Steal Their Mojo

BY LANE MCLAUGHLIN PSIA/AASI-NW TECHNICAL VP

The McLaughlin Report

By the time you read this, you’ll probably be into your early season routine. Training to become a better teacher, taking on new lesson challenges and starting to get feedback from directors, peers and clients about what makes you a good teacher. Hopefully your quest is not only to be recognized for what you do well and what comes naturally to you, but to also expand your skills and talents into areas that are new and progressive. Looking at the skills and talents of others and recognizing what you’d like to try, adopt and perhaps even copycat is a great way to keep inspired throughout the season and to become an even better teacher. So, your challenge, if you choose to accept it, is to look for that special teaching ‘mojo’ in others and attempt to ‘steal’ it for yourself. Here are some examples of unknowing ‘victims’ I’ve ambushed in the past.

The Comedian

All right, admittedly I recognize that a comedian is not actually a teacher, other than perhaps pointing out that we’re not all perfect. But, there is a very special mojo a great comedian possesses, and that’s the ability to create a stage presence that draws in the audience’s attention and has them hanging on every word. The comedian never blasts into their bag of tricks until they’ve drawn in every crowd member. Perhaps it’s with a big “how you all doing?”, or a very animated and maybe even quirky visual appearance, or some kind of physical stunt that makes you go “huh?”. Something is done to snap in everyone’s attention, and even more importantly, hook them into an eager (not skeptical) anticipation of “where’s this going?”

So, click on the comedy channel or drop into your local comedy club and do a little homework while you’re busting a gut. How does the comedian draw you in and keep you hooked? The techniques may range from the use of wit and words, to intelligent analysis of human behavior, to pure silliness and physical humor, to a grasp of current events and social culture. Pay attention to what works on you and what seems to work for the crowd. One of the best ways to enjoy your time with your guests is to feel as though you have their attention and that you can entertain them during your ski and snowboard time together. Steal the comedian’s mojo for yourself and bring that fun factor to the mountain.

The Yoga Master

The yoga teacher is like a teacher on steroids, but all natural, of course. Similar to snowsport instruction, the yoga teacher has to communicate physical movements to their guests, analyze the quality of movements, provide feedback, and coach individuals to breakthrough plateaus in performance. The mojo really comes out in just how precise the great yoga teachers are in describing the exact movement, with the right intensity, intention, purpose, direction and energy; all to attain specific benefits. The actual tone and pacing of the instruction matches the physical effort. How instructions are spoken is as important as what is actually described. To facilitate a flow of movement, the yoga teacher cannot be disjointed, random, too verbose, nor babbling with the instructions. To facilitate the right physical movements, the yoga teacher cannot be vague or incorrect with cause and effect understanding of movements. This accuracy and effective communication is something we are all striving to be better at in the snow world.

So, drop into a studio near you and try a yoga lesson. Come dressed in the disguise of a yogi wanting some stretch and sweat and flow, and covertly keep your ears and eyes and mind open to how skilled the yoga master is at facilitating the session. Let your muscles get spongy while your mind sponges up all the mojo you can steal for your own teaching skills and then develop that mojo yourself with your clientele. Become very precise with what you want your crew to do, what the benefits are, and how one activity is part of the flow to the next activity.

The Gym Teacher

Controlled chaos, in a nutshell! If the gym teacher can take 20-30 kooky kids who have been repressed by small desks, chairs, books and lectures, and get them to play in a collectively organized way, then there’s some mojo we can definitely steal to facilitate play time with groups half that size. ‘Play’ is the expectation when going into gym, so ‘organization’ has to be spun a bit more covertly by the gym teacher. Watch how the gym teacher uses a very command oriented style to effectively grab an energized group’s attention, while efficiently getting out the instructions needed to get the activity started. Only enough is said to get to the next step. As the group sees that getting organized is the key to getting to play, whether it be lining up, or selecting equipment, or choosing teams, or assigning positions, or hearing the ground rules, they’ll trust the teacher and their command style. This is obviously very important to us, where play is important but safety is paramount.

So, see if you can go observe a gym class at your neighborhood school, or hang out at the local park with the youth teams practicing, or check if your athletic club has some kid-play sessions - some kind of opportunity where you can watch a good kids coach facilitate a fun session and somehow orchestrate a lot of ‘moving parts’. Then, steal a bit of this mojo for yourself to help facilitate safe play and hopefully your clients will remember the experience as more of a game of learning than the school of skiing/ snowboarding.