DWx

Welcome

Welcome!

Might help if you have some info handy by your phone, like costs, class timetables etc. then when it doesn't come off the top of your head its easy enough to find and talk through. Also if you prepare some FAQs and answers then when you get asked stuff you have a basic answer to start with.

Not a blog as such but TKDTutor writes good articles regularly. The guy who writes it does have a blog but I don't think its all that good compared to the actual site.

Most systems if they have rankings will have a blackbelt rank. But what does it mean to you? Master of the arts or just another step along the chain?

Welcome

Welcome

There's this club sort of near us and their instructor made up some "music" to do the forms to. Its only cymbals beaten in time to match the techniques but is good if you want to get your timing good. Not really that useful for demo or XMA type stuff. http://www.essential-tkd.co.uk/3.html

Well, the WKF (World Karate Federation) has been formed, and is the Governing Body for Karate, as the IOC sees it. The groundwork is laid, so it may become a possibility. The standards for the katas are already laid out. And aside from that, if it does go Olympic, it may just be the fighting, like with TKD. Would Karate at the Olympics be representative of only a section of the art then? If you look at TKD it is only Kukkiwon TKD which is represented and the other groups such as ITF, ATA, Moo Duk Kwan etc. aren't shown unless those practitioners learn to fight the WTF way. Here is a list of former [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Olympic_boxers_of_the_United_Stateshttp://Olympic gold medalist Boxers. You will find several recognizable names, like Roy Jones, Jr., Muhammad Ali, George Foreman, Evander Holyfield, Joe Frazier, and Oscar de la Hoya. These guys would have been competing amateur ie. Olympic style and then moved into professional boxing. Obviously I don't know for sure but they probably trained for the Olympics and then adpated and changed their training to compete as pros. Similar to TKD? Do people train for the Olympics and then adapt their training to suit their needs if they decide to focus on some other competition level or the self defense

The last demo we did was probably our most successful. Everyone lined up, had warmup ran by one of the students. Then a range of coloured belt forms done by kids in formation. Then Juche by a blackbelt. Did step and free sparring. Throughout the demo the little kids explained the tenets to the crowd. Also included special technique stuff and breaking.

Kuro-obi means blackbelt. It looks good, IMDB say that it will be shown at the Cannes film festival. Released soon after? Found its website: http://kuro-obi.cinemacafe.net/ but can't read the Japanese..

When I was younger I used to enjoy watching MA flicks like The Karate Kid and various Jackie Chan, Sammo Hung and Bruce Lee stuff. Had always wanted to do something but never got up the courage to ask my parents (they were the type who wanted me to dance and play the violin..). Anyway, did various sports as a kid, netball, tennis, swimming etc. but didn't get very far with them and gradualy became more and more overweight. Then when I was 10 my Dad mentions that he saw an article in the paper about a local TKD school and knowing that I liked MA films and stuff like that, suggested that I might like to go along. I'd never heard of it but went to my first lesson anyway. Never stopped training since.

Saves time but is it really that much extra effort to complete the name in Japanese (or Korean)? Fair enough you save yourself that little bit extra breath but I still think the pros outweigh the cons. What it boils down to is the fact that my students speak English, and not Korean. If you learn the Korean names right from the beginning, its no more difficult than learning the names in English. IMO you don't need to learn the names in English at all as long as you are unstanding what the Korean/Japanese/Chinese... names mean.

I don't have anything to do with our site but I'm guessing the template is one that the host has pre-designed because someone else I know that uses them has a near identical template.

I don't currently run a website or my school website but I have dabbled in stuff in the past and do bits and pieces of graphical design sometimes. First and foremost it’s best to decide who is going to visit your site and why they are going to visit your site. I'm guessing in your case it will be students and prospective students. You will need to decide what info they will be looking for and make sure it’s easy to find this info. Usually a links toolbar at the top or side will suffice. The usual things to include are: class schedule & location(s); information on instructors; a bit about the style(s) you teach; events calendar; latest news; photo/video gallery; contact details; page with useful links to orgs/associations, partner schools etc. Colour is important. Sadly a fair few people insist on making their website into some sort of rainbow monstrosity which just hurts your eyes. Also people are more likely to think the site is amateur-ish and will be distracted from the info. Try to pick 2 or 3 colours + black & white and do the whole site in this colour scheme. Try to stick to a basic font too. No swirly curly letters, they’re again too hard to read and distract from what the text is saying. Sans serif styles tend to display better too. Throughout the site it’s a good idea to use a standard template and colour scheme to retain some level of cohesiveness and it just makes the whole lot look more professional. Personally for me, a picture really is worth a thousand words. If I’m checking out a school I go straight for the pictures and videos. You can tell visitors plenty about your school and style with words but if they can see good technique for themselves then it is so much better. Plain text is just boring so images interspaced in your articles will usually look better. I don’t know if this is the case for your site but quite often there is a limit on how many images your host will let you store on their server. If this is the case its worth using free external sites such as ImageShack, Photobucket, Picasa etc. to upload your tourney, seminar, grading albums etc. to and then link to them. You can then be selective about what images you choose to upload to your host’s server. Same goes for videos. Use something like YouTube and Googlevideo and then embed them on your site. This also increases traffic to your site too if people find your videos on say YouTube and then visit your site to find out more. Another thing to ensure is that you have a range of pictures. This means adults/children, high/low grades, gradings, tournaments (if you do them), normal class training. Just having lots of images from one event is boring and doesn’t say much about what you do. New students will want to know that you are a “complete” school. Oh and personally I hate “Enter” pages. They are a waste of time, especially when you want to find something quick, first you have to wait for it to load, then you have to wait for the main page to load and then finally get round to looking for what you wanted. Probably talked too much now… I like our website (apart from the stupid “Enter” page at the beginning): https://www.burbagetkd.com

Congrats!

Good luck to you!

Saves time but is it really that much extra effort to complete the name in Japanese (or Korean)? Fair enough you save yourself that little bit extra breath but I still think the pros outweigh the cons.

Congrats NE_KyoSa!

Instep is so cool, would love to be able to do it. My favourite is 2x 1" no spacers with an elbow or I can just about manage it (on a good day) with a knifehand. Kicks can't get past 2 boards and am too terrified to try bricks or tiles. Most creative break I've seen in person is this lad backflipped and broke a board in the middle. Never in a million years would I be able to do that.

I have seen a punch listed as "chungdan chirugi." We say "ahp ju mak." I have seen high block listed as "chukyo marki." We say "san dan maki." Those are just a few examples. "Ahp jumak" translates only as front forefist. If you want to be specific technically speaking you should add the "chirugi" bit to it so you get "ahp jumak chirugi" or front forefist punch. "Chung dan" just denotes the mid section. "Chukyo" means a rising motion that takes place above the shoulder line, thus you get a high section rising block. "San dan" just denotes the high section so both terms are correct for the block as it is rising and above high section. However the terms are different parts of namingthe technique. "San dan" could be used to denote any high section block whereas "Chukyo" is specific to the rising motion above shoulder line. In both of these examples it is just a case of missing half the sentence off rather than name changes. To be totally accurate you should have " Chung dan ahp jumak chirugi" and "San dan chukyo makgi". Its not a different name as such, just laziness on both sides to say the entire name.

We usually let the start from 4+. The young kids are in a separate class to the adults and do things slightly different. The 1st couple of normal belts are subdivided for the young ones so they earn the grade in stages doing mini-tests every few weeks in class. The lessons are also 45 mins instead of 1hr.

Maybe you should both try seeing what it is like learning where you can't understand the language. It is a lot easier than you think. Also generally it is only more advanced grades and adults that will attend overseas events with someone who doesn't speak their language so they can grasp the concepts fairly quickly as it follows directly on from their prior learning. Quite often its not the words you learn through but the tone of voice and actions that accompany it. Ever watched tv with the sound off? You can still understand whats going on. In fact ever watched tv abroad? You can still understand what is happening. Babies and young children learn at first through tone of voice rather than actually words. So do animals like dogs actually. Of course they don't understand the words but can understand through intonations in the voice. Its when we get older that we don't notice intonations as much and don't bother with them in day to day life. Seriously though, I think you should try having someone teach you in a different language and see that its not really that hard if you are willing to learn. Could you give an example?

This has been addressed and changed. They won't allow a point if you cannot maintain your balance during the technique. I think it was Herb Perez who used to do a spin hook kick, and would go down to the ground afterwards to avoid the counter. They changed the rules because of that. Ok my point becomes redundant then. I still have yet to see an Olympic fight where both competitors remain on their feet though. I'll have to wait until later this year... Seeing this type of sparring makes TKD look bad with regards to the self defense aspect, at least with the other Olympic MAs it looks like some damage could be done. The boxing is definately full contact and the judo techniques look like they have an effect. Olympic TKD just doesn't. The Olympics has put an emphasis on scoring points rather than fighting effectively. Fighters are training themselves in this way and leaving the self-defense aspect behind. Sure plenty of people train both ways but there are equally plenty who only train the sport aspect and focus on the winning medals as opposed to fighting/defense skills. Was the Olympics bad for TKD as a sport? No. Was it bad for the Martial Art? I think this is a yes.

Plenty of TKD shoes around that are made for the mat and survive bag work (though nothing too heavy). http://www.kwon.com/kwon/shop_artikelliste.asp?kid=5 Adidas, Nike, Macho, Mooto, Blitz are some of the other well-known brands you could look at.