When I first trained as a sports coach and fitness instructor in the early 1990s, there was a strong emphasis on providing clear and detailed teaching points alongside demonstrations. We were taught to consistently reinforce these points as clients performed the actions. This often involved long, directive lists of instructions, such as: “Back straight, head up, wrists flat, do not lock out elbows, shoulders back…” However, these instructions often felt more like a box-ticking exercise than a genuine effort to help clients.

As my interest grew in working with older adults and individuals with neurodegenerative conditions, I began exploring alternative, potentially more effective methods of instruction. This shift led me to question traditional approaches and experiment with new techniques. In this article, I will discuss three types of instructional methods I frequently use: figurative cues, verbal kinaesthetic cues, and analogical cues.

When delivering chair-based exercises—particularly for older adults or clinical populations—the way you communicate movement is just as important as the movement itself. Since participants’ base of support is fixed to the chair, verbal instructions must work harder to engage the correct muscles, maintain postural alignment, and keep participants engaged. Figurative, verbal kinaesthetic, and analogical cues are three distinct tools that, while sometimes overlapping, target different cognitive and sensory processes to enhance the effectiveness of instruction.

1. Figurative cues

Figurative cues use metaphor, imagery, or symbolic language to paint a vivid mental picture. Instead of describing the mechanics of the movement, you describe a poetic or illustrative image that naturally triggers the correct movement pattern.

• How it works: It bypasses analytical thinking and taps into the brain’s creative processing, allowing a complex motor pattern to happen smoothly and holistically.
• Seated exercise examples:
  • For spinal extension/posture: “Imagine a golden thread attached to the crown of your head, gently pulling you up towards the ceiling.”
  • For a seated row: “Imagine your shoulder blades are bookends, and you are squeezing a thick book tightly between them.”
• Best used for: Softening movement, encouraging a taller posture, and reducing rigid, tense movement patterns.

2. Verbal kinaesthetic cues

Verbal kinaesthetic cues focus purely on internal bodily sensations, anatomy, and physical mechanics. They direct the participant’s attention inward to feel exactly what their muscles, joints, and bones are doing.

• How it works: It directly enhances proprioception (the body’s awareness of its position in space) and the mind-muscle connection by asking the participant to analyse a specific physical sensation.
• Seated exercise examples:
  • For a seated leg extension: “Squeeze the muscle at the front of your thigh (your quadriceps) as you straighten your knee, and feel that muscle go tight.”
  • For abdominal bracing: “Draw your belly button in towards your spine and feel the firm tension across your midsection as if you are tightening a wide belt.”
• Best used for: Precise muscle isolation, joint safety, and ensuring participants are engaging the target areas rather than just moving their limbs passively.

3. Analogical cues

Analogical cues use functional analogies or real-world tasks that the participant has done thousands of times before. They map a fitness movement directly onto a familiar, everyday action.

• How it works: It leverages motor memory (muscle memory). The brain already has a perfectly optimised “neural program” for picking up shopping bags or opening doors, so tapping into that program makes the exercise instantly intuitive.
• Seated exercise examples:
  • For a seated bicep curl: “Imagine you are lifting a heavy bag of shopping up onto the kitchen counter.”
  • For a seated hamstring curl/heel slide: “Imagine you are trying to scrape a stubborn bit of mud off the bottom of your shoe against the carpet.”
• Best used for: Functional fitness application, coordinating multi-joint movements, and working with participants who struggle with fitness jargon or anatomy.

Compare and contrast

To understand how these three styles interact, consider how they differ across key instructional dimensions:

The core distinctions

• Figurative vs. analogical: While both use comparisons, a figurative cue is symbolic (you do not actually have a golden thread on your head), whereas an analogical cue is literal and functional (you actually do lift shopping bags in real life).
• Kinaesthetic vs. the others: Kinaesthetic cueing is entirely internal. It requires the participant to think about their actual anatomy (“feel your thigh tighten”). Figurative and analogical cues redirect attention away from the joint mechanics and onto an external concept, which sports biomechanics research often shows leads to more automatic, less forced movement.

Layering cues

In a chair-based class, the ultimate strategy is layering. Start with an analogical cue to get everyone moving safely and immediately (e.g., “Pick up the shopping bags”). Once they have the rhythm, layer in a kinaesthetic cue to refine it (“Now squeeze your shoulder blades together at the top”), and finish with a figurative cue to perfect their form (“Keep your spine as tall as a tree”).

Layering cues allows you to guide participants through a seamless progression: you start by establishing the basic movement pattern, refine their internal awareness to ensure safety and engagement, and then use imagery to perfect their form and posture.

Examples of layering cues

Example 1: The seated chest press

This movement is excellent for functional upper-body strength, but participants often collapse their posture or push purely from their elbows without engaging the torso.

1. The analogical cue (the foundation)
   • What you say: “Bring your hands up by your chest, elbows wide. Now, imagine you are pushing open a set of heavy, stiff double doors in front of you. Push away with purpose, and then control the doors as they slowly swing back towards you.”
   • Why it works: Everyone knows the physical effort required to push open a heavy door. This immediately sets the correct track of movement, establishes natural resistance, and dictates a controlled tempo without you having to explain joint angles.
2. The verbal kinaesthetic cue (the refinement)
   • What you say: “As you push forward this time, focus on the sensation in your upper body. Feel the muscles across the front of your chest and the back of your arms tighten as you straighten your elbows. As you pull back, feel your shoulder blades sliding smoothly together along your upper back.”
   • Why it works: This draws their attention inward. It ensures they are not just going through the motions passively; they are actively and mindfully contracting the pectorals and triceps, which is important for building strength when working with resistance bands.
3. The figurative cue (the polish)
   • What you say: “Excellent. Now, as you push those heavy doors, keep your spine as solid as a grand oak tree. Do not let the wind blow you backward into the chair. Stay tall, proud, and anchored.”
   • Why it works: This poetic image triggers core stabilisation and postural alignment effortlessly, keeping them sitting tall out of the chair’s bucket.

Example 2: Seated sit-to-stand preparation

This is a fundamental skill for maintaining independence, focusing on the weight transfer and lower-body drive required to stand up, without necessarily leaving the seat completely.

1. The analogical cue (the foundation)
   • What you say: “Slide your hips slightly forward in your chair and bring your feet back a little. Now, lean your upper body forward just like you are about to stand up to answer the front door, but keep your bottom on the seat for now. Lean in, then press back.”
   • Why it works: It triggers a deeply ingrained motor loop. By asking them to mimic the preparation to answer the door, they automatically perform a “hip hinge” and naturally shift their centre of gravity over their feet, which is the hardest part of the biomechanics to teach abstractly.
2. The verbal kinaesthetic cue (the refinement)
   • What you say: “As you lean forward into that movement, drive your feet firmly down into the floor. Feel your heels pressing into the carpet, and notice how the muscles in your thighs and your buttocks immediately go firm and switch on.”
   • Why it works: It shifts the focus from just leaning the head forward to actually transferring load into the lower limbs. It builds the vital neural pathways and muscular strength needed for an actual stand, ensuring their legs are doing the work rather than just momentum.
3. The figurative cue (the polish)
   • What you say: “As you lean forward and press down, imagine your hips and thighs are a coiled metal spring, storing up power. Hold that energy for a second at the front, and then release it to gently guide yourself back to upright.”
   • Why it works: This imagery prevents the movement from looking jerky or collapsed. A “coiled spring” implies controlled, elastic tension and potential power, which improves muscle tension control (eccentric and isometric stability) during the most demanding phase of the exercise.

Please note that although I have presented the three different types of cues as a three-step teaching process, there are many different ways of offering instructions – this is just one approach.

In summary, effective cueing in chair‑based exercise requires more than delivering technical instructions; it involves using the right type of language to shape how participants understand and perform movement. Verbal kinaesthetic cues provide precision and safety, analogical cues make movements intuitive through familiar actions, and figurative cues enhance posture and flow through imagery. By thoughtfully combining these approaches, instructors can improve clarity, engagement, and movement quality – ensuring their words genuinely support the needs of those they teach.