It’s almost the end of my fourth year of teaching high school kendo and time to reflect on the year that’s past.
A bit of background: I teach kendo in an Australian high school, in two classroom settings: years 7 and 8 (12-14 years old), and after school to a wider range of students. I have already written an article that appeared in the last issue of Kendo World which described in detail the process of establishing a kendo culture in a non-Japanese high school. Building on what I’ve learned in the previous three years, this year I trialled some new approaches.
The main one was to introduce the students to shiai sooner. Each class does kendo for a semester, and previously I judged that this was too short a time to get to doing competition. However I realised that many of the least engaged students were also the most physically gifted in class, and I thought hard about how to include them more, how to get them to connect to kendo.
So this semester I introduced regular shiai, even though many of them didn’t have what I would describe as ‘solid’ kihon. What I found has really forced me to re-evaluate how I evaluate readiness in a student. Almost without fail, the ‘disengaged’ students responded brilliantly to shiai. They couldn’t perform reiho or kirikaeshi properly, but they could achieve recognisable yuko datotsu and in some cases also perform genmyo-na waza such as men-debana-men and men-suriage-men moving fowards. I was astounded to see waza that I can only perform rarely cropping up time and again in that strange, alchemical cauldron known as shiai.
It also helped all students realise the importance of strong kiai (many would just mumble if they were doing kihon drills, but screamed and threw themselves into it when faced with an opponent). They also realised the riai of kendo timing, distance and opportunity in ways that lectures would never get across.
The final surprise was when I acceded to their requests to shinpan some matches. Really I thought there was little chance it would be more than an interesting experience for them. No way could they realistically perceive yuko datotsu, especially at this problematic skill level. But judgements were by-and-large pretty good, about 75% in agreement with what I would have scored. And some shinpan teams were even able to maintain the “triangle” better than most adult yudansha.
One of the interesting things about this classroom kendo approach is that of all the students that start the program (which is about 100 students per year), 100% of them end up wearing full bogu, doing jigeiko and now also, doing shiai. In a normal club or dojo setting, from my own experience at least, only about 30-40% at most would progress to wearing full bogu, and only 10% or less would experience shiai. So there is 100% participation until the end of the semester, when there is 100% attrition! It is appropriate that these students are able to leave the class feeling that they’re experienced a little bit of everything that kendo has to offer. I don’t think I’m selling them a watered-down version of kendo (which is something I’m constantly reflecting on). Those rare souls who then turn up to after school training do start to glimpse the depth behind kendo’s outwardly simple form.
So what’s the learning from this? Well, for me it’s two-fold. Firstly, at certain ages, young people can run before they can walk so to speak, so the traditional timetable of skills acquisition that we’ve inherited sometimes has to be discarded, or at the very least amended. Secondly, if the students ask to do something in kendo I should take more notice of what is behind their request. It may be that they’re asking because, against my better judgement, they’re actually ready. By doing so it is possible to bring the excitement of the kendo journey to students who otherwise might have been turned off by the rigidity of its traditional structure and step-by-step approach.
Heh. I like the kid with the hi-no-maru hachimaki on in the background.
This is good, I like the observations. I teach Judo & Karate to children around the same ages and I found the very same things out years ago, they just want to get on with it. It would appear that we may be trying to teach something that is perhaps slightly above there levels of comprehension at that stage of their lives. I am about to embark upon my Kendo teaching career after the Christmas break and hopefully I will be able get a decent interest level going so thanks for the observations, it gives me confidence in thinking that the way I do things does have some benefit.
As a follow up, here are the results of some feedback the students were asked to give on the subject. You’ll be able to get an idea of some of the conflicting motivations of the students (e.g. one wants less theory, another wants more about Japanese culture). You can also see the different levels of engagement (student 3 being the most and student 13 being the least with the rest on a continuum in between), and even the different levels of educational attainment. Students here are between 12 and 14 years old. Also keep in mind that this is a group of kids who did not self-select (as in a club setting) so some have had no affinity with kendo from the beginning. b
Questions
1) What did you learn?
2) What was your favourite part of the subject?
3) What could be improved?
4) Other comments
Student 1
1) How to use the shinai and write some letters (i.e. kanji – BS) in Japanese.
2) Nothing
3) More sparring
4) Don’t know
Student 2
Kendo, it’s good.
Student 3
1) Firstly, I have learnt how to perform correct kendo cuts and patterns, and I’ve learned about Japanese culture.
2) This semester has been good because I got to wear armour and perform more advanced series of cuts.
3) I’m not sure what can be improved, but it would be better if the whole class participated. More different activities would be better.
Student 4
1) I have learnt how to demonstrate basic kendo movements and operations. I have discovered different aspects of Japanese culture.
2) The different clothing and armour was enjoyable and interesting.
3) The problem is more the people (other students?-BS) than the class (content?-BS)
4) More about the culture and Japan would be nice.
Student 5
1) I have learnt the Way of the Samurai
2) Using the shinai
3) It can be improved us wear armour more.
4) Kendo was a good experience.
Student 6
1) I learnt how to defend myself and how to strike people.
2) Fighting each other
3) To do more fighting.
4) No because everything was good.
Student 7
1) I learnt to strike a person with the shinai.
2) We watched a movie about the Chinese (sic) warrior.
Student 8
3) more stories
Student 9
1) I have learnt how to use the kendo stick (sic).
2) (competing against)… other people in a kendo match
Student 10
1) I have improved my knowledge of Japanese culture.
2) We got to spar.
3) It can be improved by having more space to use swords and more sparring. apart from that, nothing really.
4) Using the sword braking technique (tenouchi – BS), I improved my cricket too. It helps you roll your wrists so the balls I hit don’t fly to get caught.
Student 11
I liked the movies but didn’t like all the walking around to do kendo.
Student 12
1) I have learnt about Japanese culture.
2) Putting on the uniform and armour was the highlight.
3) I think that we should put the uniform and armour on more often.
4) I think that we should do less theory.
Student 13
1) I have learnt how to hit people with sticks
2) Nothing
3) Everything
Bey Ben,
I didn’t know you are in Australia. When are you going to come visit us in Sydney? If you want to get in touch, email me ay jayson.chaplin@gmail.com
Great post by the way!
Cheers,
Jays
@Jayson1981
Hey Jayson! Ben visited SKC in January 2005 I think? It was a hot Saturday I remember.