Mark Lynn
Master Black Belt
That or they want to make their program seem more robust than it really is.
Not all schools are like this of course but most are. I visited a school a couple of months ago and saw that escrima was added to their TKD program. I watched as some kids were out on the floor doing a basic pattern (Sumbrada) but they really didn't have much of a clue as to what was going on. Afterwards a young BB got up and demonstrated a boken (wooden katana) combination of I think three cuts with the clearing of the blood off of the blade finish to the group of adult students. Everyone followed his lead, I was glad to see no one was hurt with all of the wooden weapons/sticks flying around, clearing away the imaginary blood.
Look at most schools today teaching their students to hold the kama choked up to the blade so they can control it while they are doing flips through the air or cartwheels in the form competition at the local tournament (or even national tournament for that matter). It is crazy.
At the same time though, I've added to my curriculum basic defenses against weapons (from the FMAs) in the Brown belt and higher ranks. The difference being that I have also a curriculum based on the FMAs which I also teach for my adults. Just FYI my main interest lies in the FMAs and I'm way more qualified to teach the FMA material than I am to teach my curiculum of Americanized TKD. However since I have more kids than adults, and I really like teaching the kids, over the past two years I teach more TKD than arnis.
Mark
