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Walter & Group...
[GH] Winding up our topic on teaching youngsters:-
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[GH] From Paul Arden...
Hi Gordy,
I think - can't remember if it has been - that the eye protection has to be reinforced, I tell them that the eyeball can explode if a fly hooks it - this generally gets the desired effect. Before my time on my local fishery we actually had a hook rest *on* a kids eyeball. This could have been a complete disaster on all counts. The kid was grabbed and rushed to hospital, his first reaction was to grab it, fortunately the instructor grabbed the child and prevented this from happening.
Obviously it goes without saying that every instructor should be fully insured. I don't know how common this is in the US? In the UK we've made it compulsory as part of our membership fees.
There was a video by the late Donald Downs called "Flycasting is kid's stuff". I don't know if this video is still available, but the techniques Donald used,
lifting the rod as if it was lifting a bucket of water
making a backcast as if you were spiking a balloon above your head
*pause*
forward cast as if - can't remember - maybe flicking a tomato off the tip!
Lower the rod (bucket of water)
Roll cast, answering a telephone (to Michael Evans),
forward cast, chopping a cucumber with a kitchen knife etc etc
The late Peter MacKenzie-Philps used to teach the forward cast as sticking your thumb in your teacher's eye.
The school teachers that got involved in instruction in the UK in the mid 90s didn't like any of these things. :-) Can't understand why...
In the UK now we're very careful not to be out of sight of another adult with a child, and we're not supposed to make physical contact. I'm pleased I'm not a child nowadays, I think I would grow up with a complex! I taught 1000 children one year... that was an interesting year!!
Cheers, Paul
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[GH] Paul,
Right. Eye protection is a MUST.
Even a soft yarn fly with no hook.... or the raw end of a leader can cause eye damage!
Youngsters are much less likely to arrive wearing or even possessing any sort of eye protection.
I keep a batch of inexpensive plastic "shop" glasses in my teaching bag. I'm most likely to have to break them out for use when I teach kids. I use the ones with ear pieces, not the "ski-mask" or goggle types.
I recall giving a pair to Walter Simbirski's daughter, Laura, years ago when she took one of my Conclave Workshops. She wore them and, later, called them, "my gordy glasses".
I'll check to see if Donald's video is still available.
All should heed the advice in your least sentence ... especially in this day and age.
I don't know if some fly casting schools carry liability insurance for their instructors.
Personal liability insurance coverage can be purchased privately as a "rider" to home-owners insurance policies.
Here is a link to Fannie Krieger's DVD on teaching kids to fly fish, TOMORROW'S FLY FISHERS :
Gordy
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[GH] I was just reviewing some of Tom White's teaching tricks.
One trick which works well with both adults and kids, is the purposeful overloading the fly rod with a line 2 or 3 weight designations greater than that of the rod. Helps to teach the all important "feel" of rod loading.
Another, is the marking of the fly line at the end of the head. Some instructors recommend marking the line at the point they recommend for the amount of line out of the rod tip for kid's flycasting exercises.
Short tapered leaders work better for kids, in my experience.
Tom kept a special rig for just that. The "fly-line" was made up of a 20' segment of heavy nylon monofilament. Shorter for youngsters. The leader was designed with short fast taper. He had a series of "rod bending" exercises designed to get that point across. He also used it for some of his PULD maneuvers. *
When teaching on grass, he'd sometimes stretch out a roll of plastic sheeting (6 mil. VISQUEEN) and spray water on it with a hose. This made the pick-up be a bit more as though done on water.
* PULD = Pick-up & Lay-down.
Gordy
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