Now that Bill and I have been working more regularly with the white belts, I find myself trying to think of different things to do than what has generally been taking up the white belt's time - that is, something more than just going through Heian Shodan as a group, splitting off those people who are having troubles with the turns and assigning them to purple or brown belt assistants to work with, and then going through Heian Shodan again with the rest of the group.
And again.
And again.
And, well, we have a few more minutes so let's do it again.
And hrm, well, how about... BASICS! Yah, we'll do yellow belt basics.
And again.
And again.
I was getting bored of this, nevermind some of the poor kids who take 9-18 months to get their yellow belt because of their attention spans or motor skills already!
So, this most recent class when I was in charge of the kids, I split them into 3 groups of three, had two assistants help me by taking two of the groups while I took the third, and we went through bunkai (application) for Heian Shodan.
Of course, there are many different ways one could teach bunkai for any kata at all, so I'm not saying my way was THE way, and I really wasn't even concerned whether the assistants were teaching anything that looked consistent to what I was doing. The point was just to do something different with the only things we really can work with the white belts with, and have it be educational and interesting.
I didn't get a chance to talk to many of the white belts about whether they enjoyed it or got anything out of it, but I know two of the three kids in my group loved it for sure. The third kid... I'm not sure if it's just that he's right at puberty and working with me is difficult for him for various reasons or not... but he doesn't seem "in" to it like the other two were. Ah well, a white belt doesn't need to be intense, and he'll stay if he wants to.
It all worked out just great, and I think if we do it a couple more times maybe we can find some white belts who click together who could do a little demonstration in front of the class or maybe even at a Christmas karate demonstration or a tournament itself. Maybe.
We'll see!
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4 comments:
Bunkai is difficult both to learn and to teach. But it is really good for yourself to teach it. It forces you to really think about what you are doing.
Chadie
htt://chadie.typepad.com/dojo/
I'm sure that doing bunkai was a challenge for your white belts. We can hope that it helped them to understand the movements of their kata better. It isn't too different from one step or three step sparring, so they definitely would get "something" out of it.
Hey..
Jus' wandered in, must say your philosophy is a good one.
Too many poeple forced into believing the only way to have a life is to be involved with someone.
So..I have ADD too, and find that somewhat less structured training styles suit me. Thinking of learning some Jeet Kune Do someday.
Of course, given I practice different martial arts, and everyone trains with different goals in mind, there will be disparities.
Continue the good work, and Merry X-mas! ;)
Gee.. I was thinking about the idea of doing repeditive techniques, and how many people consider it as "boring". I can see how someone could think "I know this already.. teach me something new" as they are doing the same basics over and over again. But I have learned that I really NEED to do the basics over and over to improve. They are like the various scales that musicians do to improve their playing ability. Repeditive movement makes knowledge become a part of you.. so much a part of you that now you do not need to think anymore to apply it. Just like an experienced musician can break into a jazz solo in almost any key, someone who has trained their body on the basic movements can easilly flow with them when needed. When one thinks that Sensei Gichin Funakoshi commented that he finally did a proper punch just a few days before he died at 86 years of age after studying karate his whole life, you have to wonder how well a white belt "knows" their basics.
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