Developing Promotional Requirements for Junior Students

Key Questions:

1.      Does my governing body already have a plan in place for promotions?

2.      What sort of training program do I want to run for kids?

3.      How much information do I expect my youth students to learn between promotions?

If the answer to the first question is yes and you aren’t a member of the curriculum development group for your governing body, the rest of this particular blog entry, like the one for Seniors, may just be interesting reading. If they don’t, this should be a good read for you.

For Question 2, you have to decide what your goal for your youth is. Do you want competitors? Will you teach confidence building or self-esteem? What about an anti-bullying program? Will you teach pure traditional judo to them? Maybe you’ll combine them, I do. What you choose here guides your choices for promotional requirements.

I personally follow the USJA Junior promotional exam and choose the things that I think are the best fit for me and my students. Specifically I took all of my requirements for the brown belt and below students and split them into appropriate chunks for each level. I chose to split them that way so by the time my juniors make it to Junior Tenth Degree they’ll be at the same level as my senior Yonkyu and ready to jump right into the adult class at that level and preparing for Sankyu.

The third question’s answer really depends on how you promote. Do you promote every month? Do you run your classes year-round or on a school semester basis? Do you test them even if they don’t know the material required or do you test them when they’ll pass? Whatever your choice, think about it long and hard to help you determine how best to teach your students so they can achieve their goals.

I use a school semester approach with my promotions at the end of each semester. This has worked fabulously for me over the last few years because it provides ample time to prepare the students, even if they miss a class or so!

My process for planning a semester starts with the local school district calendar and a copy of my promotional requirements. I determine how many training days I have and how many critical-to-quality promotional elements I have. Once those are known, I plot a sequence that is logical to me and engaging for the students putting it down to a planning calendar. When I’ve got that done I go to my favorite calendar making program (MS Publisher because it’s nice and easy), make the calendar for the levels, print them to PDF and post them and the promotional requirements for each to the club Facebook page and just the updated calendars on the club website.

What’s your process for developing promotional requirements?

Developing Promotional Requirements for Senior Students

Key Questions:

1.      Does my governing body already have a plan in place for promotions?

2.      What sort of judo students will I cater to?

3.      What is my expectation of knowledge at each stage of my student’s development?

If the answer to the first question is yes and you aren’t a member of the curriculum development group for your governing body, the rest of this particular blog entry may just be interesting reading. If they don’t, this should be a good read for you.

For question 2 you have to make an honest evaluation of what sort of students you want to have. If you plan on a competitive club, like Judo America in San Diego, your promotional requirements should reflect techniques and skills useful and effective for tournament. On the other hand, if you have a recreational club, your promotional requirements might have more kata and technical perfection. Most, I think, will fall somewhere in between.

Question 3 completely depends on your belief about how technically proficient your students should be at any given level at a minimum. If you want broad depth of knowledge with a moderate ability to apply at will you might choose to have a lot of elements required at every level with a short time frame between promotions. If you want a high ability to apply at will with moderate depth you might choose to have a few elements with a moderate amount of time between promotions.

For me, I looked at the promotional requirements that I inherited from my father and the USJA Senior Promotional Test requirements. Much of my father’s requirements revolved around technical development and the Go Kyo no Waza. Much of the USJA’s test requirements revolve around competitive development. In combining the two I had to determine how much of both I was going to keep.  Neither was completely satisfactory for my purposes.

Specifically, my father’s standards weren’t as thorough as I think a new club instructor should use. Those requirements are adequate when an instructor has good backing or a long-term internship with a senior instructor. Unfortunately, I never had a long-term internship with a senior instructor.

The USJA test is very open to selection by candidates. It covers a broad variety of skills while limiting the amount required between promotions.  That’s a good plan for students who know judo and have a broad depth of understanding, but that’s not most students. However, I think it provides too much leeway for students.

In combining the two, I opted to keep my dad’s ten kyu system which, like the USJA system, has three brown belts but, unlike the USJA system, has six belts below the brown belts. The first two grades are the times where students learn basic judo skills and techniques and aren’t recognized by the USJA. That doesn’t bother me at all, because I don’t particularly believe in allowing most beginning adults to go to tournament. There are exceptions but those are based on tournaments and previous grappling experience. Once my students are ready for the USJA ranks they’ve already had about a year of judo and have better fitness and confidence in their skills.

I know this is a basic guide and I’d like to hear what you think!

My promotional requirements are available on my club website.

A Debt of Thanks

I’ve been having a difficult time coming up with topics, obviously! I came home tonight, got on Facebook and started talking to AnnMaria DeMars. All of a sudden I thanked her for her teaching me. She said, “What a nice thing to say.” Later I thought about it and decided I need to write a thank you post to those people who’ve taught me and, since this is a judo blog; I’m going to concentrate on those who’ve taught me judo.

First and foremost is my father. I’m not going to go very deep into that right now, because there’s too much detail and I’ve covered some of it before. Let’s suffice it to say that even today he continues to teach me, sometimes even in dreams!

Ann Stacey of New Mexico Military Institute was an awesome woman and my first woman judo instructor. As a cadet at New Mexico Military Institute with too many interests, I certainly didn’t take as much advantage as I could have of her knowledge. I remember one of my most shocking experiences as a green or purple belt was working with another cadet in randori and being blindsided by some throw I’d never seen or heard of (Kani Basami)! That was awesome! Ann was more than just a martial arts instructor; she was one of a pair of the most awesome midnight TACs ever to walk NMMI’s barracks!

Oscar Tinajero and Robert Garcia were really the guiders of my mudansha time at New Mexico State University, both before and after my hiatus. Robert, through his gift of storytelling was inspirational and helped me understand concepts where academic instruction fails. Steady as she goes should be Oscar’s motto; never have I met a more even tempered instructor.

William Andreas of Central Florida Judo and Jujitsu (and several of his black belts) was my first real introduction to judo outside of the Yawara Judo Association and my dad’s reach. I discovered sprung floors, Special Forces beginners (don’t mess with them), and even met Ed Szrejter! I went to one of my first tournaments and didn’t do too well, but it was one of my first and I’d never trained for competition. I had a great time there!

AnnMaria DeMars. Yes, that’s a full-stop. The woman is incredible and anyone who has the chance (the lucky devils at Gompers Middle School in California and the West Coast Judo Training Center!) to learn from her should leap at the chance. I’ve learned from her a couple of times but one of my fondest memories of her teaching were pulling me and another aside at the Judo Forum Clinic and Camp in 2008 and having her look at me and say, “Your seoi nage sucks. Aaron Kunihiro is going to help you get better at it.” I wish my arm hadn’t been killing me! I still talk to her and enjoy her blog; you should read her blog too!

Paul Nogaki is just about one of the awesomest clinicians I’ve ever had the opportunity to learn from. He has a very entertaining method for teaching and helps wonderfully in getting things both right and transferrable! I know I’ve giving him short shrift, but really his YouTube videos are the best instructionals (plural) that I’ve seen for judo yet!

Mike Hanon of the JudoForum and the Makoto Judo Dojo Forum has helped me immensely by watching videos of me and providing me incisive and clear help to better my skill and understanding of why the body moves in such and such a way. His writings have helped me far more immensely than I ever expected.

I’ve had a number of other clinicians and teachers that have been immensely helpful and I don’t want to leave them out but I’m running out of space. Bill Montgomery and Joan Love of Norwich Judo Dojo have been wonderful, especially with pursuing coaching and improving my ability to coach. I have given them no end of troubles sometimes, though I mean the commentary more as a way to gain more information for myself and promote potentially worthwhile programs (yes, now I realize that Kelly’s Capers is very worthwhile!). Bill Myers came down and taught Kelly’s Capers and a coaching clinic for us at NMMI last year and we’ve even taken some of his terms (“Brown belt syndrome”) and used them quite liberally. Gerry Lafon opened my mind to how a coach should look for every training method that improves results and be relentless with the paring knife to methods that just flat don’t work; for that I thank him immensely! (He’s also got a blog!)

I’m in another clinic right now and I don’t want Mark Lonsdale of Stallion Springs PAL Judo to think I’m forgetting about him (I’m not) but I am still processing everything and can’t give a fair evaluation yet. I am enjoying the clinic and learning a great deal! When that clinic is done I’m sure I’ll be able to give more info on what I’ve learned!

Oh, Hal Sharp is an inspiration and Hayward’s got a wonderful joke about a chicken!

For now, however, I’ll have to go and write some more some other day!