Should I have more patience?

[WheatCrunchie]

I'm becomming a little disilusioned with my classes.

Our sensei has began splitting up the class, low grades go with a 1st dan and sensei teaches the higher grades.

Thing is the classes have just not been the same since, us lower grades (yellow and below) get hardly anything done as the sempei talks so much. During line work he stops us after each move and anyone that didn't do it perfect he goes over and corrects them but he spends ages doing so. For instance he'll explain to them how its supposed to be, then explain how they did it, then demonstrate how its supposed to be done, then tries to demonstrate how they did it, then explains why its supposed to be the other way, then demonstrates why its wrong to do it the other way etc etc etc and by the time he's finished, the rest of us have been stood in the same position (like a head block stance) for upto 10 minutes. The younger ones begin getting restless so he then gives them pushups for being out of stance or for looking in the wrong direction so we then have to wait for them to finish before we carry on so basically....each ONE move takes around 5 minutes. On Monday we didn't even get to finish our basics as it took us an hour just to go through four moves in line work. We never got to do our combinations or anything.

When we were being taught by sensei we would spend around an hour going through our own basics, combinations, then a few extra basics etc and we would get so much done and the kids hardly ever got bored or restless.

The tediousness of these changes are really starting to affect my motivation, I just don't see the point in going just to more or less stand there in a stationary position for an hour.

I don't want to quit but I'm not the only one finding the changes hard, should i be more patient or mention my concerns to Sensei?

[Jay]

Talk to your sensei or even the person that is teaching you there is nothing wrong with bringing up concernes with your senior even if he is ranked higher than you it doesnt mean he is more important just talk to him like you would anyone else obviously in class you should show respect but no more than you would a normal person.

[white owl]

I agree with jay. Maybe even address them as a group so he knows it is not just you who has the concerns (it is a few of you that has them). If you address the senpai don't gain up on him take one or two people with you, I do not know how long he has been teaching but it not easy if you are just starting out by yourself and sounds to me like he is doing good job just needs to do little less talking, exspecially if you are losing kids and really that is not fare to the little ones to stand in that position that long.

[Karate74]

It just sounds like the Sempai hasn't achieved a high teaching skill yet. That ability to teach is easy for some and for others...well teaching is a challenge. Talk with your sensei first and maybe he can put you in a different group before you decided just to quit.

[bushido_man96]

It sounds like the sempai is just getting used to teaching. He may get better as time goes by. Just remember that you may start teaching some day, and someone isn't going to like it as much, just because you are not the sensei. They will have to get used to how you teach, and you need some patience to do that.

With that said, I do think that this sempai may be going a bit overboard with his explanations. It is important to focus on learning good technique, but it is also important for the students to get the reps in. Maybe he just likes the sound of his own voice, who knows?

I would wait another week or two, and see if it gets any better. If it doesn't, then I would take up some of the suggestions made above, and approach him about it. If he doesn't like what you say, then go to the sensei and tell him that it just won't work out for you. Maybe the sensei will take you back.

[Kieran-Lilith]

I would definitely agree that the sempai sounds new to it. Teaching is hard. I remember I was at least as bad, and to top it off, I was so quiet you could barely hear me as I said all that. It takes time to learn. Kyu ranks are the guinea pigs. That said, on the whole, teaching gets easier, but it takes practice. Lots of practice.

Also, if they are new at this, then they are probably very stressed out about it. I was a nervous wreck when I first started teahing, which is partially why I overexplained things so much. I talk a lot when I get nervous. Perhaps this person is in the same boat.

If it's really becoming an issue, I would talk with your sensei about it. Perhaps he has some teaching pointers for your sempai that might speed things up a bit.

[tori]

You should approach the head instructor privately. It would even be better if you have the others who have same concerns as yourself. My suggestion however, is approach your instructor with something positive to say about this young teacher. Example: I like how enthusiastic sensei... is about teaching, but we have concerns that.... Once you are done, thank your instructor for his time. If you make the whole experience a positive meeting, then your outcome is going to be better. Trust me, your head instructor does not want to lose students because he has put an inexperienced instructor in charge, but at the same time, he wants his instructor to gain teaching time. He will get better. Your instructor just needs to know how is sempai is doing.

[yingampyang]

You should speak to the sensei , and if the problems keep going then change schools.

[granitemiller]

You are in a tricky situation. My advice is to first put yourself in the senpai's position and think about how you would like to be told about this situation. Then, meet together with the sensei and the senpai and explain your situation just like you did in this email. I am sure that they will see your valid points and make corrections. It is important not only to do the reps, but to do them right.

[blackxpress]

I might speak to the sensei in private but I'd want to give the sempai the benefit of the doubt too. One of the things I miss the most about my old dojo (had to move away or I'd still be training there) is my sempai. I learned an awful lot from that guy. He was very deliberate in his teaching because he was nervous about teaching something the wrong way. Anytime he taught me something he made absolutely sure I understood. I appreciated the fact that he was so serious about my training. It was a little tedious at times but one thing's for sure. I never had to unlearn any of the things he taught me. That's very important. It's harder to unlearn something that was mistaught than it is to learn it right the first time.