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This past weekend, my wife and I kept our granddaughter for the weekend while her parents were away. My granddaughter is 6 years old and almost finished with kindergarten. It’s a great age for learning. Lots of curiosity and questions with few barriers to learning.

I just can’t help myself. As a coach, trainer, and mentor professionally, it’s my true love to teach people things. One of my hobbies is chess. My granddaughter is competitive, loves games, and likes to win. When she spends a weekend with us, I’ve been slowly exposing her to the game. It started with teaching her the names of the pieces and how to set them up on the board. This past weekend we played a game for the first time. I find myself now reflecting on the principles of teaching someone new something that we have learned. Here are just a few of my insights.

Fun but not easy. Learning must be fun to maintain interest. With my granddaughter, I needed to stay in touch with how she was enjoying the lesson. New learners can lose interest quickly once the fun is gone. Just as importantly, interest is maintained by challenge. If it’s too easy, it quickly loses its attraction. It’s a delicate balance that an experienced teacher knows is the difference between being able to guide the student forward progressively or losing them all together.

Fundamentals are the building blocks. A good teacher can dissect a complex subject down to the most basic of truths. These truths must be learned if the student is going to be able to be proficient as they progress. This meant that I needed to start by teaching the rules of movement for each piece on the chessboard. It would have been a mistake to try to instruct her on game strategy if she did not first know the unique rules of movement for each piece.

Questions are the key to engagement. My granddaughter didn’t need a lecture, but she did need engagement to stimulate her understanding. Asking her questions about her next move and where she saw possibilities focused her thinking. Interestingly, she would answer my question with questions about whether she was making the right choice. If the student is engaged like this, learning is happening.

Winning reinforces interest. It’s important the student experiences the feeling of progress, improvement, and winning. A good teacher doesn’t let the beginner drown in feelings of failure. That doesn’t mean failure isn’t a necessary and essential part of learning, rather it’s the feeling of failure that must be avoided. It’s okay to lose if there is learning and growth.

Perhaps the most difficult part of teaching is the reality that no two students are the same. It would be great for teachers if there was a script that we could follow without regard to the individual student and get 100% results every time. It doesn’t work that way. It’s not enough to know what to teach, it’s much more important to know how to teach. How to teach starts with assessing what each individual student needs.

If you are reading this because you are responsible for teaching someone new and you would like some coaching on how to do it better, please reach out and let’s discuss.