Though Capoeira has spent the past couple of decades expanding its reach around the world, in many aspects its pedagogy has remained consistent in recent decades. As new cultures embrace the art, it’s difficult to see this remaining to be the case. With so many movement groups and sports exchanging ideas from a variety of disciplines, it feels inevitable that over time, Capoeira will be impacted, and teachers need to be open minded to this. This article has avoided how Capoei

Hopefully the previous section gave a solid understanding of some of the key ideas behind Skill Acquisition, and how we can view modern Capoeira training methods through this lens. It is clear however that the skill level of elite Capoeiristas today is phenomenal compared to the past. So before we look at some ideas at improving Capoeira teaching, let’s try and understand this. Firstly, as previously mentioned, many modern Capoeira teachers are now professional, dedicating th

In this section I’ll take a look at skill development within Capoeira. Obviously the research in this area is vast, and ever growing, but I’ll look at a couple of the key names in motor learning field, and then some thoughts on applying the ideas introduced For me this is the most interesting aspect of this review of Capoeira teaching, and where there is most to learn. Skill Acquisition – Key Concepts Nikolai Bernstein It’s hard to talk about research in skill acquisition wit

The Performance Pyramid In this section I’d like to introduce the idea of the Performance Pyramid by the US Physical Therapist, Grey Cook. This model is activity agnostic, but gives a structure that any teacher can use to assess students, and plan their training appropriately. The pyramid is made of 3 sections, and the coaching begins with assessing the foundation, and building upwards. The sections are movement, performance and skill. An optimal pyramid would look as follows

Though my own Capoeira journey began in a local English park in 1999, I instantly knew that I wanted to travel and learn the art in Brazil. As mentioned, there was very little Capoeira outside of Brazil at this time, and as I began to love the training, being able to do this alongside the delights of travelling and understanding another culture quickly became a goal. By mid 2001 I was settled in Rio de Janeiro. In the subsequent months and years I travelled extensively in Bra

Capoeira has had a turbulent history. From its beginnings in slavery, to outlawed activity and its contemporary form, played all over the world, the art has grown and developed in ways no one could predict. This seriesis to reflect a little on how Capoeira is being taught, and how we can learn from modern research and ideas, and develop the teaching of this mesmeric art form. My own introduction to Capoeira was at the end of 1990s, where after seeing the art on film I began a