In my CMSP course they taught that you should let out the clutch with 4 fingers slowly in order to downshift. But I am finding that in some situations, no matter how slowly I roll it out, I'm occasionally being jerked forward by a downshift.
I've seen more advanced riders "blip" the throttle to downshift smoothly, where they quickly roll on the throttle, change gears, and roll back off, but doing this is difficult because I often wind up speeding up...
Do any experienced riders on here have any tips to help a newbie learn this technique (and/or just downshift more smoothly in general...)?
First, if you are experiencing this mostly when you downshift from 2nd to 1st gear, that is pretty common for almost everyone. It is rather challenging to get that done smoothly. Doing that smoothly will come with time.
As a newer rider it is almost guaranteed that you are easing out the clutch more quickly than more experienced riders. So yes, you need to continue to work on that.
Rather than trying to blip the throttle, try this instead: After the downshift and as you ease out the clutch, roll on the throttle a small amount. This can smooth it out a bit. If it causes you to accelerate, then you rolled on too much.
Try it, and come back to let us know how you've progressed.