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I am no expert in karate. Not by a long shot. I am no expert in educational theory. I took several courses on it in university but truly thought that most of the professors in the Department of Education at the University of Alberta are idiots. It’s not that I am "so much smarter" that they are. No, it’s not that at all. The problem is that they really are idiots. They really are clueless. They couldn’t find their backsides with both hands, a flashlight, compass, and a Sherpa guide from the Himalayas.
I am no expert in education. There are a lot of things I just don’t know. But, I have been a school teacher for 6 years, a university teacher for 6 years, a youth counselor for 4 years, and during these years a karate teacher for about 10 years.
I’ll be the first person to tell you that I don’t have all the answers for how to make a perfect karate class, but I have been at this for a while and I have a few ideas and theories to share with you how I have made my classes enjoyable, fun, and worthwhile for my students.
I am usually loathe to give advice to anyone about what they should or should not do, so please feel free to take and dispose of what you like in the text that continues from this point.
Teaching is a job that attracts a lot of different people. We grow up in classrooms having to "look up" to the teacher. They are the boss. They control our time. They evaluate us and praise or ridicule us. They’ve got a lot of power. We’d like to get some of that too, maybe. It would be nice to be in control. It would be great to be the guy who gives the orders. All my students will love and adore me. When I am old and grey and lying in my deathbed, my thousands of former students will hold a prayer vigil for me in the front yard, holding candles and sing my favorite pop songs.
I can hear them now:
"Istanbul was Constantinople, now it’s Istanbul not Constantinople. It’s been a long time gone, Constantinople. Why did Constantinople get the works? That’s nobody’s business but the Turks…"
Ok, maybe you are not a They Might Be Giants fan. Too bad for you.
Whatever your reason, hopefully it will evolve into wanting to teach because you love the job, feel it’s important, or believe in the processes of learning, you are going to find yourself in front of a bunch of students.
How can you do it?
If I may be so bold to make some suggestions, it has been my observations over the years that there are two kinds of teachers. There are the teachers who are convinced that if only they have all the proper elements of a class: lesson plan painstakingly written out, proper activities, materials on hand, resources, colorful interesting things to captivate students’ attention, and all the correct bells and whistles of a "good class" everything will work out fine, and then "education" can ensue. Then there are the kinds of teachers who just seem to "exude" a presence of being able to teach you simply through conversation, that they have something important to tell you. All you have to do as a student is just listen. No visual aids are necessary. It’s like magic.
The first kind of teacher tends to look like they are under extreme duress if things go badly. If the power goes out, if their Power Point presentation software has a glitch, if the materials they ordered don’t get to the class on time, they are doomed. The class will fail. The students will not learn. They will have failed in their mission and no one will ever be singing, "Karma Chameleon" over candlelight on their front lawn.
The second kind of teacher could probably teach his class in the parking lot if the school happened to catch fire. It wouldn’t matter to him if he didn’t even have a piece of chalk in his hands. The class would be taught. Students would learn. The mission would be accomplished. The second kind of teacher would be looking over at the first kind of teacher writhing in contortions near the flagpole and chuckle quietly to himself, "Heh heh… serves you right, sucker!"
If you have had a good teacher you know it. You just know in your heart that the good teacher you had was not tied to the "stuff", the "material" of what they are teaching. The teacher knew their topic well and true. It inspired them, and through their passion of teaching they taught something important to you too.
If you had a lousy teacher you know that too. They repulsed you instinctively. They made you distrust them as people and maybe even hate the subject they were teaching. You doubted that they knew much of anything, and you doubted that there was ever any really good reason why they became a teacher in the first place. I guess the pay wasn’t good enough in the telemarketing business.
To me, the biggest difference between the very nervous kind of teacher that depends on all the trappings of "educational stuff": carefully documented lesson plans, rigid curriculum, the various carefully sanctioned-from-above hoops to be jumped through and the person who teaches so naturally and effortlessly is a matter of personal character.
The first teacher is "doing" the job of teaching. They "do" what teachers are "supposed to do". The second teacher usually looks within for the how to teach. They know their stuff frontwards and backwards. They do not have to look up a lot of things during the course of a class. They are knowledgeable. The "stuff" in the classroom is window dressing to them. The resources are nice, but they are not critical. To them, what is critical is what is happening between the teacher and the student. The immediate active transfer of information, knowledge, and inspiration for learning is a tangible current of energy happening between teacher and student.
The nervous teacher is flapping their arms and spinning plates. The good teacher is talking to you, looking you in the eyes, and engaging you like one human does with another.
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I think that this is the key difference. It is a matter of "becoming" a teacher, and it is either "bred in the bone", or it is developed over time. Some people who have the profession of teaching, however, just don’t seem to catch on.
My current job here in Groovy Nippon, under the Orwellian gaze of a micro-managing despot of a supervisor, is one that depends heavily on the artificial over-development of curriculum and lesson planning. Don’t get me wrong, I believe in a good plan for a good class. But too much of a plan turns the teacher into a robot, or a strategically shaved monkey, and not much more than that. The attitudes handed down to the people who do the work I do from above indicate very clearly the message that we are barely tolerated, and easily replaceable.
So for me, the opportunities to teach, where I really thrive and enjoy being a teacher, take place in lessons I teach outside my contracted position at my university. I have taught many company classes and private students over the years. I also teach karate as well. It is in these places where my real "nature" of teaching is permitted space to express itself. I always look forward to the end of the "school day" so that I can get on with my "real profession". Isn’t it strange how life works like that?
How can we better take these attitudes and themes into the dojo? How can we make "good teaching" work in karate lessons? As usual, I have a few suggestions. Please feel free to disagree wherever you like.
Teachers may give students examinations and quizzes, but students will test teachers too. They want to see if you "have what it takes". They want to see if you are a pushover, or if you are stupid, or if you are someone they can torment for their own miscreant pleasures. Yes, students are evil. You must conquer them. You must crush their little spirits so that they can be bent to fit within your own evil machinations.
Well, not all students are evil. Most are quite tolerable, actually. But you are going to be tested. We might give quizzes and exams to students but in every other way, kids test adults. You have to take control and demonstrate why you are the boss. You are the big dog, so you may as well start barking.
But be careful how you bark. Some of the worst teachers we all know would yell their heads off but no one cares, and their classes are out of control. But you’ve got to stop the craziness in the classroom and in your heart you know, "Ok people, it’s time to settle down", is just not going to cut it.
What I have done over the years, when entering a noisy classroom, is I don’t say a word. I come in, close the door behind me, put my books and papers on my desk and look at the noisy students. They may ignore me for the first 30 seconds but 95% of the time, they will all magically stop talking. The non-shouting, non-screaming, non-predictable non-"Ok-people-let’s-pay-attention-please" adult in the room is kind of freaky. I may have to wait a minute or so before I have my silent room, but it is the best investment of the year.
The key to make this work for me is not to smile, not to greet anyone like they are my "buddy". Students hate that anyway. You don’t have to do anything weird or bizarre. You don’t have to re-enact "The Dead Poet’s Society" (saints preserve us…), just be the adult in the room, be the "big dog".
If you are not a 6’3, 225 lbs guy like me, don’t worry about it. My mother-in-law, who in her tallest shoes comes up to my elbow, has this technique patented, and she has been teaching for over 30 years. Whenever I even think about her withering gaze, I get the chills. I’m just kidding, Eleanor. You know I love you. Please stop staring at me.
In the dojo, there are already quite a few artificial props in place to identify you as the teacher. You are probably already a somewhat accomplished senior belt in your class. You likely already have a brown or black belt. Your rank identifies you as "the big dog". The students, in their rainbow of belts line up in front of you. They are often already familiar with the "silence is golden" principle of the dojo, and have invested time, and often money, to have the right to have a place on the floor.
No barking is necessary.
I know that sometimes kids programs can be very hard to control, and that kids don’t care one bit that you are a black belt. Their parents made them come to class, and come hell or high water, they are going to make things hard on them, and you incidentally.
Read on for a few ideas on how to keep even the rowdiest kid in line.
This seems obvious, but so often it is not. Although in the previous passage I have seemingly disparaged the use and necessity of a good lesson plan, that is not the case at all. I really believe that a good teacher comes to class prepared. I am. Every time.
A good teacher knows what they are doing, not just from class to class, or moment to moment. They have a plan in mind for their students. They have a schedule. They have a list of necessary tasks and jobs that need to get done. They encourage the students to work hard. Sometimes they "crack the whip" when they don’t. Sometimes the teacher has to "push", sometimes they "pull". But regardless of how the individual teacher deals with the material to be taught, a good teacher knows exactly what you need to do to learn more of the material that brings us all together in the same room.
In karate clubs, I have seen too many teachers not really know for sure what it is their students need to learn. Part of the problem is that some of these karate teachers are just not very good at karate. Their understanding of fundamentals suck, so what they teach also, as a result, sucks. That sounds pretty harsh, but it isn’t meant to be. Geography teachers who are not very knowledgeable of geography usually make pretty lousy geography teachers, right?
The same thing applied to karate.
Please keep in mind that I did not say that the karate teacher must be a master "performer" of karate. The karate teacher could be paralyzed. The key point is that the teacher is knowledgeable about karate and can teach and explain and transfer that knowledge to students. As we all know, sometimes the best athlete is the absolute worst teacher.
The main thing here is that if you really want to be able to transfer knowledge, you need to organize your thoughts and methods. Write it down. Take a notebook with you to class. Keep files on what your students are doing. Design a program with benchmark checks so that students not only can see development, but you can verify it too.
Get your paperwork in order. That helps a lot, and keeps you focused on the student in front of you rather than trying to scratching your head trying to figure out who is where in your program and what kata they should be learning. I highly recommend setting up a program where fundamentals are rotated through for focus (one week front kick, the next week gedan-barai etc.) to make sure that all your bases get covered. The design is up to you, but it is very important to put more thought into your classes than the five minutes it takes you to change into your karate uniform.
The students sense when you have no plan too, so why don’t you surprise them with some organization?
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The student with perfect karate in every way has not yet been built. There is always something that a student (and teacher!) will struggle with. That’s Ok. That’s great. Struggle is important for us in so many ways, to help us grow, understand ourselves, and to overcome adversity in other areas of our lives.
Make sure to take some time to observe what students are doing as a group and take some notes. Get them to move up and down the floor while you watch with pen in hand. Are their stances too high? Are they bobbing up and down? Are their heels coming off the floor? Is their back leg not extended enough? Are their hips not moving in the desired direction? Are they hunching their shoulders? Are their hands not maintaining good shape in fists? Are they not stepping forward in the way you are teaching them? Are they looking down and thus wrecking their balance? Are their blocks strange and unnatural? Are they punching before their lead foot is "landing"?
Ask all these questions and more and make a check list. See what your students are really doing wrong. With the whole group pick on one or two glaring errors that need some immediate attention.
Students can’t see themselves very often so they depend on your feedback to identify problems.
In identifying problems and bringing it to their attention I have read that the "P-C-P" (Praise-Correct-Praise) approach is one that tends to resonate well with students. I have tried and used this often and agree completely. It encourages students, corrects them, and reaffirms them in one statement. It often sounds something like this:
"Ok nice punch. That looks very strong and the thumb is tucked in nicely. The problem with this punch is that your shoulder is a little hunched. Try to relax the shoulder a bit so that you can increase speed and have a clean form. The arm is extended nicely though, so just combine these things together. Ok, let’s go again."
The student can see that you are watching them, that they are doing some of this new "karate stuff" correctly, and that there is something that needs fixing. It’s OK though, because they are really beginning to punch like a karate pro.
It sounds a little hokey here, especially when you write it out, but it works great. Also, it is entirely sincere when I am observing someone in our club. Kids often hear rebuke at all kinds of stuff they do wrong. Seldom do they hear, "what you are doing is good". Of course we have to do a ton of correcting in karate classes, but sandwiching the advice within two encouraging statements makes the advice both heard more clearly and pushes them positively to really try to make adjustments. There is nothing new to this approach, but it is important to re-iterate it again.
Karate is very alien to what most people have learned in their lives. Even if they are seasoned athletes, often the movements and focuses in karate differ greatly from their own experience. I have taught marathoners and some very fit athletes who at first, were absolutely bewildered at the whole range of new movements and strains that were placed on their bodies.
Since so much of karate instruction is correction, it is very important not to overload students with too many things that they need to be mindful of. I don’t know about your teaching style, but in our little dojo here in Ishikawa-ken, the instructors take a lot of time to teach singular basic movements or techniques or stances exclusive of others to help beginners focus on what to do right, and to not confuse them with too much sudden information.
As you inwardly groan at watching your students butcher Heian Shodan again and again and you secretly wonder, "What is wrong with these guys? Will they ever figure this out?" Don’t stress out. Don’t worry about it. Try to find the one thing that will make their kata start to look better. There are always going to be things to fix, and it takes time. I like Dr. Elmar Schmeisser’s analogy for developing karate. He writes that it is like carving a sphere out of a square block. Each improvement makes a cut. Each tweak to the kata makes a hard edge smoother. Take your time carving the sphere. For students, this is all new territory.
As much as you are able, demonstrate to students what they must do. If you are unable to do very high mawashi-geri (round-house kicks) arrange to have a video or something to demonstrate for you. Help the students identify what they need to do in their own technique to replicate what is needed for the fundamentals and kata. The students need to see what needs to be done. They need models to mimic, and since you are the person at the front of the dojo, that responsibility falls to you.
Demonstrating karate, as much as you are able, is a significant tool to be used in the instruction of karate. At one point in the past, I held the opinion that only the fully-abled could be qualified enough to teach "real" karate. I have changed my mind on this matter. Although I think that being able to demonstrate how to do karate is a very valuable quality that karate teachers should pursue, I also believe that the ability to teach, the ability to communicate ideas verbally is the true prime requisite. Athleticism is not a quality, it is an attribute. Being able to connect with students is the true quality that we need to pursue.
We have all seen top karate performers blast through effortlessly, with lighting speed truly beautiful karate technique. Their karate looks beautiful, textbook, just about perfect. But that does not necessarily mean that they are able to find a way to transfer that information to students and get it to stick in the minds of students. A much more valuable instructive experience for students could very well be someone being able to "demonstrate" through other visual aids, through identifying the muscles and joints of the body that are being worked, through drawing parallels in other ways that make students understand what needs to be done.
Good karate performers do not necessarily make good karate teachers.
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I have seen so many karate classes that are absolutely frantic with nervous energy. The instructor feels that there is so much material that MUST be covered that not a single moment can be wasted. Warm-up lasts three minutes, then everyone must jump up and run to a place on the floor, quick, hurry up, start punching, faster and faster, with ki-ai super loud, Ok, now hurry up for kicking, kick, kick, kick… Now quick, get into lines, start moving down the floor, faster and faster, heh-heh, no time to breathe, the clock is ticking, tick-tock, tick-tock, quick, now line up again, combinations, step punch, kick, back, block, kick, kick, punch, punch, block, kick, go, go, go! Ok, next is kata, hurry up, Heian Shodan, hurry up, full speed full power, come on you guys, show some bushido spirit! Let’s go! Let’s go! Now we do all the Heian kata, then we may start with another one if we have time, hurry up. Ok, next is kumite, hurry and get your gloves and mouth-pieces in, whack, whack, whack, go, go, go! Way to go, Timmy! Nice stuff, Janice! Ok, sparring is done, line up, hurry, hurry, ok, chant the Dojo Kun, Ok, now sit in "mokuso". Now meditate! Ok, finished. Bow to your superiors. Now go home.
Whew. I’m exhausted even typing this.
A good karate teacher never flaps around like this. What a terrible class. The students probably didn’t know any better, but if they did, they would ask for their money back. Let’s take a look back on the last class you participated in and ask the question, "What was learned?" If you come up with a blank, your class was a criminal waste of time. Students don’t have to "master" anything, but they should have learned some detail, some specific thing that makes their karate better than the day before. Did they learn how to better rotate their hips in technique? Did they learn how to monitor their form better in kata? Did they get an increased sense of distancing in sparring? What was focused on in your last lesson?
It is not surprising to me that these panicky types of karate lessons are often the result of poor planning on the part of the instructor. Bad instructors teach the exact same stuff all the time, and do a whole lot of different things in class equally badly. A good instructor breaks up the different techniques over a span of time and focuses from time to time on different elements. Of course having an overall consistent structure is good. I like classes that break up kihon, kata, and kumite into compartments. But each day you can choose a different kihon technique to work on, a different part of a single kata to focus on, and some variations in kumite with particular objectives in mind.
In order to teach, and really plant the seeds of understanding in the minds of students, you need to go slow. Here in Japan when attending a seminar, or having any opportunity to train with some real champion level karate teachers, I often see these people taking time to move extremely slowly through their technique. Even with the most basic of basics they glide through as if they are doing Tai Chi, focusing on each tiny nuance and detail of what they are doing.
Taking the pace down a notch also helps students understand more clearly some of the most critical elements of fundamentals. It also helps them from feeling overwhelmed. It’s like the old joke goes, "How do you eat an elephant?"
One bite at a time.
Chew carefully.
Ask yourself this question: "As a teacher, what is your goal for your students?"
You need to have an answer for this question if you really plan to be able to teach anyone. Without a primary objective, or "mission statement", you are not going to get the job done. Whenever I visit a dojo and take a look around at the kinds of classes going on, it is almost instantly obvious to me what the objectives are of the teacher regarding his or her students depending on the kinds of training and the general disposition of the Sensei towards his pupils.
The lousy teacher has no real plan. The lousy teacher does the same thing all the time and instructs poorly, yet enigmatically or charismatically enough to keep the students on the hook he planted in them before. The students never really get good. Their fundamentals are awash, their timing, speed, sense of distancing is mediocre at best, they have wretched kata even though they may profess to know a whole lot of them. The umbilicus is not yet ready to be severed. Yucky as that image may be for us to dwell on, that is the modus operandi of the lousy teacher. Pity the poor student who bought this junk hook, line, and sinker.
The highly-trained, yet poorly prepared student has serious body conditioning and flexibility issues. They were never taught from the beginning how to get ship-shape karate-wise. They were never really shown and taught how to stretch. They were never taught how to strengthen their bodies. They were just tossed into the rank and file and dragged up and down the dojo floor flailing their limbs akimbo.
Why not try a better way to teach students karate? Take some time and energy to learn and teach students how to stretch. Lord knows I am inflexible, but I got to get out there and do my best, stretch as best I can. Take some time to build up some body strength. Encourage your adult-aged students to hit the weights. Maybe take a little time at the end of class to do a few push-ups. A few sit-ups is a good idea too while you are at it.
Karate technique wise, why not do a few knuckle-pushups to get students figuring out how to form good punches. Make sure that you do them right, and do them safe. Students can even do them off of a wall they are leaning against.
How about showing students some of the best ways to loosen up the joints and how to relax their shoulders? A few very light aerobic moves will help facilitate this.
Body conditioning is critical to good karate. We all know that just knowing the technique is not good enough. Without the strength or flexibility behind it, karate is more theoretical than practical. I am not writing this to tell you to be "a great karate teacher like me", but rather, I write this as a reminder and spur to myself as well. Good teachers are supposed to be good learners too. We are all basically "tripping up the stairs" as we make progress.
I think that part of the lack of enthusiasm some karate instructors have in taking time to work on body-conditioning during class is that they may not be very good at it. Maybe you can’t do the splits, or do 50 push-ups. Don’t worry about it. Really! Most people can’t. But if you do have a student in your group who is truly flexible get that person to get on the floor right next to you in front of your students. Show your class through your "prime example" how to do it. And then you struggle along too. Don’t worry about your group thinking that you are not the "real deal" as an instructor. Your tenure, knowledge, ability in so many other karate-related ways, is so far superior your position is not really in doubt.
Anyway, it might put you in a better light than you think. Now your students can see that you struggle along right there with them, and they know that you are all "in it together".
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There is nothing duller than someone who never laughs. Frankly, I can hardly trust such a person. People who have no sense of humor just seem to miss out on too much that is going on around them. I doubt their ability to adequately perceive the reality in which they exist.
Life is too short to be joyless. You need to simply enjoy your karate as well. Of course, teaching karate is a serious job. Naturally, there are many responsibilities in teaching martial arts to students. We need to take our jobs extremely seriously. After all, so many people come to us with the expressed desire of learning how to defend themselves in life-threatening situations. We ought not let them down.
But we also need to celebrate our karate as well. There is much to laugh about, have fun with, experiment and play with. It is OK for you to like what you do. It’s OK for us to have good fun with karate as well. Some of the best belly-laughs I have ever had were on the dojo floor. We take karate pretty seriously, but it is an intensity in approach that also spills into our desire to live fully as well, and thus the laughter.
I think that kids are healthiest growing up in environments where people laugh. Not the kind of sit-com laughter that we hear and which is often at the expense of someone’s shortcomings or mistakes, but the laughter of sheer joy. I think that there are so many benchmarks that we can identify in our personal development of karate skills, we should celebrate them better.
I find it kind of depressing sometimes to see how people "graduate" from one belt to another in some dojos. There is a grim sort of acknowledgement that accompanies the giving and granting of awards. Where is the laughter and applause? Why not clap your hands? Don’t worry. The Shinto gods in your kamidana ("god shelf") will not explode with bolts of lightning. No one will be mortified or offended. Your dojo will not implode.
Take some time to figure out how to make your "graduations" more celebratory. Take some time to figure out how to make your hard practices enjoyable and "cool". Karate is hard enough training as it is, there really is no need to add additional artificial layers of psychological or social pressure to the environment. When the temptation comes to make things more "traditional" or "austere" take a moment to ask yourself also, "Who does this serve?" and "What is the purpose of this?"
You’ll be a hundred times happier if you do.
Have fun in your karate! You work hard. You deserve it.
Mark Groenewold
Kanazawa, Japan
September, 2005
This page is copyright © 2005 Mark Groenewold