Purple belt???

[Monkeymagic]

I think it gives people an incentive and inspiration to continue to progress, especially children. I teach children (PE teacher) and they need incentives. Most clubs have children attending, either seperate classes or the same. They would need to follow the same belt system as the adults.

They set a standard and a benchmark for people to reach, otherwise, unless you are expremely dedicated and train all the time, you can loose the way. we are overworked and streesed and we all have incentives and benchmarks to reach in this day and age, especially in the western world. people need goals. Children especially. people need to know how well they have done and belts help them and others recognise their comittment and achievements.

Of course, they don't show how good they are but it does give some kind of indication. Each person can then identify where they are themselves with the other karateka around them. we have this belt system at our club:

White

Red (10th kyu)

Blue (9th kyu)

Purple (with white stripe) (8th kyu)

Purple (7th kyu)

Yellow (6th kyu)

Orange (5th kyu)

Green (white stripe) (4th kyu)

Green (3rd kyu)

Brown (white stripe) (2nd kyu)

Brown (1st kyu)

Black (1st dan)

Blacks ++

This site uses belts - I bet everyone who writes on here has a quick sneek at the belt they are and how many times they have written. I think there is an orange belt and Purple belt in this site's belt system too (can't remember if there is purple, I think so)

[Georgia]

In my style of karate we have a purple belt just before the brown belt. Our system goes:

White (9th Kyu)

Yellow (8th Kyu)

Orange (7th Kyu)

Green (6th Kyu)

Blue (5th Kyu)

Purple (4th Kyu)

3 Browns (3rd through 1st Kyu)

Black (1st Dan etc.)

I like this because it pretty much goes from lightest to darkest, but I really hated wearing a purple belt. I finally got rid of it a month ago. It seems kind of pointless, but I wouldn't like to have two blues or any other colours thrown in there, so it works for me. It took me a year after I got my blue to go for purple and a year and a half after that to go for brown. So if we had just two levels of blue or purple, I think my belt would have fallen apart. It was in pretty bad shape anyway, so it's possible.

[Oahngoji]

Every club has its own order of belt levels....Usually lighter colors represent lower levels, and darker colors represent high levels.

[Sabumnim]

We didn't even have a blue belt, we did have three brown belt grades though.

[swordtail]

at my club we have a large number of belts:

-white

-white with red stripe

-red

-white with yellow stripe

-yellow

-white with orange stripe

-orange

-green

-blue

-purple

-brown (x3)

-black

[Koji-Kabuto]

8 belts in my dojo, and every other kyokushin dojo on my country...

White(10th Kyu)

Orange(9th Kyu)

Light Blue(8th-7th Kyu)

Yellow(6th-5th Kyu)

Green(4th-3rd Kyu)

Brown(2nd-1st Kyu)

National Black(Shodan)

International Black(Shodan and onwards)

[schmerz_und_stolz]

Mine goes white, yellow, green, 2 purple, 3 brown, and blacks...

[schmerz_und_stolz]

Mine goes white, yellow, green, 2 purple, 3 brown, and blacks...

[schmerz_und_stolz]

Mine goes white, yellow, orange, green, 2 purple, 3 brown, and blacks...