Last Updated2 June 2023

Using, Adapting and Creating Progressions covers the ways that you can structure, deliver and prepare for lessons. Learn how to put together activities to develop new skills, structure presentations and deliver information. Understand how to create longer teaching sessions to explore the mountain and continue to develop skills.

Copying, Choosing & Creating

Let’s look at the decision-making process and progression building from the standpoint of the instructor based on how much experience they have.

The NZSIA believes in the “copy, choose, create” theory. Simply put, this means as an instructor develops and experience is gained the instructor develops how they construct their lessons and make decisions.

Copy

A new or less experienced instructor needs a starting point. At this stage, the instructor needs lessons or progressions to “copy”. What this means is that the decision making has been done prior to the lesson starting and often by a trainer or fellow instructor.

The steps or progressions that a newer instructor uses generally have been suggested to them by someone with more experience. Most experienced instructors have a series of activities that they have memorised and use as the basis for their beginner lessons. These progressions have been used many times and have been proven to be successful. This lesson can then be copied by a less experienced instructor who will also see success using these steps.

Choose

Once an instructor has gained some experience they will likely have multiple ideas or progressions they have used and tried with their students. Ideally, they will start to reflect on these lessons and start to make educated decisions about which activities or progressions they will use. This will enable the instructor to look more closely at their students and pick activities that are more closely tailored to the specific student.

This knowledge of different activities is often called a “tool box”; the more experience an instructor gets the bigger this tool box gets. This tool box, when combined with the ability to analyse the students and reflect on previous experience, will enable the instructor to be more versatile in their lessons and ultimately give their students a better experience.

Create

Now the instructor will be able to adapt in the moment. The experience they have gained and the developed decision-making skills will allow the instructor to build progressions as the student learns. Each step or activity will truly be decided upon once the performance has been analysed. The ability to adapt the activities and pre-learned progressions to the student is key. The instructor will also be able to adjust the activities to multiple students at the same time and relate to their differing needs and individual goals.