I was curious and wanted to ask in this open forum; how do you teach your students to fight?
Seems simple, but the question is much more complex. I consider styles such as Praying Mantis to be advanced fighting styles that require a greater deal of control than most mainstream styles. As such, the path to becoming a proficient fighter using PM is a very difficult one that very few can attain. More often than not I see schools teach the drills, forms, principles, etc., but once actual fighting commences most everything that was taught disappears.
So to expand on the above question:
What do you do to progress a student's training such that they can execute their techniques at full speed?
And a second part to the same question:
What do you do to progress a student's training such that they can use their skills regardless of the situation?
The intent of the second question is to understand how you train the mind and body to react using the principles of PM.
For example, suppose you take your student and do a basic drill (Au Lou Choi) that goes back and forth. Now suppose your change the drill midstream so that as your student is punching instead of countering with [Au Lau Choi] you execute [Diu Hyun Cheui]. How does your student react?
Note that I do not ask how he SHOULD react, but what will he actually do? Will he stand there confused or will he yield and counter with a different technique?
Now expand that into a freestyle training scenario where you could attack with anything, but you don't wait for your opponent to counter as you continue to attack. Will your opponent react using his skills to defend himself or will he fall back on his natural instincts? Will you as the attacker be able to feed off everything your opponent gives you to develop a new counter?
In PM the fighting should adhere to the principles and look like the forms. So back to my original question, how do you train your students to fight?