Fabian Seymour - 143967

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Awards Completed

MLW RCI ML
Member Of

Indoor Climbing Record

Details

Date : 01/05/2018

Duration : 1-2 hours

Grade :

Grade : N/A

Style : Assistant Leader/Instructor

Type : Top-Roping & Bouldering

Routes : 0

Flagged :

Description

Instructor at Harrogate Climbing Centre
- 2h week 1/3 adults beginners. Getting to try out more of my teaching style with an introduction to tying in & belaying (using Introduction, Demonstration, Explanation, Action, Summary) approach
- 1h - belaying for a blind chap
- 1.5h - Rockets - Bell ringing and autobelay session with 7 kids
- 1.5h NICAS 1-3 Hangtime sign-off session
6h total in May

After this session I decided to stop working for Harrogate (mainly because the number of sessions per week and the timing of them made this financially unviable).

I greatly enjoyed doing this. However I found that bell-ringing with groups of kids was rather tedious.
Reflecting on the bell ringing group sessions, the hardest thing I found was remembering their names. Also with kids the grass is always greener on the other side, so trying to mix things up is good even if it's just running two lines next to each other in a different bay. It's been interesting managing odd numbered groups with a three and a two. Generally I've learnt early on that getting them to group by size helps greatly - ensuring pre-flight checks are always done and also to remove slack from the system before lowering any of the kids. Keeping positive and enthused is also important.

With NICAS, it was often difficult having levels 1 and 3 in the same group. However it almost became self-managing. Getting the L3s to talk through warm-ups for example to the L1s and see them do that particular exercise. I also had to become a bit more direct with them. They all have different parts of their syllabus they need signing off and are still kids. I have no idea what they each need to do (and frankly didn't actually care). So I made it clear it was for them to come and tell me what parts they wanted to do and then to make sure I did that with them. Again, trying to partner up a diverse group who could be 10-16 years old and every size in between proved challenging at times - remembering sandbags was something I was generally crap at.

With adult sessions I'm used to having more time with them and less of them. My style was very much helping them understand what they are doing and why. For example there is a good reason for not having a stopper know 6 ins away from the figure of 8. I like people to understand why I'm insisting on it rather than just be told that. It aids learning and understanding. However the centre is a conveyor belt and although the sessions I ran were good (I know this as the Centre Manager asked the clients whether they enjoyed it and they all seemed to and said so without my knowledge), I was criticised for not getting them live-belaying within the first hour. I also learnt that for absolute newcomers, their eyes and minds are simply on the height and verticality of the walls and that is intimidating and mentally consuming. So I like to get a quick climb out of the way in order that they can trust the system even if not fully understanding it. It makes teaching tying in/belaying far easier if they are not all staring at the wall saying 'gosh that's really high isn't it'?

This is a bit of a reflection from my time with Harrogate Climbing Centre. I think for me I work better privately - not with pre-paid groups. Working with 2-3 adults or older kids is far more rewarding than bell-ringing.

Area : Harrogate Climbing Centre

Location

Marker
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