Kids are the Best Karate Teachers

When I finally had my black belt tied around my waist at my black-belt grading, I looked around at all the high-ranking instructors in attendance and said to a fellow gradee, “Boy, did I ever fool them”.

As hard as I had worked on forms, techniques, and sparring, and as well as I thought I knew my stuff, it seemed like getting my first degree was starting at white belt all over again. I wondered how this black belt was equipping me to teach. I didn’t feel ready.

So, how does a lowly first degree sensei become a coach sensei like all the higher ranking black belts? Part of the answer is through ten times as much work as it took you to get your black belt. The second part is incorporating specific strategies to speed the process along.

When I first headed off to start a club, a senior sensei suggested that I start with a kid’s class first, as that was the best way to build a club. Since then, I have cursed that advice many times, as right as it was. Kids are brutally honest, and in your face when you are unreasonable or boring or too rigid in your approach. You can see it in their posture. Or they would say, “This is boring.” As a result, I have found them to be the best teachers.

I quickly learned to get my students to feel empowered in all aspects of karate, from technique to sparring to kata. Great athletes in all sports make what they do fun, and as a result they love to practice. In karate, I learned that I had better make practice fun, because all of my students would be practicing many times longer than they would ever compete. And some students would never compete at all.

I learned to use games to teach techniques, games that were challenging and competitive. I learned to use enthusiastic and spirited words. And, once I got their attention this way, they rarely missed and became very skillful.

Kids teach you this stuff, in your face, whereas adults are very polite week after week. Then a month later, they disappear. I always wondered where they went because I was sure they liked my teaching.

Here are three suggestions to help turn you, the newly minted first degree black belt into a seasoned coach sensei:

1. Use your instructor and other instructors as role models. Attend as many workshops as you can, not so much to learn techniques, but to watch instructors teach. Listen and learn, and then be them when you teach your students. Step into their shoes and try out their mannerisms, how they use their voices and how they pace a class. It speeds up the learning process.

2. Perspective is good. Step back from your teaching in order to imagine yourself in front of your class. Imagine what you look like as you teach, as though you are watching yourself on a stage. This vantage point will give a lot of information about your teaching. It will give you a whole lot more in terms of what you need to do to become a coach sensei. From this vantage point, you can make yourself bigger and stronger and more confident. It will allow you to see the frustration, headaches, anger, boredom, etc. that indicate your students are getting off track. Step back and change the one person you can change - you. In this way, you transform your frustration, and, class by class, you learn to be a motivational coach.

3. Last, but not least, plan your class. Perhaps you have never seen your sensei with a plan, but you can be sure they have it in their heads. Never take chances. Put yours on paper and if you have to refer to it during class—do so. It will help you to stay focused and directed, so you avoid running out of ideas. With practice, you’ll be able to leave the list in your pocket.

There are many more suggestions that seasoned sensei coaches can offer to first degree senseis. But these three will get you started, and, if you are willing to put in ten times as much work as you did for your Shodan grading, you will become a fluid, inspirational and confident sensei coach, perhaps as inspirational as the head sensei coaches you saw at your black belt grading.