Well, I did it... taught a 2 day defensive handgun class

And I think it went pretty good. The real secret is all 5 students have had some if not a lot of previous formal training in this and so they were pretty much just honing their skills with me being a guide.
This was supposed to be myself and another instructor. My friend the retired Marine D.I. but he had not shot in the last year because of neck surgery last March other than 50 rounds a couple of weeks ago and so he decided he wanted to be a student. Now there is the real challenge which we have discussed.... instructing students that are better than you... but then as I have determined that is what a coach is actually supposed to do. I was a little slow and not up to speed at first but did get into the groove after about an hour or so. The funny part was early in the day when I would start 'expanding on a subject' my two friends would be giving me hand signals to shut up, they want to go shoot... but as it got hotter and we would take a break and go back and sit under the tent they weren't nearly as eager to get back on the line.

The class consisted of our host, one of my best friends who owns 'the farm' which is his hunting land, he has attended the Front Sight 4 day class 7 times, (I only did it 5), my other friend the retired Marine who also attended Front Sight a number of times as well as went with me to the Sig Academy once, two 'regular' guys who both have attended this two day class before (taught by two LEO's last year) and another guy who is a retired LEO and attended Front Sight with us once and this class last year and also served on the Tallahassee SWAT team. The day before the class our host and my Marine buddy and I set up the firing range and built a shoot / no shoot house. Then most of the 2nd day was designed to be fun...serious.... still but fun... I don't think I ever posted one of the targets I designed for this.... if anyone wants to see it, I'll post a link to the you tube video I scratched together of the two days.... My Marine buddy's wife saw this target and told him, "you better shoot that b!@ch!".

Are you gonna post a video of all this,, like what you do up here???

I'll do it as long as you guys go gentle on me.... the first part of the video is actually the final drill which is the man on man competition where you save the hostage. Yellow steel silhouette (hostage) with an orange flag beside the head (hostage taker) and then there is another hanging steel target near the ground that is the hostage takers back up. There are two separate targets like this side by side and two students on the command draw and fire at the one directly in front of them about 30ft away... the one who makes the two hits first wins and hitting the hostage of course disqualifies you. My friend and the host of this event did this so dern fast it is amazing he actually beats the guy who was over all the best shooter in the class... a retired swat team officer who was using his new Glock with a red dot on it. My friend was shooting is Glock in 45acp with just iron sights .

Anywho.... here is the link, and as I said, "please be gentle"

I tried not to get too preachy at the very end.

Congratulations! It sounds like it was a success. Think you will do it again?

Interesting video.
Looks like y'all had a fun time and learned a lot.

So, tell us what YOU learned. Not a trick question, I always learned something whenever I made a presentation. Sometimes very valuable things.

Looking good.

I would like to add a few little things from a different perspective.

In the part where "Bob doing drill #2" the shoot house where the BG's are out the back. To open the door,, he puts his off hand forward of the muzzle. For safety,, "No part of the body should ever be forward of the muzzle."
Depending upon how you approach a door, you can always put the muzzle up to the door, and use the off hand to open the knob, and then use the muzzle to push the door. And if this is done with the muzzle close to the knob,, it allows for a quicker return to a proper 2-handed grip.

Tip #2; Again from a safety standpoint. Use plastic barrels instead of metal ones for "walls or barriers." If a negligent discharge happens,, OR,, if a shooter is moving faster,, and hits a plastic barrel, it's much better than a metal one. And if they use a red dot optic,, often,, they see the target,, but not always the barricade in their view.

When slicing the pie in an open doorway. A step back from the doorway will give the shooter more field of view then when up against the wall. Everyone wants to hug the wall. Either gets the job done.
Good job. I am sure you put in many hours.

Good advice, kmoore. Being too close to a wall, door, or any obstruction limits movement and as you pointed out, requires more exposure.

Yep, I had Jay do a demonstration of how to address the door and go through the "fatal funnel" and he did it perfect in the demo but you know how it is when you start to do it....
I wanted plastic barrels but they cost like $5 more and Jay chose metal..... the interesting thing and the part that really worried me was what they had contained... "K-Lube". not making this up.. mineral oil. What I was worried about was if there was vapor from this left in the barrels... and so I had the plugs taken out of them incase we shot one and made a spark.

Believe it or not,, I have seen metal barrels that were shot, and the bullet did not puncture them. That means a ricochet. That was my point about using metal barrels & safety. (I can show you a few on my range,, that are used as table tops etc,, where a stray bullet has hit them & not penetrated.)
I never use any of my metal barrels as props for shooting scenarios.

I had to chuckle at the comment about Jay doing it perfect in the demo, and then once you actually do it,, ! In competition we have a saying; "When the buzzer goes off,,, the brain disengages!" I see that OFTEN!!!!!!!

You didn't mention this so disregard if you did. After it was all done, I imagine the students expressed their thoughts. But to get more honest feedback to do better or different next time have a sheet of questions and allow comments on how the class could be better. Some people just won't express their true thoughts in a group. I have read many of these, as each student was to fill them out in basic firearms training and some advanced. Once and a while I got good suggestions. If you see a common negative comment, you should figure out a better solution.

Our host Jay is supposed to send an email to the students asking for their comments and suggestions this week. I've already started making my own notes....

And yes, I understand about the metal barrels.... but it's what we had.