Motivating Kids

[the beast]

In our kids class we have a few children who just don't seem to be into it. Before class they are full of energy, but as soon as class starts they act drained. This drives myself and the other senseis nuts. My question is this. Does anybody else have this problem and if so how do you motivate these kids???

[Rateh]

How old are they and what is the age range in the class?

Also, how long have they been training?

Are the higher ranks in that class really putting their efforts in?

In general the best way to get kids to put energy into their training is to be super energetic yourself. If you make the drills sound really fun and exciting, then that will often help as well.

More details about the situation, such as answers to the above questions, would give me a better idea of how to help.

[the beast]

The ages are from 9-12 and from white belt to youth black. The newest has been training for a few months and the oldest one for about 4 yrs.

We have tried to be energetic, and even play "games" with them and this still doesn't seem to work. I know that you will always have a the "10%" that you just cant get through to but it seems like when they see that one student start slacking they all follow suit .

[Truestar]

From my experience with 9-12 year olds, I've had many of them question, doubt, appear bored or uninterested.

At this point (leaning towards the 11-12) I think they are mature enough to start grasping what they can get from the Martial Arts. I told a student a week or so ago to understand that some days are going to be boring, some things she won't yet understand, some days are going to plain suck, but if she trusts me and gives everything she's got she will be much better off as a person and Martial Artist. This girl is 11, and in the past few months has taken leaps and bounds in her training. She's started taking things she hated, such as knuckle pushups, and is now requesting them during warmup. I've tried to explain to her what she can be, sport wise, self defense wise, and personable wise, and that if she lets me teach her she will get there.

She's usually in her class by herself or with one other student, so that may be a reason as to why it was easy for her to start grasping the whole picture. Trying to explain that to a group of kids might be different.

Show them black belt is something worth making it to, but to get there they have to take each day and learn from it and grow. A hard concept to get into young kids minds, but over a course of years, months, or maybe weeks it's something that hopefully starts getting through to them.

Obviously the younger and less mature you get, the more difficult it gets. When digging into younger kids, under 9 years, a lot of it does rely on your energy, and sending that into the room and the kids.

[Rateh]

I agree with what Truestar has said.

One drill you might try is an energy drill. You split the class in half, one half on each side of the room. Have each half choose a team name. Then you will have one team do a technique trying to be the most intense with the best kiah. The second team will follow trying to be more intense and energetic than the first. Continue the back and forth until you feel the students have gotten the message of being energetic, trading off which team goes first.

I like to award the best team with push-ups, the effectiveness of that depends on the group though. Either way the winning team should get some sort of re-enforcement. If you wanted you could make this a permanent warm-up in the class.

Is there any drill that these students seem to enjoy? If so using that as a reward to motivate them might be another option, including making those students who did not show enough effort have to sit out on that drill.

[the beast]

Thanks for the advise Truestar, and Rateh. I have been trying to find some more fun drills for them, but hate rewarding them with games when they don't put forth the effort in class. Maybe I'll try to do some fun drills at the begining of class or in between some of our normal drills.