Color Guard: How Can I Learn Faster?

Now that you've aced your auditions for winter guard, or soon will, your season starts with a lot of technique and new choreography. That means, after getting to that comfortable auto-pilot phase of performing at the end of last season, you now have to start learning to learn again.

Some people learn quicker than others and I wanted to give a few tips to those who may find themselves wanting to be more efficient learners.

  1. Think Big Picture First  

Everyone knows that one person on your team that always asks super detailed questions after the choreography teaches the first 8 counts. Don't be that girl or guy! You need to look at the big picture first before you start getting into the details.

First - Watch the general movements of the flag or weapon. For example, is it going up and over to the right or to the left, or is it making a cone up or a cone forward.

Second - Look at the hand positioning of each movement (don't worry about counts yet!)

Third - Look at the body underneath. This is a pet peeve of mine, considering I'm the movement instructor for any guard I work with! What do the feet do? Do they go into passé? Are you up on relevé? Does your leg rond de jambe around? What about your free hands?

Keep in mind, you don't need to get all the big picture components perfectly, but you do need to know what they are!

  2. Count or Talk as You Spin  

Most color guards I teach either count through most of their sections or talk through them (up, down, around, over the mountain, wiggle wiggle, whatever works!). It's usually something we make them do when they're not getting the choreography or spinning together, but I recommend that you use the technique when you're first learning the work. If you feel weird talking out loud, try doing it silently. If you start talking yourself through the choreography, you'll actually be using a larger portion of your brain and connecting more neurons so that you can start to put it into your long term memory rather than remember it for 2 seconds and then struggle to get through it once the instructor isn't in front of you anymore.

  3. Divide into Chunks  

Sometimes the instructors do this for you as they teach, but if not, make sure you do it for yourself. Divide the work into manageable, logical sections or "chunks." It may be every 16 counts makes sense, but maybe 8 counts is more manageable for you. Then practice each chunk separately. I like to do one chunk a few times, and then move on to the next chunk. Then I connect the two chunks together. Every time I do a chunk, I first think about what comes before it, and then as I finish the chunk, I think about what comes next. That will help your brain start to put the pieces together because your brain needs to understand the work before your muscles will start getting it right (for most people anyway.

  4. Don't Stop, But Go Slow  

After you've learned each of the chunks, try this one! One technique I found particularly useful when I was at Carolina Crown was to force myself not to stop as I went through the work. I had a habit of getting to a part and making a mistake, pausing, and then resuming the work. Or I would do a chunk, my brain would freeze, and then I'd do the next chunk. I realized I was trying to take the work up to the right tempo. I tried slowing myself down and forcing myself to do every count in time, to that slower tempo. I found that I could get my brain to go through the work and not let me stop spinning. Eventually then I could pick up the tempo little by little and was back up to speed, but without pausing!


Do you have a technique for learning faster that works for you?