The new year at the karate club started with the opportunity for a new experience: to be an assistant for the teacher at beginner's course! The role itself is very simple, and the responsibilities are quite minimal: the teacher (one of the sensei themselves or another senpai, depending on the lesson) takes care of pretty much all the lesson planning and explanations, while we assistants (one or two at a time) are the crash-test dummies to show how the techniques work. Well, fortunately there's a little more than that, such as leading some exercises, checking students' postures and movements, and providing suggestions on how to improve them.
It's been a couple of months already, and needless to say, standing sometimes on the other side is a truly beneficial experience. I had forgotten how hard it was only two years and a half ago to even understand where to put your feet in a certain stance, how to coordinate arms and legs or how to avoid falling while doing the simplest kick. Now I have not only to re-think about how to do things properly, but to understand the perspective of someone still has no clue about it, and finally find a decent way to explain that.
It comes as no surprise now, that in our club every green belt is actually required to be an assistant either in the beginner's course or in children classes, otherwise no admittance to the blue belt test.