The Problem with new spinners today...

Ive been spinning poi for a good two years now, and I am always more than willing to teach anyone who wants to learn.

Now a bit of background info: Sunbeam, Konsti (troubled badger notjingt to lose) and I (and also another friend) are all at University together.

Here there are many spinners.

The number is growing as well...

however, there is one thing that for some odd reason annoys me (well, not reallys annoys, more like its me being a bit grumpy)

Hyperloops.

I had been spininng for two years before these dumbfounded contraptions of moves were invented.

I learnt the "moves" in poi as most people do (2 beat/ chase, butterfly, corkscrew, 3 beat, 4, 5, etc) and then i learnt hyperloops.

But nowerdays people are wanting to learn Hyperloops straight away.

But I say NO!

My question to you is:

Is my saying NO! justified?

Should people, when learing this Poi malarky, start with easy moves or go straight into hard technicalised stuff?

Is there even a correct order in which to learn spinning?

*mandoratory suck up to not offend anyone coming up*

This post isnt aimed at ANYONE on here and i dont not mean to cause offence. If you dont like what im saying, then print up a t-shirt and tell the world. I dont care.

*mandatory suck up finished*

good question.
long answer.
read this.

ive been spinning for 10 months as u know ucof, should i be trying to learn technical stufF???

does 10 months qualify me? cause ??? cause ??? i wanna learn them, and have learnt a few and am progressing onto some crazy ones?

do i qualify? and am a a "new spinner"??

I would say your better off having a good grounding in the basics first. But then I'm willing to admit I'm wrong.

Where do you draw the line? Can you do a thread the needle behind your head and back? How about a 4 beat behind your back or head?

Hyperloops are a family of moves and although technically more difficult, who's to say where they should be learnt in order.

There is the argument that poi moves reveal themselves to you over time and that's true but you often need the initial seed (or knowing something exists) or you could miss something.....I think. This isn't the same as been showing somthing like that though.

i hope not.... p i've only been spinning since october! i think he means NEWbies like 'ooh i picked up poi last week show me hyperloops!'

IMO (which stands for In Monkeys Opinon)

its not about what "moves" you have

its about the control you have over the poi

you can start with tangles before cross follow if you want and\or can

you might find it a bit tricky

but i know an über juggler who did exactly that

and now he's rather good at them

i say if they want to lear n hyperloops teach them, its then not ur fault if they end up as a 5 trick woner, not knwoing how to spin properly!

still its you who will get bad mouthed!

I don't think that you can say that you cant learn the hard stuff first. But I kinda defeats the reason of calling them the advanced hard moves if they are learnt first. Plus it's a whole lot easier to learn hyperloops, wraps and isolations once youve got the basics done first. I have been spinning for just under eight months and would call myself a new spinner but at the same time I would call myself a good spinner. I would have loved to learn the hard stuff first but it's like trying to run when you can't walk. Now having got hyperloops under my belt I'm not that impressed and I don't really see what all the fuss is about.

laZy

i don't think there's any right or wrong, people can learn whatever they want - if you won't teach them then someone else will.

but if they don't learn the basics first then they will be rubbish, basicaly. they will be able to do those tricks, but they won't be able to progress much in any direction till they know the building blocks.

people always ask me to teach them to do btb waeves before they can do a reverse weave - it's possible to learn btb forewards, but much harder, so i never teach till they can do both forewards and reverse. I could try teaching fwd btb, but they normally find it too hard and just give up - it's in people interest to learn properly if they want to take it further.


However if they just want to learn that trick, it's really up to them, they know what they want, and as long as you've explained to them the progression why shouldn't they learn whatever they want?

humph....more like the problem with old spinners today

No seriously....different people develop at different rates. Personally I've been learning for *counts fingers* 9 months and had the 5 beat fwd/bkwd basic weave nailed within a cuple days of trying and that was about 2 months after I started spinning....but....I only saw a hyperloop being done about 2 weeks ago and nailed it reasonably quick. But could I do it because I've now been spinning consistently for the last 9 months and have the technique or just because they're actually incredibly easy to do?? If I had seen them done earlier I'm sure I would have nailed it earlier but of course I'll never find out now.

So in answer to your question....

"....people are wanting to learn Hyperloops straight away. But I say NO! ......is my saying NO! justified?"

No. I don't think so. I think if they want to learn show them how to pull off the move, explain the basics of it but explain your thoughts on the importance learning the basics and technique first. Do you have structured lessons? Then make sure that hyperloops aren't in them.
Don't stop spreading the knowledge of moves, you could be holding up the next poi prodigy!!

yeah. I think you can teach anyone anything they want. weather they can do it is another matter, and you might suggest a few things to get them there...

so the kids want hyperloops, give them to them, watch thoes planes. give them heavy poi to practice with too, if you can do it you can, and thats great, you kneed joy in your poi to put the hours in to realise your planes. peaple find them in the end, but mainly through trying to learn tricks that are too hard for them.

besides, if something is really difficult then you should straight right away, cos its gonna take ages.

Later madam bovery

T

p.s. isolations are always good, they are damm hard and take a few months of practice at least, its shure to get teh newbie going, one way or the other... hehehe

I think that many of what we call advanced moves aren't necessarily harder to learn than the basics if they're taught properly.

It took me 3 months to learn a reverse 3-beat and I've occasionaly taught it to someone in an hour.

I don't think that one handed butterfly combinations are technically more difficult than 3 beat stuff.

I've recently been teaching a girl who's got a lot of potential who's picked up the basics really quickly, last week I started to show her how to do releases/throws.

On the other hand I was recently showing someone else some basics but she was constantly asking how to do five beats. I found it a little annoying as I was trying to help her achieve a more relaxed and stable three beat.

To me, she really needed to sort out her 3 beat before working on getting extra beats in and my feeling was that I was wasting time which could be spent either teaching someone else more willing to listen, or practising my own stuff.

Whereas, the first girl put in a lot of effort to learn the basics I showed her and made a big effort to put thought into learning to slow down the moves as I suggested, so I was totally happy to spend more time teaching her and introduce her to some release moves.

Part of why I wanted her to try this was to satisfy my own curiosity about whether releases are genuinely advanced or whether it's just a tradition to teach them last.

I think everyone should get a firm grasp of the basics before trying anything technical and complicated. If someone doesn't have a firm grasp of your basic 3-beat weave. Meaning making look clean, not having problems, being able to move the planes around and all the tweeks to it. When they get to harder more technical moves its gonna be that much harder to control the planes keep it looking clean and even from looking good at all.

I think if you havn't been spinning for long and are just starting make sure you have everything down before you move on to more technical stuff. It will help you learn moves in the long run.

I made the mistake of not learning my windmills and corkscrews clockwise when i first started and had to go back and relearn those moves. Believe me it was frustrating.

Personally, when I teach, I bring spinners through the basics first, to give them a foundation from which to build upon.

Different spinners learn at different speeds. I am a slow learner, and I know this. I am a decent spinner, in my opinion.

I'm not a trick spinner, though I love learning new tricks. What I've been told I do and do well is move and dance with the poi. Oh and rolly pollies too.

Seriously, though, I am not able to teach folks hyperloops because I'm not there, nor am I able to teach isolations.

I can teach behind the back reverse weave, but not btb forward.

Unless the spinner in question seems to be comfortable and smooth with reverse to forward weave turns, I tend to hold off on the extra beat moves until their planes seem decent, and they've relaxed.

HOWEVER, as I said earlier, different people learn at different speeds, so I've had to learn to be flexible.

One of my friends/students has an amazing grace to his spinning. He's probably close to the level I'm at as a spinner, and has been at it for less than a year. He can even move, and dance as he spinns, which is totally amazing to me. It took me about a year to really start moving with it...but then...I'm a slow learner.

Now that I've rambled, and written a novel...I'm going to finish eating my breakfast.

Jon, this morning*

Quote:

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Hyperloops.

I had been spininng for two years before these dumbfounded contraptions of moves were invented.

---

OK, my neck needs a stretch

No-one invented hyperloops!

I know this because I used to do hyperloops with lengths of rope many years ago, before I even knew what poi were. But that doesn't mean I invented hyperloops, does it?

You could even say it was the first ever "move" I learned. At the time it didn't look like it could be of much use to anyone so I stopped doing it. When I found poi, I read hyperloop instructions which confused me into no longer being able to remember how I originally did them, although i know it's definitely the same move. Is this the right way to learn?

Anyway, that's how it happened for me

(*only joking luv )

replace "invented" with "got popular"

this means that you have now got to take out the "were" in the sentence as well, but you know what i mean.

I'm always amazed at how fast I can teach someone to learn moves.

I think I taught what took me a year to a certain someone in a weekend. And not even very much time on the weekend too.

To answer your question, YES, you are justified in saying "No" to teaching a newbie spinner tricks before they are ready.

When teaching chemistry, I've got tons of tricks that I COULD tell the kids to allow them to get the 'right answer' on an exam without actually learning the concept. Of course, I don't tell them the tricks until AFTER I feel that they've learned the concepts. And the same is true for poi.

As a poi teacher I feel that I have a responsibility to teach theory and philosophy as well as 'moves'. And if you're not willing to buy into that, then go find another teacher.

Or UCOF, you could just be a jerk about it which is always fun... just keep saying things like:

-"Here, watch me!" [And do the hyperloop slightly differently every time]
-"You're thinking about it too much! Just let your mind clear"
-"Let the poi move you"
-"You've almost got it... try it faster and closer to your face."
-"Visualize it"
-"Be the poi"
-"Yup, that's it!" [When they clearly can't do it]
-"Watch, 1,2,3,3,2,1!" [Just count randomly while doing the trick for no apparent reason]
-"Try it without the poi first"
-"It doesn't work unless they're on fire"
-"I learned that in London, I can't teach it in New York" [Works for me only]
-"Which move did you want to learn? This one?!" [And then continue doing the wrong trick] "Or this one"?

Hee hee... the list continues... and yes, I do realize that I'm giving the entire London Crew ammo for the next time I ask them to explain a trick.

I got a DJ friend that works in clubs and whenever someone asks him for a request he always says one of two things... either "Yo, I just played that" or "I'm gonna put that on next"... Translate it to poi and use as necessary.

But again, that's just me being silly. I do think we have a responsibility to incorporate proper philosophy and technique in teaching as well as showing where to put your hands for a hyperloop.