra muscle tension, which impedes a good, natural cueing action. With a good stance, you should be able to stand in your stance balanced comfortably, even if you don't have a table in front of you."
If you're too focused on "make sure my leg is far enough forward", then you've missed the point, and very soon in your practice, you may realize you've forgotten how to exactly find the stance that your instructor helped you discover during your lesson. But if you've focused on all the "whys", then in your practice you can examine your stance and correct it yourself based on what you've learned, and maybe as your game evolves, you'll find that there are different tweaks to your stance that will help you even more, and you won't need an instructor to figure them out for you.
Sorry, this post was long and rambling (I don't think I can be concise before about 9:30 AM), but if you learn what the instructor tells you to do, you'll eventually forget or relapse. If you learn WHY the instructor tells you what he tells you, then you can continue being your own instructor into the future. I think that's how to get the most out of lessons.
-Andrew