Teaching Kids - getting them better

[shesulsa]

Anyone have problems with kids retaining correction on their basic material?

What do you do about it?

I have a consistent problem with wrong side combinations even though we drill same-side across the floor in exercise.

 

[Stac3y]

Yep. Kids (like puppies, though my husband hates it when I compare them) often need hundreds of reminders before they retain a particular lesson. Additionally, depending on their age, they may have difficulty with the concept of left and right. There's really no way to fix that but to wait until they are developmentally able to understand it.

 

[jks9199]

Anyone have problems with kids retaining correction on their basic material?

What do you do about it?

I have a consistent problem with wrong side combinations even though we drill same-side across the floor in exercise.

Yes.

Best I've figured out is that you just have to accept that you're going to have to really, really repeat corrections to kids. And when you don't reinforce things regularly... they'll get dumped right out of their heads. Kid who could do a drill perfectly 3 months ago will flub it terribly if he hasn't had to do it since when you ask him to do it today...

 

[bluekey88]

I concur with the fact that kids just take many more reps tahn teens or adults. The younger they are, the more reps they need. Also, how you present th ematerial is imortant. While I try to break techniques down into doable chunks....soemtimes with really young kids, that doesn;t work. They struggle with connecting the chunks.

So, I find that sometimes I just have to let their natural ability to move take over. for example, with roundhouse kicks, I used to break it down to turn the front foot, lift the back leg, turn th ehips over ad extend the leg and so on. Aside from the balance issues, the kids don't get it.

I changed tyo putting a kicking shield in fron of them and telling them to pu tthe top of their foot on target. It took fewer reps to get the motion down, then I was able to spend more time smoothing over the nuances once the idea caught on. Turns out they call that whole-part-whole instruction (as opposed to the part-part-whole instruction I was doing).

Keep what you're doing simple and soemtimes letting the kids figure it out will make them catch on faster than guiding them step by step from the get-go.

Peace,
Erik

 

[Stac3y]

Speaking of roundhouse kicks, I've noticed that some kids (usually the younger ones) have a really hard time striking with their insteps, instead of their toes. They tend to flex the ankle the wrong way at the last instant and hit with the toes. I used to think they didn't understand; now I'm leaning toward it being a developmental/motor control thing. They chamber the kick correctly, but can't maintain that foot position. Anyone else noticed this? Using striking mitts seems to help a little bit; as does holding the foot in position with your hands while the child goes through the motion of the kick--anyone have other ideas?

 

[shesulsa]

I think one of the more difficult things to approach for a class full of children is when they're under 10, they all still learn in very unique ways and usually it runs the spectrum of all types of learning.

The hyung we do are varied and complicated, not at all like TKD, and there are so MANY combinations they have to remember. I've honestly thought about completely eliminating the long hyung for kids under 10 and creating a class of ranks for them.

I think most kids reach a new level of learning around 10 or 11 and can better duplicate and correct themselves from that point, so I may completely restructure my children's program.

Thing is, I don't want the way I approach the younger kids to be so complicated it can't be duplicated, ya know?

 

[bluekey88]

I totally get that. As I'm an assistant instructor and not the school owner, I have very little input into the curricuum. However, I've given a lot of thought towards how I might structure my own curriculum. One of the thoughts I had was to have essentially four seperate, but interrelated programs. One for the little ones. One for the older children, (8-12) one for the tweens, then a teen adult program. Each would eseentially have it's own rank structure but the curriculum from one shoudl flow into the other (and the ranks in one shoudl correspond to the ranks in the other.

So, I might have 5 ranks for the little ones, and when you finish that curriculum you shoudl be old enough to move to the childrens programs and start out somewhere in the middle of that. The kids program gopes to somewhere in the middle of the next program. By the time kid reaches the adult program, he/she should be close to but not quite at the black belt level.

Mind you this all hinges on quality control and a curriculum that keeps the kdis interested and learning throughout the whole process. Not sure if it's doable, but I'm working on it none the less.

Peace,
Erik

 

[ynnad]

I have a consistent problem with wrong side combinations even though we drill same-side across the floor in exercise.

This sounds like a mirroring problem. Most kids will naturally turn toward their instructor rather than away from him/her. You may need to switch sides so the kids have an easier time mirroring.

 

[shesulsa]

This sounds like a mirroring problem. Most kids will naturally turn toward their instructor rather than away from him/her. You may need to switch sides so the kids have an easier time mirroring.

Yeah, mirroring doesn't work for any of them, so I face the same direction they do and stand just a little bit in front of them.