Does your school have a unit plans?

**alex** · Posted On: 6/28/2012 10:55pm

Originally Posted by Kali11324

I kinda feel like your going to start ripping on the school . . . which is fine. My when it comes to training, my priorities now, at 39 with two kids, are totally different from when I was in my twenties.

out of interest, what are your goals?

personally number one on my list of goals when/if i send my future kids to a martial arts school is that they learn how to kick someones ass, especially since they are, i imagine, going to be on the short side (what can i say, i have a thing for short girls)

im not a fan of places that go on about how your kid will learn discipline and structure and blah blah. firstly thats the parents job and secondly with any kind of physical activity you are going to learn these things. for me it was cross country running. inventing dragon style cross country running to promote my sense of wellbeing or whatever was not neccessary.

also, a place which has stuff like

Should the unexpected occur and you are attacked, you have the ancient skills to protect yourself instantly and completely

screams "avoid" to me.

**Petter** · Posted On: 6/28/2012 11:04pm

We are capital-O Organised. Classes run on a 16-week cycle, with two different class plans per week on each of three levels for adults (basically beginner/intermediate/advanced), and at least one different level for kids (maybe two; not sure)—e.g. today featured “fundamentals class, week 16, class B: this, that, and this third technique”. Gracie Barra has a pretty solidly designed curriculum. (I admit to originally being a little put off by the seeming rigidity, but having heard the rationale I agree with it, and the instructor does of course have freedom to substitute variations and so on.)

**goodlun** · Posted On: 6/29/2012 12:20am

Originally Posted by Kali11324

I kinda feel like your going to start ripping on the school . . . which is fine. My when it comes to training, my priorities now, at 39 with two kids, are totally different from when I was in my twenties.

Na, I don't think I am going to rip on it. Assuming you have poked around this site since Dec 2007 that you should already know most of the red flags and all the other BS. Honestly if what you want is a fun place to go and burn some calories that are close to home who am I to tell you that you are wrong.
To answer your original question the school I go to does seem to have a plan (IE There will be written down on the board what we will be going over) but nothing highly structured and it is modified on the fly to meet the needs of who show up for that particular day.
This being said though most of the class I go to tend to range from 2-10 people or so.

**Fuzzy** · Posted On: 6/29/2012 4:40am

I'm no instructor, but according to the material I'm learning for the background portion of my grading, Doce Pares multi-style is split into a series of 6-month units with examinations every 3 months or so, obviously adjusted to skill level.

As Permalost said, I'm pretty sure this is GM Canete's influence.

**el dangeroso** · Posted On: 6/29/2012 4:49am

I think organizing a curriculum may be better for learning progression, but what about those who can't attend classes on a regular schedule throughout the week, say, one week they can only attend class one day, and the next week they can come to class 2 or 3 days because of their work schedule? Wouldn't they be missing out on alot of information they need for progression? I know a "one size fits all" curicculum is impossible, just curious to see how you would handle that.

**Kali11324** · Posted On: 6/29/2012 8:31am

Originally Posted by goodlun

Na, I don't think I am going to rip on it. Assuming you have poked around this site since Dec 2007 that you should already know most of the red flags and all the other BS. Honestly if what you want is a fun place to go and burn some calories that are close to home who am I to tell you that you are wrong.

And pretty much that is it. When I was shopping for a school for my kids I needed to look at things like pricing and convenience and well as the quality of instruction. The other schools for kids in my area are pretty crazy, things like $300.00 non-refundable registration fees.

I myself used to go to an excellent MMA school but over time that place changed. The teachers were awesome, but despite their best efforts there were to many muscle heads there for the wrong reasons. It is a long story for another thread. Guess what, every time you roll in class it is not an Olympic trial and doing a technique and hurting your partner does not may you a badass, just an asshole.

**Kali11324** · Posted On: 6/29/2012 9:07am

To get back to the original topic. I think having an overall big picture can really help you make sure you are covering everything. A big part of my job is teaching students to write research papers. I know what the end product should look like and then I can ask myself, "What do the students needs to get there?" At that point I can start breaking things down and putting in order. So yes, if students miss classes they are getting left behind and they will need some type of one-on-one help from the instructor or another student to get caught up.
Just the fact that an instructor is going through that mental exercise of breaking down the end product is a good thing. Then if they can share that plan with the students, the students will have a better understanding of why you're doing what you're doing and how all the pieces fit together.
It something that high school teachers have found really effective. Obviously though the biggest difference is that students at a Martial Arts school are there because they really want to be there.

**Petter** · Posted On: 6/29/2012 9:45am

Originally Posted by el dangeroso

I think organizing a curriculum may be better for learning progression, but what about those who can't attend classes on a regular schedule throughout the week, say, one week they can only attend class one day, and the next week they can come to class 2 or 3 days because of their work schedule? Wouldn't they be missing out on alot of information they need for progression? I know a "one size fits all" curicculum is impossible, just curious to see how you would handle that.

It depends on how the curriculum is structured. If each week builds explicitly on the previous week that’s certainly true, but there are other ways of doing it. The GB curriculum is more geared toward making sure that by the time you hit blue belt you’ll have seen all the basic positions and have some options from each of them; so the plan is there not to have each class build on the previous one, but to ensure that all bases are covered. We have beginners at every week of the cycle and no problems; each class is accessible without the previous one. The safe assumption (for instructors) is not “the students in class 11 have taken all of classes 1–10”, but “the students in intermediate classes have pretty much done all the fundamentals classes a couple of times and know all basic positions and techniques”.

**marcwagz** · Posted On: 6/29/2012 10:09am

Originally Posted by goodlun

Just out of morbid curiosity is this a link to West Coast's site
http://wcmaasd.com/

OMG! that is awesome they have a parkour program? I have never seen that before.
thats pretty sick

**Permalost** · Posted On: 6/29/2012 11:24am

Originally Posted by Kali11324

I have found a really good place. It is called West Coast Martial Arts in an area called 4s Ranch. It is about a mile from my house which makes it super convienent. It is maybe a little bit of a McDojo but it meets our needs. They let my one son take classes 3 times a week for a month before we had to pay. They are atarting BJJ for the adults, I don't know if they are going to ever intergrate it into the kid classes since it is anoutside coming to teach it. Actually he is one of the other parents so who knows.

I've recommended the place here on this site before, but that was when there was an FMA program run by Guro Mario Gajo, that had a stickfighting and conditioning in armor focus. It was one of the most intense workout I've done in years and I was close to vomiting a few times. He had some kind of falling out with them, though, and he no longer teaches there. I thought he would make a great athletic coach.

Other than that, it seemed like a pretty standard commercial martial arts school. Nice facilities. The kung fu class I happened to watch (because I got to the FMA one early) was pretty typical of kung fu, but not in a way that I really like. They were doing forms, then partnering up to work on the applications, but I didn't see any sparring or aliveness. Maybe that's on a different day or something. If I were you, I'd pay less money (probably; they don't mention pricing on their site) and take the drive down the freeway to Judo America to learn from an Olympic class judoka.

I didn't realize they did BJJ there. Its not on their website, and they seem to be good about updating it, because every trace of Guro Mario is removed from their site.