There is an old adage in education. One can only teach those willing to learn.  Like most sayings, it is true to a point.  Back when I was a teacher you would hear this primarily as an excuse for poor test scores.  The inverse of this is also true, to a point.  That if a student has a profound desire to learn, no teacher is necessary.  History has no end of great scholars, artists, and scientists who were all self-taught.

I personally believe that the primary role of a teacher for younger students is to show the value of learning…not so much the knowledge.  So as a history teacher, focusing on dates and factual events could lead a student to the cliché question “When are we ever going to need to know this?”  Honestly the answer is never, and with today’s modern wireless devices the entire world’s knowledge is literally at one’s fingertips – memorizing dates is really just for quiz shows.  However, if the same lesson focused on skills, for example critical thinking…the “why” of the historical events, the same tired question becomes one easily answered.  I am teaching you this, so that you will be able to learn whatever you desire to know.

“The only purpose of education is to teach a student how to live his life – by developing his mind and equipping him to deal with reality.  The training he needs is theoretical, i.e., conceptual.  He has to be taught to think, to understand, to integrate, to prove.  He has to be taught the essentials of the knowledge discovered in the past – and he has to be equipped to acquire further knowledge by his own effort.”

Ayn Rand

In short the ultimate goal of learning is to learn how to learn.  May sound foolish, but in many ways this is far more important in this day and age than it has ever been.  For instance knowledge facts like: when was the Battle of Hastings – are only a few key clicks away on a cell phone.  Knowledge is a freely traded commodity and its value is fairly low.  Wisdom, understanding, and the ability to process information into original thought that is true power. Consider fly patterns…a simple Google search will yield you all the patterns you could want – provided you know basic tying techniques, and most important if you know how to use them: where and when – you get the idea.

Fly fishing has a number of skills that I feel many of us have learned more or less by rote.  Leaders, knots, basic water reading, and fly casting are all skills that one simply doesn’t learn and cross off a list.  In fact, given the nature of fly fishing a change or adaptation in one component causes a change in another.  For instance, a fly cast is differently with a long leader compared to  shorter one or a heavy fly.  Naturally, there are a near infinite range of possibilities and most fly fishermen make adjustments without really having to think about it.

When it comes to fly casting, however, there is something of a downside to learning.  Much of the “knowledge” of fly casting is tied to muscle memory which (like riding a bike) is somewhat involuntary.  The good news is that a good caster can do everything he needs to almost instinctively.  The bad news is if an experienced caster wants to learn a new style of casting, technique or more importantly, to correct a bad habit he may have had and lived with for years – it is exceedingly difficult to do so.  As Yoda said, “You must unlearn what you have learned.”  But how do you unlearn something that is not known to your conscious mind?

In my region, the rivers are small, the ocean is big.  It’s not uncommon for an angler with years and years of river experience to want to transition to fishing the ocean.  However, poor casting technique can be a killer when one needs to increase distance or deal with a powerful headwind.  In New England, to be an incredibly successful trout angler one may never need to cast more than…actually one doesn’t really have to cast at call, a simple roll cast is more than adequate much of the time.  An inefficient, but perfectly useful, river cast will not serve the needs of a saltwater angler.

Even if this caster knows exactly what his faults are, is willing to practice, and even if he has the most skilled instructor to assist him, overcoming his own knowledge may prove extremely difficult.  If only there was some magical way to travel back in time and teach himself the right way to cast first.

Oh but there is, and you don’t even need Dr. Who.

More often than not – it’s that thing attached to your other shoulder – your left arm – or if you are a more sinister member of our fellowship the right.

When I took my fall the future usefulness of my right arm was cast in doubt, so two days after the accident I was practicing with my left.  What surprised me was not how quickly I learned – it actually was a slow process to build the muscle memory, but how after a few weeks my casting with my left arm was technically superior to casting with my right.

My right arm has nearly 30 years of experience, however, it learned to cast under less than ideal conditions.  Like nearly everyone, I learned as I went.  I read books, took a lesson or two, and just screw up a lot until I got it to work.  My left arm, on the other hand – get it? Oh man I apologize this topic is dry but I needed a segue way to some casting articles – was trained by an experienced caster.  A blank slate free of any bad habits, I learned a much better form.  Even though my left arm will never be as coordinated as my right, it doesn’t punch casts, shock rods, over overpower loops.  When you tech your off-arm, it listens.

Even better, when my right arm healed and I started using it again the lessons from the left transferred over.  Sometimes I think the best way to learn something you already know is to learn something completely different – in much the same way by learning to cast two-handed rods I improved my technique and ability with one handed rods.

So if you are ever trying to learn some casting technique, or if you are trying to perfect your casting skills, I highly recommend trying the new material with your off-arm.  Its lack of muscle memory will be a godsend.

In the next few articles I am planning to detail an efficient casting course.  There are many theories about how a person should learn to cast and how a person learns really anything.  If this helps you, great, if it doesn’t then leave it be.  My only advice to the more experienced guys is to try this lesson plan with your off-arm first.

Last thing:  this process is not my idea – I have tweaked it a bit.  My father used many of these techniques to teach me, I also know the LL Bean Outdoor Discovery school uses a similar method, and probably the best aid would be “Saltwater Casting: 10 Steps to Distance and Power” a DVD by George Roberts in my opinion the single best casting DVD on the market – and I watch a lot of them.  The method is all about drilling…in fact you don’t make a single cast for the first few WEEKS.

Ya that’s right WEEKS – the Flyosopher doesn’t make BS promises if you truly want to improve your cast it takes TIME and PRACTICE.  But hey its winter, what the hell else you going to do go ice fishing…ice fishing is like kissing your sister (For those of you in the South I mean to say it is not much fun…I’m sure your sister is lovely.)