Testing/Evaluations in Class or Separately?

[still kicking]

I was wondering if all you sensei's (and others, if you like) could speak to the question of how you schedule testing. In the school I train at, we have "evaluations" rather than testing per se. The reasoning behind it is that everyone is expected to be in it, not just people who are ready to move up, and it's a chance for the instructors to see where the school is at as a whole, and also for individuals to get written feedback on their own performance. If you are ready to be promoted at that time you will be. I think it is a good system overall, but historically, scheduling has been an issue.

When I used to train at this school "in the old days" (many, many years ago, children, let me tell you how it was) -- anyway, how we used to do it was to just have quarterly evaluations on Saturdays. Then when I came back, which was a bit over 4 years ago, they were doing it differently. I guess it's a sign of the pressured times we live in. Most of our adult students are juggling demanding professional careers, sometimes families, with high schoolers who have their own very demanding schedules. It was not working out for people to have to give up a whole Saturday every quarter. (I'm not sure why, I wasn't there. Most people train on Saturday mornings anyway, but maybe by noon the fam is making demands.)

So then they started a system whereby Sensei would let you know individually when you were ready to be promoted. You would pre-test in one class, getting closer scrutiny, then a week later you went through a regular demanding class, performing some of your stuff individually. This system could work, I thought at first, but quickl realised the difficuly. She just didn't seem to think if it much, and if one of us screwed up our courage and asked, she would normally say 'You're almost ready", and be working with us on various details we needed to fix, then sometimes finding ones that hadn't been there before, so we had to keep work on them. I found this system to be overly frustrating, so made a proposal.

My proposal was that we would test in class, quarterley, on 2 consecutive

Tuesdays and Wednesdays, which is when sensei teaches anyway. This seems to work a lot better, and I was wondering how other teachers do it? Do you ever set up a time that is completely out of training time, or just run it in a regular class. Thanks for your help.

[DWx]

We hold testings every 3 months or so on a Saturday. There'll usually be time slots for you to turn up to get tested, an hour or a couple of hours per belt level (depending on how many people there are) and you just have to turn up at the start of that slot. Because we have classes on the same day (which someone else will teach), my instructor will usually arrange it so that they don't clash directly with the testing and you can go straight from the lesson to the testing room. If the time's really a big problem, he'll find time for you at some other point during the day or if not you'll just have to wait till next time. You have to be invited to test though and will get evaluated in class and then given the ok if you're allowed to test. If you want you can stay all day and watch but you can just go home when you're done.

I like the idea of your evaluations, still kicking, where everyone gets feedback. Sometimes I think people reach a certain point and then get complacent and don't work for their rank... Testing in class does work for some but personally I like the pressure of the whole separate testing on a special day.

[Lupin1]

Idk... I kind of like everyone testing when they're ready. Not everyone is ready quarterly and I find it unfair if they're almost ready at one quarter to make them wait until the next. The way I would change that system to make it less frustrating is to not let the students ask to test anymore. If the teacher thinks the student is ready, then it should be offered to the student that they can test whenever they feel ready. My sensei does it pretty much the same way as yours, but if someone ever asked... I wouldn't want to be that person... It's up to the instructors when we test and we just train as hard as we can until then. We know better than to ask about when we're going to get promoted. That's a big no-no at my school.

[still kicking]

Lupin1 wrote:

We know better than to ask about when we're going to get promoted. That's a big no-no at my school.

Ha ha, I know that is a big no-no at many places, and I do understand it. I do think there is a happy medium between being a "belt chaser" and someone who is just going for a workout without any drive to get ahead, though. The thing is, even though I think my teacher is great in many ways, she would be the first to admit that she just doesn't think of some things. In some ways I don't fit the normal mode (in many ways, actually, but I won't get into that). I had already worked my way through all the ranks in our system, but it was so long ago that when I came back 4 years ago I was told that I'd have to do it all over again, which was OK with me. I was also told that we were no longer doing regular testing/evaluations, and my teacher right out admitted that she often didn't pay too much attention to when people were ready to be promoted, so if I thought I was ready and she hadn't said anything, I should just ask.

I will spare you all the angst I have gone through over the past 4 years. What it comes down to, who wants to ask to be tested? It feels like having to beg for a date or something.

I am now one of the training members serving on the board of directors at our school (non-profit), and feel very involved in issues of the well being of the school as a whole. I am particularly interested in issues of retention. Many people come and many people go, I know that is normal in any school. However, it seems to me that even though some people don't care about rank at all, in most cases people benefit from having the structure of regular testing, and being able to measure their progress. It's not even an issue of being "almost ready" at testing time, then having to wait 3 more months. When I first came back, there were people in the mid ranks (6th-4th kyu) who had been at the same kyu level for more than a year! I mean these were people who were training 3-4 times a week, and doing well for their level, but there was always room for improvement, and no set testing date. In my opinion, this creates a lot of unnecessary stress and anxiety. When it's a given that it's normally an 8-10 or more year trajectory to get through the ranks no matter what, then at least you need the little comfort of knowing when you are going to have a chance to try again. Jeesh, a person can only take so much. Of course we are all primarily motivated to just improve and deepen our karate, but come on!

Anyway, I think things are going much better now in the school as a whole. With regular chances throughout the year to go through a formal evaluation, if you don't make it one time when you are hoping to, at least you know when you will have a chance to try again. I will also say, even though we are quite hierarchical and traditional on the floor, outside of that my teacher is very approachable and open to feedback as to how things are going and I really appreciate that.

DWx, the way your school does it sounds great, as far as having testing and class going on at the same time, but we don't have enough room to do that, so evaluations/class is the same thing. Your system sounds very organized. The main thing, in my view, is to be thinking about it as a school, so the students know that their progress is important to you.

So, we have another evaluation coming up at the end of May, and I am totally not expecting to get promoted yet this time, so it will be fun to just perform and see how everyone else is doing.

[ninjanurse]

Good stuff-great question!

I use a blend of old-school/new-school. We have a stripe system (set by the association) which allows for evaluation every 10 classes-students need to earn these stripes to be eligible for final approval to be promoted. Each stripe has a set requirement and standard that must be met before they are awarded.

Everyday is a test at my school-I evaluate everyone (and give feedback daily) and if they have the time and meet the standard for the stripe I will stripe them. I do not set specific days for stripe testing but we do have a "Test Week" every 2 months where I evaluate everyone (regardless of time in grade), make recommendations for promotion, and identify curriculum areas that we need more work on as a whole. Students are usually promoted every 4-6 months (we hold promotion ceremonies every 2 months). Advanced students (Red & Black) are evaluated every 20 classes and recommended for promotion every 6-12 months depending upon rank.

[DWx]

Yeah its a great topic. Pretty interesting seeing what others do.

still kicking, we're lucky in that on Saturday we train at one of the local high schools so we can use both the gym (for lessons) and the hall (for the gradings). All of the other places we used to use, my instructor either had to cancel the Sat classes or have the grading Sunday, but he doesn't really like doing that because its the one day he doesn't teach and gets to go do some training of his own.

[sensei8]

At the dojo level; testing cycles are done every 3 months by invitation only. The individual sensei's are closely evaluating their students every single day on their Kihon, Kata, and Kumite. Then when it gets very close to a testing cycle, that sensei will send out invitations to those students who the sensei believes is ready to test, via U.S. Mail, and only those will be allowed to test.

All individual dojo's are required to then send all testing results to the Hombu to be officially recorded two ways. One way the results are recorded is on the Hombu's computers 'Hard Drive' and the other way the results are recorded is on the students 'Hard Card' that's located in Hombu's file cabinets.

At the Hombu level; testing cycles are done every year in June by invitation only. But these yearly testing cycles are mainly for Godan and above candidates, even though, all ranks, both kyu and dan alike can test at the Hombu. Those Godan and above candidates MUST submit an Application For Testing to the Hombu whenever that candidate has meet the required tenure of that said Dan rank as a minimum prerequisite. Not every application is approved, for one reason or another, by the Hombu.

No matter whether the testing cycle is done at the individual dojo or at the Hombu, ALL MUST BE INVITED TO TEST, no matter the kyu/dan rank! No Godan and above are ever tested at their individual dojo's. This is prohibited!

[Nidan Melbourne]

at my school we test students on curriculum every 6 lessons for a 'tag' and to grade for the next belt you need 5 'tags' on your belt.

so on average you would have 30 lessons under your belt before you grade. But a lot of students will do a double class instead of the usual one.

But nearly all the advanced grades (green belt and above) will do an increased amount of classes to have the competency in all the areas that we test in.

But for gradings if you perform quite weakly in areas in the grading you receive a 'G' on the back of your attendance card. the 'G' on the card basically means that area you were weak on at the grading and that you need to work on it a bit more so you have an extra 6 lessons before you get tested on it.

[ps1]

Let me point start by explaining that BJJ has two separate ranking trees for Adults and Children. There is no overlap in belt color at all. For children, it goes as follows:

White, Grey/white

Grey, Grey/black

Yellow/white, Yellow, Yellow/black

Orang/white, Orange, Orange/black

Green

- the first two ranks take about 6 per rank to be graded. The rest all carry a minimum of 1 year in training. Once you turn 16, you are automatically moved to the adult ranking tree. So it's highly unlikely that most children will ever reach the green belt level.

Adult ranking tree is as follows:

White, Blue, Purple, Brown, Black -> It takes about 2.5 years per rank.

Yellow belt = Blue belt, Green belt = Purple belt

This means that when a child turns 16, if he/she is wearing a Yellow belt, he automatically becomes a blue belt. If he/she is wearing an Orange belt, he automatically becomes a blue with 2 stripes...ect...

Ok. For kids, I have a grading every 2 months. 99% of the kids are grading for a stripe on their belt (because belts take 1 year to earn). They earn 4 white stripes then 1 red stripe (review stripe) then they can test for a new belt. This is done in this manner because kids tend to forget moves quickly and the constant grading keeps everything fresh in their minds.

- I have a rather large kids class and this is the easiest way to ensure I'm getting the information to them consistently.

For adults, they become eligible for a stripe every 20 classes (for white belts). At that time I take the student aside (usually during open mat) and evaluate their knowledge, skills, and abilities. If I determine they are ready for a stripe, I put it on them. If they aren't ready, I work with them on what they need. Colored belts are eligible for a stripe every 100 classes. I handle them the same. However, after 100 classes, it's extremely rare that someone isn't ready.

So it's a combination of the two methods. Once my adult class gets larger (over 40 or so students), I'll probably go to organized testing for them as well.

I'm still figuring out how to charge them for it though. I feel bad charging for a piece of athletic tape on a belt. So I still don't charge testing fees for stripe tests. Only belt testing, which is required to get the certification from our association.

[Aodhan]

at my school we test students on curriculum every 6 lessons for a 'tag' and to grade for the next belt you need 5 'tags' on your belt.

so on average you would have 30 lessons under your belt before you grade. But a lot of students will do a double class instead of the usual one.

But nearly all the advanced grades (green belt and above) will do an increased amount of classes to have the competency in all the areas that we test in.

But for gradings if you perform quite weakly in areas in the grading you receive a 'G' on the back of your attendance card. the 'G' on the card basically means that area you were weak on at the grading and that you need to work on it a bit more so you have an extra 6 lessons before you get tested on it.

We also have a minimum number of classes to be eligible, and we use the belt stripe system. If you can demonstrate your form successfully in class, you get one stripe. If you can successfully demonstrate your sparring segments or one step combinations, you get a second stripe. Your self defense (Weak link release, etc.), gets you a third stripe. Weapons is new for colored belts, we don't use assigned stripes although it is part of the curriculum.

Once you have all three stripes and the minimum classes, you are eligible to test. The instructors then watch those students, and when we have graduation, those students we feel should pass are invited. You can still fail, but it is rare to have that happen, as if you aren't ready, you don't get invited to test. Yes, that means just about everyone passes, but that's also because if you aren't ready you don't get invited.

Once you start getting midrange in the colored belts, and when you get to black belts, then all lower belt curriculum is fair game. I've seen 3rd degree black belts fail midterms because they could not remember the form and sparring combinations for purple belt.

John