Battered and Bruised but Worth it

I tested for my first degree black belt on Friday. While I don't officially find out the results until Wednesday, and I won't get my belt for weeks yet, we're not allowed to test if we aren't cabable of passing, so the outcome is not in doubt.



It went pretty well, and mostly as expected. Line drills were relatively easy, and I only had to do three of the ten forms. (We're going to start learning the taeguek forms in the club now. I'm so excited! We only do the palgwe forms now, and I hear the taeguk forms are more showy.) Forms are my favorite, because I'm good at things I can memorize.



Sparring, not so much. I've never been *great* at sparring...I've improved over the years, but since it relies so much on reacting and instinct instead of memorization, it's more difficult for me. I did pretty good on the first bout, since I was pretty fresh. Second bout, not so much since I got kicked in the head and was so woozy Master Ashton had to yell at me to snap me out of it. In my defense, I was fighting a National Champion, so I don't feel too bad.

Board breaks were a little disappointing. I tried to do a speed break with a knife hand, and while I had no trouble with the practice board, I bruised up my hand and forearm, and had to do a regular break instead. Part may have been the way Cameron was holding the board - since speed breaks rely on speed instead of power, it's much more important that the board is held correctly, and Christie mentioned he was holding it differently than she had held it when I practiced. It took me two tries on the flying side kick when it only should have taken me one, and I think it was because I was flustered from the speed break and wasn't paying as much attention to my aim. So that was a little disappointing.



I'm glad I waited the extra time, though. I feel much better about this testing than I would have last year when I was still trying to figure out my heat issues. I feel more like I have earned it, and that's an accomplishment.

I was Right - Now What?

I was right about the approach: last night, the first thing I did was lay out the expectations. Testing is six weeks away, there are only five classes left after this one, this is what you need to know, we need to buckle down and work hard and be quiet while instructors are teaching and if we do, we'll have time for games at the end of class. I haven't seen a class do so well this semester. We even did line drills, which are the hardest thing for kids to do and not talk, and they were quiet. V showed up to teach last night (she's only really scheduled for Mondays), and I thought it was a great opportunity to point out the difference in results. But when I talked to her about it, she said "Oh? I wasn't paying attention." and pretty much dismissed me.

Now I've had "issues" with V. in the past - she wears her sleeves rolled up, which is not the proper way to wear a uniform, and she was dismissive of me when I mentioned it. While that rankled me, I mentioned it to the head instructor and let it go, because I didn't feel it was worth pursuing. But yesterday I ran into a parent of a couple of the kids - long time participants and really good kids - and she expressed her concern to me as well, because the boys want to quit because they don't like her. That reinforced my impression that V. relies too much on punishment and not enough on discipline, and that the kids aren't reacting well. These are my kids and I'm not going to let it go.

I think I'm going to try one more time to talk to her, and be a little less diplomatic in my approach. I don't have high hopes given my experience with her, but on the other hand, I didn't mention that a parent had talked to me, either. I want to fully make sure she understands the depth of my concern before I talk to either Norpel or Ashton. Wish me luck.

Edit: I realized I wanted to talk a bit more about my teaching philosophy in this post...I rely more than most on positive reinforcement. I try to offer compliments on a job well done as much as I do correction. I don't do a good job of remembering whom I've complimented and whom I've corrected, and I've been working on trying to make sure that each student gets a good balance of each, and not just the class as a whole. I try to notice when a student has improved - like last night I mentioned to Matt how much his front stances have improved, and he just glowed. I try to compliment when a student realizes he or she made a mistake and corrects it without prompting. I also say "I can tell you've been practicing that" - and the kid is proud because his or her hard work paid off, both in the form of improved techinque and recoginition of the time and effort. I know this works, because I see improvement, and I see other kids work harder and correct themselves when I offer a compliment to one of their classmates.

So when someone else comes in with the complete opposite teaching style - yelling and excessive pushups as punishment for not obeying her expectations that I don't think she's established appropriately for that particular age group - to the extent that kids want to quit after two of her classes...it just makes me sick to my stomach.

The 4th Tenet

In Tae Kwon Do, one of the first things you learn are the five tenets: Courtesy, Integrity, Perseverence, Self-Control, and Indomintable Spirit. As martial artists, we are to practice the tenents both inside class and out. Last night, the kids were really having trouble with the fourth tenet, self-control. Too much talking while the instructors were trying to teach, talking back, complaining, not following instructions, and in general having a poor attitude. I think we have been letting these things slide a bit this semester, mostly because there are just so many new kids, and we let some things slide with new kids as they are reminded of and get used to the rules. The problem is that because we let new kids slide, the more experienced kids have been sliding with them and being poor examples.

I understand the difficulty of following the fourth tenet. In some ways, it's the most difficult of the five to follow. I find it relatively easy to be kind, to be honest, to not give up, and to believe in myself, but when it comes to controlling my actions and keeping my temper, it's just a little bit harder. Not just in my love/hate relationship with food, but that's the foremost one that comes to mind, because I can point to the times when my head tells me to stop stuffing myself, but find myself eating anyway and hating myself for not stopping.

Part of self-control is knowing what your limits are. I know it's easier for me to eat no Halloween candy than to stop at one, and I know it's easier for the kids to not talk at all than to know what it means to talk quietly. I also think an important part of self-control is sometimes allowing yourself out of those self-imposed limits. Sometimes you just need a reminder of why you set those limits in the first place. I treated my body like crap this last weekend, and it rebelled. I can't think of a way it didn't rebel, and let me tell you, this has been the easiest two days of staying within my limits I've ever had.

So I'm going to apply these lessons to Thursday's classes, and see if I can't head off Monday's problem. I don't particularly like the way Monday's problem was handled (and I'm not sure I like V.'s teaching style in general but that's another post all together), so since I'm in charge of Thursdays, I'm handling it differently. I'm almost positive it's a matter of reminding the kids about our expectations for their behavior. We'll see if I'm right.

I went to my first live MMA event at the Riverside Casino. There were seven amateur fights and four professional; as with any card, there were some good fights and some not so good fights, but it was all pretty awesome nonetheless. We had pretty good seats five rows back, but once fights went to the ground, it was hit or miss whether you could see anything at all.

This is a pretty good triangle:


And this guy had him in a ground and pound:


I got to meet Big John McCarthy:


And Jens Pulver:


Frickin' awesome!