Skip to content
By: Anne Mette Frandsen
I am a trained Pilates instructor. With a background in Stott-Pilates Matwork, and then took the pilates instructor programme in classical matwork at Pilates Cph. Which I have not regretted!
Pilates Cph's matwork programme is based on an experiential approach to Pilates. This means that a large part of the programme is spent testing and examining the exercises and how different bodies move. This is a great advantage because the course weekends function as a test zone where both the role of practitioner and instructor are tested. You feel everything on your own body before you have to teach it to others.
On your own body
During the course, you will have the opportunity to train together with other course participants so you can discuss and teach each other. You will have the opportunity to experience the instructors' own teaching practice. You'll also see how they put together their lessons and how they supervise and guide a class. At the same time, you'll have the opportunity to participate in classes at Pilates Cph's studio and experience both training and instruction on your own body.
Time to build on top
The course runs over a number of months, allowing time between course periods to integrate the exercises. This provides continuous development for the course participants. The course material is designed in such a way that the information is introduced gradually, so you are constantly building on what you have learnt and integrated. This allows you to become more familiar with both performing and instructing the exercises as the complexity increases. This provides a nice and fluid progression, while leaving time and space for the individual to go in-depth with the material.
A living approach
Gitte Peirano and Camilla Bækholm complement each other in the very best way, with their different core competences. This emphasises Pilates Cph's vibrant approach to Pilates as a practice that is constantly evolving. Also through the owners' collaboration.
There are three main reasons why Pilates Cph's Matwork programme differs from other programmes:
1) Empathy and Body Awareness
The exercises of the Pilates system are the primary content of the programme, but where Pilates Cph's programme differs is in the way the exercises are approached. The programme focuses on the instructors experiencing the exercises themselves and integrating them into their own movement system in order to understand them as movements and teach them as integrated movement flows rather than as technical exercises.
2) Cueing and Communication
Being an instructor is very much about communicating on many levels at once. Communication about movement is challenging in itself, but what is emphasised at Pilates Cph - besides training the instructor to tell the practitioner what movements to do technically - is communicating to people how to use their body to move in the exercises. It's a fundamental element of training that is indispensable for anyone who has to communicate experience with the body.
3) A living practice
Pilates Cph offers a dynamic programme based on the fundamental premise of how the workout is experienced. That's why we think “inside-out” rather than “outside-in”. The goal of the programme is not a finished, streamlined Pilates ideal, but rather a striving for the course participants to achieve their own precise cueing, thorough insight into the exercises, and a dynamic practice that can evolve.
I highly recommend the programme to both new and trained instructors, and to anyone who wants to either improve their Pilates practice, or to gain greater body awareness and control, and thus better mobility.
Read much more about the Pilates instructor training programme in matwork here
Anne Mette has practised Pilates intensively for 15 years and has healed a broken back without surgery. She is therefore a passionate believer in the Pilates system and the body's ability to heal itself through movement. The key words for training with Anne Mette are presence and intensity, energy and flow, concentration and continuous challenges.