What is your class structure at your dojo/gym/school?

[Adonis]

Standard Structure at my school would be stretch, Warm ups, techniques, and sparring. Total (1 1/2 hours)

Streching 2-5 minutes

Warm ups, 10-15 minutes.

1. abs exercises

2. Forward Rolling

3. Back ward rolling

4. Shrimping

5. Standing up in base.

With partner armbars, triangles, omoplata's

Techniques- Depending on the subject that week.

(certain passes from diffrent type of guard, or submissions or sweeps from certain positions, ect...)

Usually 1-3 techniques at the most is covered.

Rolling (sparring), 1st and 2nd Roll done from situational rolling.

Free Rolling (sparring) for 30 or 45 minutes.

I would rather have more time spent on drilling techniques then this structure and less on rolling time. I feel I get more out of it with the drills, and can apply them quicker when I do roll.

When I did Karate it was pretty much same format regarding, stretching, warm ups, Techniques, maybe sparring at the end or seperate day for sparring. Those classes ran about an hour.

Whats every one else's school format? Any interesting drills you like the most?

Probably a drill I like alot is just standing up in the guard so I can pass. However I like the leg work out and also the focus on (posture, Hips forward shoulder back to keep my back straight) has helped me out alot since the people in my school are really good with over head sweeps from guard, and if you have bad posture even a little bit you may be going for a ride over head.

[Wastelander]

The adult class at my dojo is after several childrens' classes, so most of us are already warmed up from helping in those and we skip warm-ups. Stretching prior to exercise has been shown to actually decrease muscle effectiveness, so stretching is an after-class activity to work pooled blood and lactic acid out. Our adult classes don't follow a rigid schedule, but we tend to start out either with basic techniques or kata, then move on to bunkai or advanced techniques and concepts, and sometimes we will work concepts as they are trained in other arts (tai chi concepts, kung fu concepts, muay thai concepts, etc.).

The childrens' classes are more structured. Typically they start with warm-ups that consist of kicking across the mat, doing lunges, rolls, or crawls, jumping jacks, etc. After that we work basic techniques, either in the air or on bags or handheld pads/targets. Sometimes that is the entirety of the class and sometimes we work kata for the kids as well.

We have separate sparring classes for both kids and adults, but my Sensei talked to me last night about working with the kids on some sparring basics to help ease them into the idea. Apparently when he gave out the official rank requirements for the dojo (they use the Shorinkan requirements as a base and he added requirements that he thought were important) he had a few kids get very upset and tell their parents that they didn't want to do karate anymore because he is requiring them to spar for rank at Purple Belt and up. Starting Monday I get to start trying to show the kids that sparring isn't scary or bad and that they can have a lot of fun doing it, all while making sure that they DON'T get hit until they get over being afraid

[ninjanurse]

Warm Ups & Stretching: Consists of hand techniques, footwork, and old-fashioned exercising followed by stretching

Basics:5-10 minutes hand work, stance work, kicking techniques, etc.

Lesson Plan for the day: Covers at least 2 of our curriculum areas (Sparring Combinations, Sparring Techniques, Combat Tactics, Step Sparring, Self Defense, Forms, or Free Sparring)

Cool Down-discussion of philosophy, Q & A, etc.

Classes run 45 minutes to 60 minutes depending on level.

[bushido_man96]

Basics

Forms

One-steps

Sparring

This was the traditional set-up we followed. Mondays are now a forms focus day, and one-steps aren't usually done. Wednesdays are the same, but one-steps are the focus and not forms. Tuesdays and Thursdays are hour and a half classes, and we do all, and spend more time on sparring. Monday and Wednesday are just an hour.

[KarateGeorge]

Warm-ups

Katas

The day's lesson plan

Wrap-up

[DWx]

We don't really have a standard structure. Every lesson is different. We do have set lessons each week geared towards something, like Thursdays are sparring and fitness whereas Tuesday is a more technical session. But they're never the same each week. One week we'll be doing tons of pad work in the sparring class, the next week we'll spend the entire time just sparring. Or like today we had to run round the field and do sprints up and down the football pitch before sparring.

Even the warm-up/cool-downs are different each time. I think it keeps training interesting as you get to class and don't know what we will be doing.

[PoppaDLo]

Only speaking for the adult class at both dojo's I attend. They are both in the family of the United Martial Arts Academy, just different Sensi's.

Kosho we work a weeks worth of Kosho, next week we might work Japanese Jiu Jitsu and the week after might be kicking/punching drills and as always forms week.

It's a light stretch, working a form/technique then bunkai on what we learned usually with a partner.

At my Yoshitsune class we work stretch, run kata/rank material then stand up to ground sparing using those techniques.

[evergrey]

It's really up to the whims of our shihan, who tends to carefully plan each class, though he sometimes makes it seem as if it's whatever comes to mind.

Usually, it goes like this- individual students stretch a bit before class, off the mats because there's a kid's class.

Once we've lined up and the kids are dismissed, we "start the falls," where we go around the mat twice practicing four different falls. Then we do dive-rolls, then walk on our hands. After that, we often run around the mat for a number of laps, mayb e10 or so, and then we do push-ups, on the knuckle, arms shoulder-width apart, elbows brushing the ribs.

After that warm-up, there are any number of things we might do, but most of the time it's kihon- we drill the basics. Sometimes we line up and drill, and sometimes we partner up and drill with contact, starting with one side punching and the other side blocking (high, middle, low) and then one person will punch the other, say, 100 times in the stomach with half-inch penetration, and then the partners will switch. Then we might punch to the chest, or do mawashi geris, or mae geris, or what have you. We might practice something like uraken and then two middle-place punches, 10 times each back and forth, or a grab and a throw, or whatever.

Then we usually form two lines, low ranks on one side and high ranks on the other, and we do kumite. Fight for a couple minutes, stop, one of the low ranks runs down to the other side of the line, everyone on that line moves down so they are facing the next person, fight again... often until everyone in one line has fought everyone in the other line. Then it's usually the "end of basics" and we are welcomed to keep practicing on the mat once Shihan has left, until the last key-holder goes home.

[Nanashii]

We'll generally pick a focus for each class post warmup - so it'll look something like this

Opening ceremony

Warmups - We'll do a main focus - for example, we'll do mainly core one class, with a lighter focus on the rest, and switch next class. It'll start with some light jogging and a light stretch, then move into the rest. (planks, crunches, held pushups, squats, lunges, suicides/sprints, running, mountain climbers), then move into a second stretch.

Kihon (standing and moving) - We have dedicated Kihon classes as well, so we always start with this to work up to the next segment of training... Unless someone messes up . Then we really hammer it.

Kumite (Ippon, Sanbon, and Jyu). We have dedicated Kumite classes as well. We'll do competition time to keep it organized.

Kata.

Closing ceremony

Like I said, it varies based on what we need to work on and how Sensei wants to focus our time. That's just a basic overview, but we'll have classes that are highly focused on bunkai as well, and counters, stance work (static holding), parries and footwork, chain attacks/combinations, breakfalling, body toughening, moving basics, etc. It's a lot to fit in, and each class is only an hour and a half or so, but we work on a focus point each class so we don't have to cut quality based on time.

[sojobo]

Could be just a Wado thing but every lesson tends to start and end with "Mokuso".

In my Koryu dojo, it starts and ends with a greeting to the spirits - with a clapping of the hands prior to the za-rei toward to dojo shrine.

Then we get on with physical stuff - having (hopefully) got the most important thing going first.

Otherwise - it's just aerobics

sojobo