Today’s Karate has many faces: Sport Karate – which is by far the most prolific; Traditional Karate – which is less popular, but not uncommon; and Self-Defence-Orientated Karate – the stuff we do (almost vanishingly rare).

Kids start Karate through a multitude of different circumstances: they either start because their friends are doing it, and they nag their parents until they get to go along (about half of kids fall into this category); or they are there because their parents want them to be there (nearly half fall into this category); or they are there because they have very clear goals in terms of their self-defence capabilities (this was me when I started at the age of 10 – and I realise that it is rare).

The kids that fare best are the ones in the first category; the ones that fare worst are the ones in the second category.

In their journey to adulthood, I believe that children need love, stability, security, adult attention, praise, fun, humour, friends, a lot of play, good role models, a release for their boundless energy and people being nice to them.

What I believe they don’t need are aggression, a big load of duties, criticism, conflict, unpleasantness, sarcasm, pressure (to perform), fear and enforced harsh discipline.

What is it that we really want for our children?

Personally, I would like my children to grow up into adults who have a sense of balance, who are self-disciplined, benevolent, self-confident, goal-orientated, undaunted, un-intimidated, adventurous, fun-loving and have the capacity for intellectual critical thought (the desire to question everything). I would like them to look back on their childhood with warmth and nostalgia.

So how should we run a martial arts class for children in order for our goals for them to be realised?

As parents, we should absolutely not force them to go. We can gently persuade them to try it, but if it is not for them – end of story….for now anyway. It might be for them later – kids change.

A lot of kids train because their parents want them to do what they don’t do themselves – they are often the ones that secretly would like to train (or would have wanted to have trained). Parents should absolutely not demand achievement or set performance expectations.

As instructors, we have to remember that we are very important role models for our kids. The kids are there to have fun; they are there for social interaction with their friends, they are there to learn how to physically train, to learn co-ordination – all with a martial arts flavour.

We have to be nice to them, entertain them (kids love stories – we all have a lot of those). This sets a tone of trust and comfort and it is amazing how kids train so much harder, concentrate harder and behave better in this environment.

Kids do get tired, their attention span is limited, they do get bored, they do get upset and frustrated. We must understand this and we must show understanding.

If we shout, we must do so as encouragement. If we reprimand or punish, we must do so sparingly (only to contain disruption that is either irritating or unsafe for the other kids) and only as a token and always with a sparkle in our eyes.

Kids and self-defence: we are not there to teach kids how to fight! Fighting is wrong and schools in New Zealand put a lot of effort to teach our children not to resort to violence to solve conflict – let’s not undo this or work against this.

We should rely on basics and the strengthening and co-ordination effects of kata (and very controlled sparring) only to give them just enough self confidence to avoid trouble with other kids.

It is a myth to think that kids can learn sufficient martial arts technique to effectively protect themselves against Adults (especially crazed adults). The strength disadvantage is just far too great and we would do a lot better making kids aware of the dangers instead: teaching them to behave in such a way as to avoid this sort of danger.

We should absolutely not teach them or practise the applications of the katas. These techniques are particularly nasty and kids have no business possessing this sort of knowledge (thus potentially endangering other kids) – that is why they are not in our junior syllabus.

This can be saved for when/if they cross over to the adult’s class.

In terms of martial arts, my real goal is to lay the foundations for children to learn as adults. Not many kids do cross over successfully to adult’s classes, but those that do have a huge advantage over adults that didn’t train as children, as co-ordination and form are almost hard-wired into them.

Kids and sport Karate: last weekend (June 2002), as a result of being nagged by a few of my kids, we took a team to compete in the Central North Island Regional Championships.

What I saw, reminded me of why we don’t do sport Karate:

In the Kata, kids who performed simple Katas well scored much higher than kids who performed the much more difficult katas, maybe not so well. (A terrible incentive to have a go at the hard katas).

In the Sparring, the judges only really scored reverse punches (and obviously ignored almost every other technique) making the entire competition very technique poor.

The judging was very inconsistent, kids were getting hurt, getting angry with each other and crying. Kids were getting shouted at by their instructors, team members, parents and other adults when they performed poorly.

I find this sort of naked aggression and behaviour in the name of sport quite offensive. It cannot be anybody’s idea of a good time. I would rather see my kids playing table tennis or soccer or something that they will remember as being enjoyable.