As a student (note my lack of experience in what I'm saying below), I've always been taught to push forward on the stick to get the plane into the glide attitude.
You have to remember that when the engine failure happens, you are probably going to be in the climb attitude and trimmed as such. I would be surprised if there are many aircraft which have the same trim settings for climb and glide!
When you practice basic stalls, you normally start from straight and level flight, then reduce the throttle and try to maintain the straight and level attitude. The speed will of course slowly wash off, in such a way you can feel the different stall characteristics of your particular plane. It might be useful to try stalling from the climb attitude (I would talk to an instructor before trying this!) - the stall is likely to be quite different- speed loss will be much quicker. Gravity isn't your friend...