How old style martial arts teachers taught

Zhang Yi Zhong was born just West of Shanghai, China, in 1921. When Zhang was in his early twenties, World War II had just ended and with the Japanese withdrawal from Taiwan, the Chinese government sent Zhang t to Taiwan and take things over from the Japanese. Zhang's first exposure to the internal martial arts in Taiwan came from Wang Shu din's teaching of Chen Pan Ling's integrated Tai Ji system.

When asked about the teaching styles of Chen Pan Ling and Wang Shu din, Zhang said that neither of these gentleman provided a great deal of detail in their teaching. He said that both teachers were highly skilled and very strong, however, they did not analyze and provide details about what they were doing, they just did it. Asking questions of the teacher was discouraged. Zhang said that if you asked a question, the teacher would become angry, so you really had to be clever to figure things out. Zhang said that these teachers would show the movements of the forms and give a small bit of explanation, but it was up to the student to practice hard and explore his or her own realizations about the movements and techniques.