Today.....
Woke up at 8am, bummed around, packed my kendo gear, breakfast, train. I deliberately caught the later train so I could get a offpeak ticket, save myself $2.40 since I am now in skinflint mode LOL.
Got to uni, sat in my fridge office and went through my emails, and did more job hunting to not much luck really. I had a chat to Imtiaz about his work and clarified some stuff for him, had a chat to Roshan to clarify some stuff for him on his results, and also had a chat with my supervisor in regards to jobs, Imtiaz and Roshans work also.
Then off to kendo training.
Oh my, I'm about to lose my voice thanks to the kiai I did today. Our training was quite spectacular today. We did 300 hayasuburi, and man that absolutely killed. My heartrate was going over 240 if I counted my pulse/second correctly, I think had we gone on, I'd probably have a heart attack or collapsed.... next time, I think I'll have to slow down or stop or something.
We focussed mainly on men cuts today, doing a series of different exercises with the emphasis on the men cut, proper kiai and zanshin. It was slightly different than normal, but besides the pushing on zanshin and kiai, it really didn't feel any different to normal waza training except it was all on men cuts. I do appreciate the more feedback given when I was partnered with the person leading, but it didn't really seem that different. I know that my right is still leading for example, and well, it's really hard to fix =( Oh well.
We did have an incident though when one of the bogu players was trying to teach a beginner on their men cut, and the leader stopped them. It later blew up into a pretty big row, and well, the bogu player stormed off and it just wasn't very nice.
The issue at hand is, the club is running at a very inefficient manner. There is very little co-ordination on many things, and a lack of a lot of communication also. Our situation, like a lot of smaller clubs, is that we are a university club, not a proper professional club with people who are paid to do administration, or paid coaches etc. Our instructor isn't even there during the week, and is only there on Saturdays, but yet still gives these 'orders' that are expected to be followed by the club. Fair enough, since he is our 'sensei' if you could call him that, but without continual presence and guidance, it is really falling into shambles. The point in debate was about who can, and can't give instruction to beginners.
It is fair to say, that only the better/qualified players should teach. But, right now, only one person at a time takes the beginners, and only two people are given this privilege or pain depending on how you see it. The problem with that is when you have a very large group of beginners, and the person who teaches them is being thorough, there isn't enough time to get to every single one of them during the session. This means the ones left unattended to pick up bad habits, and keep them because no-one is correcting them or helping them get better.
A point to note from here is that this is my personal opinion, not anyone elses, so tough if you disagree or dislike them.
I think that the 'orders' given in regards to who is or isn't allowed to teach beginners is utter crap. Personally, I think a lot of the things that our instructor says in relation to how the club is structured and run is really terrible. I like him, he's a great guy and he teaches great kendo/kumdo, but his ability to run a club, organise a club, or even consider particular things in regards to the club is shocking. His experiences come from the fact that he has been in dojo's in Korea, and he tries to run things the way he experienced them there. Well, we're not in Korea, and this isn't your standard dojo. This is a university club, where students who participate aren't going to be as dedicated as those who would go to a traditional club. If you ask them to spend $300+ on a bogu, and they dislike something about the training, they'll just bugger off. Ok, yes, that means you only get the dedicated people left in the club. Excellent, because they are the true kendo players. The down side is, the club would die. Without enough members, you don't have enough funding from the sporting body of the university because you need minimum membership numbers, nor do you gain enough income from memberships to hire the hall we train in. A diehard core of members is always important, but for a club like ours, keeping people interested is even more. Giving beginners attention, individual attention is well received, if you can.
The point that our instructor gives is that, not everyone is good enough to teach good kendo. Therefore, they shouldn't. Yes, fair point. But, all things considering, we are all pretty bad at kendo compared to the rest of the world. Then, the point about seniority kicks in since kendo is a very traditional martial art in many ways. For example, one of the people who is the beginners instructor is a 6th kyu. The person in bogu who wanted to help out is a 4th kyu. A point raised is that if you overstep the beginners instructor, you're overstepping the 'orders' from our instructor. But, hang on, as the 4th kyu, he is technically higher ranked in ability according to tradition than the beginners instructor at 6th kyu..... But, the whole sempai/kouhai issue also comes into play (sempai is the senior, kouhai is the junior). Anyone who starts earlier than you is normally deemed to be your sempai, making you their kouhai. In this situation, 6th kyu person is 4th kyu person's sempai. Confusing? Yes. Complicated, very. So, where do these boundaries lie? The 'orders' from the instructor, if he was a normal sensei, would be considered absolute. As he once said, if he says, this person leads today, then that person is the emperor or king for the day, and everyone must listen to him. Regardless of their rank..... So, in theory, because the instructor gave this power on a long-term basis to 6th kyu, then he is king. But, 6th kyu isn't being challenged really, it just that 4th kyu wants to help out, and instructor says no-one but qualified persons can teach.... Technically, our instructor isn't a sensei because he's not 6th Dan.
Now, if you take me as example, 6th kyu player is actually better than me. I know it, he knows it. I have no problem with that. But, I'm his sempai, and I'm also a 4th kyu, so technically I outrank him on both counts, except he still holds the king trump card from the instructor. Messy isn't it? But, is he able to teach everyone in the small amount of time? No, I don't believe he can. He himself expressed frustrations in regards to that the beginners can never get everything taught to them in each lesson properly, and that is mainly because they don't get sufficient instruction on the individual basis. They will then go away and practice at home and embed those bad habits and form further, which makes it much harder to fix later, believe me, I know all about that.
What are the solutions? Hard to say. My opinion is that there has to be more people to help. Yes, some of us are certainly unqualified. But, some of us, in my humble opinion, are qualified. Some players are good at playing, but they suck at teaching. Some suck at playing, but are good at teaching. I know this for a fact and experience from my time looking after archery. There are plenty of excellent archers out there who can't coach or teach for crap, while there are great coaches who shoot really shockingly bad scores. You don't have to be a good player to be a great coach, and I think that our instructor misses that point, or doesn't believe in that point, which is fair enough, his opinion.
Unless we have the resources, and the ability to say to 3-4 people, you teach beginners only this semester, no bogu playing for you, then we'll have this problem. It's not fair to them, and they should be compensated if that ever happens. But, you can't have too many people changing all the time because their teaching styles and methods will only confuse the students more and more as it changes. But, at the same time, having different people teach you the same thing can be helpful because it can help you understand and learn things differently because not everyone learns the same way. Different examples are often very helpful.
What can we do?.... I suggested that perhaps if you are a bogu player, and am training in waza for the day, you ignore what is going on with the beginners. You're in bogu, train hard in bogu, leave the non-bogu alone. If you're a lazy bum, or injured, or don't have enough time for bogu training (like only 1 hr or something), and you join the beginners, ASK the person leading if you can help out. They are 'king'. If they say yes because they deem that you are good enough, then great, help out. If they say no, tough titties, suck it up princess and be humbled because that is part of life, you might think you're top shit but you might actually be shit.
An alternative perhaps is a buddy system. We don't have many bogu players during the week, but quite often, we have time before training starts when we are outside chatting or after training when we are outside chatting. If we have a 'buddy' system, the beginners can be put with the bogu players, and if they have questions, or want help, their buddy can provide it before or after training outside, go through on a more individual basis, explain things and so forth. Perhaps that will work, perhaps it wouldn't.
There are many things that need to be considered. The club will have some issues if these things don't get resolved quite frankly, and that is the opinion from me, with my past experiences in looking after a club.
Woke up at 8am, bummed around, packed my kendo gear, breakfast, train. I deliberately caught the later train so I could get a offpeak ticket, save myself $2.40 since I am now in skinflint mode LOL.
Got to uni, sat in my fridge office and went through my emails, and did more job hunting to not much luck really. I had a chat to Imtiaz about his work and clarified some stuff for him, had a chat to Roshan to clarify some stuff for him on his results, and also had a chat with my supervisor in regards to jobs, Imtiaz and Roshans work also.
Then off to kendo training.
Oh my, I'm about to lose my voice thanks to the kiai I did today. Our training was quite spectacular today. We did 300 hayasuburi, and man that absolutely killed. My heartrate was going over 240 if I counted my pulse/second correctly, I think had we gone on, I'd probably have a heart attack or collapsed.... next time, I think I'll have to slow down or stop or something.
We focussed mainly on men cuts today, doing a series of different exercises with the emphasis on the men cut, proper kiai and zanshin. It was slightly different than normal, but besides the pushing on zanshin and kiai, it really didn't feel any different to normal waza training except it was all on men cuts. I do appreciate the more feedback given when I was partnered with the person leading, but it didn't really seem that different. I know that my right is still leading for example, and well, it's really hard to fix =( Oh well.
We did have an incident though when one of the bogu players was trying to teach a beginner on their men cut, and the leader stopped them. It later blew up into a pretty big row, and well, the bogu player stormed off and it just wasn't very nice.
The issue at hand is, the club is running at a very inefficient manner. There is very little co-ordination on many things, and a lack of a lot of communication also. Our situation, like a lot of smaller clubs, is that we are a university club, not a proper professional club with people who are paid to do administration, or paid coaches etc. Our instructor isn't even there during the week, and is only there on Saturdays, but yet still gives these 'orders' that are expected to be followed by the club. Fair enough, since he is our 'sensei' if you could call him that, but without continual presence and guidance, it is really falling into shambles. The point in debate was about who can, and can't give instruction to beginners.
It is fair to say, that only the better/qualified players should teach. But, right now, only one person at a time takes the beginners, and only two people are given this privilege or pain depending on how you see it. The problem with that is when you have a very large group of beginners, and the person who teaches them is being thorough, there isn't enough time to get to every single one of them during the session. This means the ones left unattended to pick up bad habits, and keep them because no-one is correcting them or helping them get better.
A point to note from here is that this is my personal opinion, not anyone elses, so tough if you disagree or dislike them.
I think that the 'orders' given in regards to who is or isn't allowed to teach beginners is utter crap. Personally, I think a lot of the things that our instructor says in relation to how the club is structured and run is really terrible. I like him, he's a great guy and he teaches great kendo/kumdo, but his ability to run a club, organise a club, or even consider particular things in regards to the club is shocking. His experiences come from the fact that he has been in dojo's in Korea, and he tries to run things the way he experienced them there. Well, we're not in Korea, and this isn't your standard dojo. This is a university club, where students who participate aren't going to be as dedicated as those who would go to a traditional club. If you ask them to spend $300+ on a bogu, and they dislike something about the training, they'll just bugger off. Ok, yes, that means you only get the dedicated people left in the club. Excellent, because they are the true kendo players. The down side is, the club would die. Without enough members, you don't have enough funding from the sporting body of the university because you need minimum membership numbers, nor do you gain enough income from memberships to hire the hall we train in. A diehard core of members is always important, but for a club like ours, keeping people interested is even more. Giving beginners attention, individual attention is well received, if you can.
The point that our instructor gives is that, not everyone is good enough to teach good kendo. Therefore, they shouldn't. Yes, fair point. But, all things considering, we are all pretty bad at kendo compared to the rest of the world. Then, the point about seniority kicks in since kendo is a very traditional martial art in many ways. For example, one of the people who is the beginners instructor is a 6th kyu. The person in bogu who wanted to help out is a 4th kyu. A point raised is that if you overstep the beginners instructor, you're overstepping the 'orders' from our instructor. But, hang on, as the 4th kyu, he is technically higher ranked in ability according to tradition than the beginners instructor at 6th kyu..... But, the whole sempai/kouhai issue also comes into play (sempai is the senior, kouhai is the junior). Anyone who starts earlier than you is normally deemed to be your sempai, making you their kouhai. In this situation, 6th kyu person is 4th kyu person's sempai. Confusing? Yes. Complicated, very. So, where do these boundaries lie? The 'orders' from the instructor, if he was a normal sensei, would be considered absolute. As he once said, if he says, this person leads today, then that person is the emperor or king for the day, and everyone must listen to him. Regardless of their rank..... So, in theory, because the instructor gave this power on a long-term basis to 6th kyu, then he is king. But, 6th kyu isn't being challenged really, it just that 4th kyu wants to help out, and instructor says no-one but qualified persons can teach.... Technically, our instructor isn't a sensei because he's not 6th Dan.
Now, if you take me as example, 6th kyu player is actually better than me. I know it, he knows it. I have no problem with that. But, I'm his sempai, and I'm also a 4th kyu, so technically I outrank him on both counts, except he still holds the king trump card from the instructor. Messy isn't it? But, is he able to teach everyone in the small amount of time? No, I don't believe he can. He himself expressed frustrations in regards to that the beginners can never get everything taught to them in each lesson properly, and that is mainly because they don't get sufficient instruction on the individual basis. They will then go away and practice at home and embed those bad habits and form further, which makes it much harder to fix later, believe me, I know all about that.
What are the solutions? Hard to say. My opinion is that there has to be more people to help. Yes, some of us are certainly unqualified. But, some of us, in my humble opinion, are qualified. Some players are good at playing, but they suck at teaching. Some suck at playing, but are good at teaching. I know this for a fact and experience from my time looking after archery. There are plenty of excellent archers out there who can't coach or teach for crap, while there are great coaches who shoot really shockingly bad scores. You don't have to be a good player to be a great coach, and I think that our instructor misses that point, or doesn't believe in that point, which is fair enough, his opinion.
Unless we have the resources, and the ability to say to 3-4 people, you teach beginners only this semester, no bogu playing for you, then we'll have this problem. It's not fair to them, and they should be compensated if that ever happens. But, you can't have too many people changing all the time because their teaching styles and methods will only confuse the students more and more as it changes. But, at the same time, having different people teach you the same thing can be helpful because it can help you understand and learn things differently because not everyone learns the same way. Different examples are often very helpful.
What can we do?.... I suggested that perhaps if you are a bogu player, and am training in waza for the day, you ignore what is going on with the beginners. You're in bogu, train hard in bogu, leave the non-bogu alone. If you're a lazy bum, or injured, or don't have enough time for bogu training (like only 1 hr or something), and you join the beginners, ASK the person leading if you can help out. They are 'king'. If they say yes because they deem that you are good enough, then great, help out. If they say no, tough titties, suck it up princess and be humbled because that is part of life, you might think you're top shit but you might actually be shit.
An alternative perhaps is a buddy system. We don't have many bogu players during the week, but quite often, we have time before training starts when we are outside chatting or after training when we are outside chatting. If we have a 'buddy' system, the beginners can be put with the bogu players, and if they have questions, or want help, their buddy can provide it before or after training outside, go through on a more individual basis, explain things and so forth. Perhaps that will work, perhaps it wouldn't.
There are many things that need to be considered. The club will have some issues if these things don't get resolved quite frankly, and that is the opinion from me, with my past experiences in looking after a club.
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