2023-07-03

Teaching my regular classes at the Ross Farnsworth - East Valley YMCA.

Tonight brought a whole new definition to “small classes” with one student in each class. Of course, it was the Monday before a holiday on Tuesday, so lots of families probably make a long weekend of it. Nevertheless, we made the best of it and the two students who showed up got tailor-made classes.

In the youth class, we spent lots of time working on vocabulary while doing techniques. Instead of sitting cross-legged on the floor, memorizing vocabulary, I had the student practice kihon while saying the name of the technique each time. (e.g. He’d step forward and punch, saying “oi-zuki” each time.) Not only does this make it more interesting, but it gets more senses into the game of helping to memorize the words. Hopefully the act of doing the technique while saying its name will help the knowledge stick.

In the adult class, we pressed hard and made it all the way through Heian Nidan for the student who recently made 8th kyu. She’s a quick learner, so we made good progress. As usual, I also went over some applications of the techniques in the kata. When I learn kata, knowing what I’m supposed to do is nice, but knowing why I’m doing it always helped me learn it faster.