[hotShot]

The best thing that happened to me when I first played in a bridge club night (after about 2-3 month of learning) that they had pairs playing:
Acol, Swiss Acol, Better Minor, "Small Clubs", "Big Clubs" and Precision.
A few month later we played pairs using Moscito and Polish Club.

This way I always knew there was more than one system out there.

[pdmunro]

I think 5 card majors has some good mnemonic devices to aid the memory when you are beginning bridge.

Teaching 5-card majors, there is the simple symmetry

- a major fit is 5-3
- a minor fit is 3-5

Every time you pull out your convention card at the club, a memory jog is written in front of you "Opening bids promise: ♠♥ 5  ♦♣ 3".

Similarly, the phrase: bid 4 card suits "up-the line", seems to stick in the memory.

These parts of the system have to do with the shape of the hand.

As regards the point count, there are a few repeated numbers that are the cornerstone for me:

The key one is 11:

1 any - 3 same = 11-12
2/1 = 11+
1-any - 2NT = 11-12

Then if you are trying to remember your system, you can say to yourself: 1S-2S must be less than 11. I need 6 to respond. Yes it's 6-10.

The other important ranges to keep in the memory are 1NT = 15-17 with 8-9 required to bid as responder. Having only just learnt that 1NT-2NT invite showed 8-9, a complete raw beginner whom I teach - a lady who paints nails, i.e had nothing to do with numbers all day - knew to respond 3NT with 10 points. I was so proud of her.

My simple policy is: Do my utmost to reduce the memory load in order to keep my customers coming back. Repeat ideas. Stick with a concept, so that they "get it".

I truly believe it's all about the fundamentals. And beyond that, to go deeper rather than broader.

A couple of my players kept saying they just couldn't get interested and were going to quit. I simplified my lessons even further and tried to remember to praise their achievements. And they have stayed and are showing real promise at helping others to learn.

[mink]

About transfers:

They are not only standard in BBO, but also in bridge-clubs of Germany and many other countries, so as soon as a beginner meets more advanced players he needs to know about it, at least in order to understand opps' bidding.

Of course, for beginners the transfer concept is not easy to understand. But this is true for stayman, too. So if the goal was to make it most easy for the students, you should also drop stayman: Any level-2-response to 1nt is to play, and any level-3-response is forcing. If responder has no 5 card suit, he can only pass or bid nt. Obviously, this system can only be used for the start to make it quickly possible for them to bid any hand. But even this seemingly simple system has a difficulty: the 1nt opener must know he has to pass a level-2-response even if he got 4 cards in the suit. For sure, before the class is finished, stayman and transfer need to be taught.

I believe that this way is superior to teaching stayman at once but delay the transfer.

But delaying one or both of the concepts has a real disadvantage: you teach something that needs to be forgotten later and replaced by something new. In my opinion, this is much harder for the students than learning the complicated stayman and transfer right away. It is a new concept to have artificial bids, and it will be new to them no matter if you teach it near the start of the class when introducing the 1nt opening or at the end of the class. Rather, maybe it is not a bad idea to teach stayman and transfer as the first 2 lessons of a bidding class, when they not yet know the concept of natural bidding and therefore not expect everything to be natural.

Karl

[helene_t]

mink, on Jul 17 2007, 08:58 AM, said:

Of course, for beginners the transfer concept is not easy to understand. But this is true for stayman, too. So if the goal was to make it most easy for the students, you should also drop stayman: Any level-2-response to 1nt is to play, and any level-3-response is forcing. If responder has no 5 card suit, he can only pass or bid nt. Obviously, this system can only be used for the start to make it quickly possible for them to bid any hand. But even this seemingly simple system has a difficulty: the 1nt opener must know he has to pass a level-2-response even if he got 4 cards in the suit. For sure, before the class is finished, stayman and transfer need to be taught.

We recently had a discussion in another thread about the sequence:
1♣-(1♥)-p-(p)
1N-(p)-2m

To my surprise someone argued that most players would assume system to be on here. I hope "most" is an exageration but I have seen some of the weaker players at the club play "system on" in all kinds of situations where neither I nor the player's partner had the fantasy to figure that system could be on. And even if you stamp into their heads that system is never on except in the very specific sequences for which is has been agreed, those who have been brought up with transfers often do not know how to bid in situations when system is off. For example:
1N-(2♦)-?
Do we play forcing freebids, semi-positive doubles and weak jumps as after interference over a suit opening? It gets worse if you have taught them Biedermeijer because the forcing character of a freebid depends on the rank of the freebid relative to opener's suit - that rule is of no help when partner hasn't bid a suit. Or is NT the highest-ranking "suit" ?

Also, transfers are of little help with pick-up BBO partners since I have no clue in what competitive situations partner will assume transfers to apply. In SAYC, stayman applies in response to overcalls but transfers do not. In Biedermiejer, system is on in response to a direct-seat notrump overcall but not in response to a balancing seat notrump overcall. In both cases, it's probably a small minority of the users of the system who know that.

It's true that you'll have to adress these issues for stayman if you play stayman but no transfers. But since stayman in mainly used with strong hands that can afford a cue-bid or a t/o double when such is available, and since stayman can't be on when opps overcall our 1NT, that problem is smaller.

[chicken]

mink, on Jul 17 2007, 01:58 AM, said:

About transfers:

They are not only standard in BBO, but also in bridge-clubs of Germany and many other countries, so as soon as a beginner meets more advanced players he needs to know about it, at least in order to understand opps' bidding.

sure, but again remember about ur time beeing a beginner. i agree with timG and others to reduce the memory load and teach most bids as natural=easy as possible.
when they start playing in the club you already have won the war and it is no problem to adopt x-fers for example if there is a need for it. in our club the advanced players switch to non x-fers if they are playing with beginners until the process of stabilisation is completed and the novices dare to play without their notes for example.
in the early stages of tuition i made the experience that an even slightly above average complexity (IMHO x-fers fall under this category) puts people off and they tend to leave or get disappointed.

----> lets open another thread: quotas of beginner-course finishers joining the local club . anybody getting 30% or more into the club is doing a helluva good job.