Anyone else...

nathanjusko · Yellow Belt

Amen, lets bring back some of the integrity to martial arts before it kills itself and we lose the good name that so many of us worked our tails off in order to preserve.

Mc. Steve · Orange Belt

What, so no one agrees with me that children should learn from a young age because it's easier to learn? Come on people, at least admit classes specifically for children are a good thing. Won't someone think of the children
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nathanjusko · Yellow Belt

I will think of the children, and that is why I will not teach them martial arts at such an early age. I will not force them to learn something that they do not have the capacity to understand, and to do so is a rather disgusting waste of time, for both the child and the instructor.

TangSooGuy · Blue Belt

Personally, I am torn on this subject. I. too hate to see black belts handed out to kids liek they mean nothing, but I think this reflects a problem more with the mentality of the instructor giving the belt than with the idea of teaching children martial arts.

Personally, not only do I think children should be allowed to learn martial arts, I think we as instructors have an obligation to teach children who are willing and able to learn.
Please note the "willing and able" part of that statement. I will NOT award a child any belt, even a 9th Gup, unless they have shown a willingness to work for it, and a genuine drive to improve themselves.

Instilling those values alone is reason enough for me to teach children martial arts. I am a believer that the martial arts to help to instill a certain level of morality, confidence, and discipline if they are taught correctly.

Now, awarding chldren with belts simply because mom and dad have paid, or teaching clasess like day care, or allowing students with bad attitudes to progress through the ranks is just plain wrong. I'm sorry to say it, but in my classes, kids who aren't willing to work, or to show respect to their elders (regardless of rank), just don't stay around...it's simply too hard for them, not because we make it so they can't succeed, but because they are unwilling to do what it takes to succeed. I tell my youth students that until they show that they are willing to learn from me, I can't and won't teach them anything.

Now, the physical/defense side of things. It's not practical to tell a young child that they are going to be able to defend themselves 100% of the time against a full grown adult. My students are made aware of that by having to defend themselves against me (I am 6'3", 200 lbs.). I let them do pretty much whatever they want (with some limitations of course), along with the stipulation that they cannot apply this much force against other students. Sometimes it just doesn't work for them, but sometimes it does, and let me tell you, there are times where 9 and 10 year old kids have actually hurt me enough that they could have gotten away in a real self-defense situation.

In this day and age, I will give these kids any advantage they can get. Maybe they won't succeed, but they'll be far better off than if they had never had any training at all. I always teach awareness first, and always teach them to get away, that being their number one priority.

I'm babbling a bit, but I feel strongly about this. I think the problem is that we set expectations for kids too low. We talk down to them, and teach down to them. Kids surprise me every day with their intelligence and ability. If you set expectations high, they will meet and exceed those expectations, so you can keep setting them higher. I don't think the problem lies within the kids themselves, but rather within setting our expectations for them too low, and in turn lowering our expectations of ourselves.

EDIT:

I, by they way, started training when I was ten, and am now thirty. I have never stopped training along the way. My training has shaped the person I have become, and without having trained as a child, I'd probably be much fatter, much lazier, and way more socially inept. I would have been insulted as a child if someone told me I did not have the mental or physical capacity to learn the martial arts. My instructor never talked down to me, and I am indebted to him for that.

aefibird · Black Belt

returning_wave · Yellow Belt

Its not so much the black belts at a young age that I object to (altohugh i do disagree with them - I dont think a kid can posess what a black belt represents) but I am strongly agaisnt training kids under 14-ish in MA at all. I think it instills them with a misplaced confidence which can damage the important sranger-danger lessons, and as they are too young to understand fully the mental/spiratual aspects they will not know how to use it responsibly even against people they can take (ie their schoolfriends). A MA is a commitment they should make for themselves at least as an adolescent.
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Fenris-wolf · Green Belt

OK, I'm going with 5-10... It's not the same as doing aerobics or tae bo! While the child is not going to be able to really delve into the deeper aspects of MA it will teach them discipline and give them a huge physical advantage as they get older. Has it occurred to anybody that most MA have been traditionally taught from a young age? I think that a lot of the issues bothering the people here who are against children learning would be null if the school is well run and their sensei knows what they're doing.

Teaching a 6 year old is not telling them they could beat anybody up, it is giving them wonderful ground work for when they get older, and theoretically teaching them not only how to fight, but when not to.
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TangSooGuy · Blue Belt

WolverineGuy · Red Belt

My viewpoint exactly. My son will be starting martial arts when he is 5 or 6, no later. I want him to have the same moral foundations that were instilled in me when I started the martial arts. To me, that's the most important part of children learning the MAs.
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