Students begin by learning Dan Chi Sao or Single Sticky Hands. 

With Dan Chi Sao people only use one arm at a time. This is much easier to learn and coordinate than using both arms at the same time and gives students the opportunity to refine the techniques at their most basic level. 

Structure, correct forwards force (originally cultivated in Su Lim Tao) are applied and refined and students begin to learn to react to changes in their opponent’s force and oncoming attacks.

The next stage is to learn Sheung Chi Sao, or Double Sticky Hands.

Students learn to do Sheung Chi Sao with both hands simultaneously. At this stage students should have good structure already inculcated through a combination of Sui Lim Tao and Dan Chi Sao and the basics of forwards force. 

The focus of doing Sheung Chi Sao is to learn to apply forwards force consistently through both arms independently simultaneously; this can be very difficult. 

At this stage students simply do the Sheung Chi Sau drill at its most basic, sometimes called “rolling arms”.

As students build on Sheung Chi Sao from the attacking and defending drills they may begin to incorporate very fluid footwork.

Aside from teaching students to maintain good force and structure and to move while doing it, this also teaches students to stick to their opponent as their opponent also moves around trying to out manoeuvre them.

It must always be remembered however that all Chi Sao is a training drill. 

When Chi Sao is applied in a practical self-defence situation it is much more basic and immediate than it appears in training; so much so, that, in a practical situation, it should ideally all be over and done with almost as soon as it began.  

The ultimate intention behind Chi Sao is to shut down an attacker by smothering their initial attack and preventing any further attack immediately; in self-defence we are not interested in fighting or trading blows, but rather to become safe as fast as possible.