Lecturing

I direct tournament games at the Manhattan Bridge Club, usually once or twice a week and occasionally more often. The games I run are mostly what we call “299ers”, limited to players with less than 300 masterpoints. (In practice, I generally set the top strat to non-Life Master, and allow in some players who are a little over the 300 limit but whose standard of play is appropriate). Before each 299er game, there is a lecture, about half an hour long. The lectures are free and open to all, but the 299er players are the target audience. Sometimes one of the regular teaching staff gives the lecture. And sometimes, I have to give the lecture myself.

Now, I have had a career as a software developer and analyst, and I’ve had to make presentations to management, users, and subordinates. It wasn’t necessarily my favorite thing to do, but I got by. But a teaching presentation is a little different, and I don’t mind admitting that I’ve had some trouble finding my - well, groove, for lack of a better term.

The topic of the lecture is, quite literally, anything the lecturer wants to talk about. There may be a few things that deserve a talk. For example, if I could get them all to understand (and use) the Losing Trick Count, I’m sure that their bidding would improve dramatically in the area of getting high enough when appropriate and staying low enough when the warning flags are out. But that’s a bit much to get across in a 25 minute talk. I’ve seen at least two of the teaching staff try it, and as straightforward as the LTC is, you still have to talk fast to get across all you want in the time-frame. And there’s no time left over for some example hands and bidding sequences, which is actually pretty critical stuff for a decent teaching effort. These days, I’m starting to follow the lead of Jeff Bayone, the owner of MBC. Jeff sometimes gives the lecture himself, and he doesn’t have a topic. One of his lectures is all about a hand. Just one hand, and the interest is usually not the bidding. It’s all about the play.

That sounds like it could be boring or repetitive. Or it could easily drift into techniques that are beyond the grasp of the intermediate players who are the audience. All of those dangers are real, but at the same time, there is plenty of scope for some interesting stuff that they really need. From declarer’s side, everything that Mike Lawrence wrote about reading the opponent’s cards is relevant, and well within their capabilities. So are some basic ideas around avoidance, suit establishment, card combinations, safety plays, and so on. From the defensive side, I’m not so sure (I’ve not tried a defensive lecture yet). I think it should be possible, though. There must be some hands that have enough points of interest to last 25 minutes! You need more than just one critical lead or switch to focus on, so I’m thinking perhaps a no-trump part-score will have two or three points to make.

Which leads to the next question: where do you get the hands from? I don’t really like to use composed deals to make a point in this sort of format. If I’m going to stand in front of a room full of people and chat about a hand, I want to be able to say “Here’s a hand from Houston last week” or “Here’s something that came up Thursday evening”, or something like that. But I don’t seem to be able to spot the right sort of teaching material as it comes up, at least, not yet. I’m hoping I get better at this with practice.