Searching for Judo

On Certified Ranks and Others

2013-09-06T00:00:00.000-06:00

In my last post, I mention that I only intend to hire certified brown belts or above to coach at my dojos. Most judo players in the United States have no difficulty with that concept, but I know quite a few who might have some qualms with that. I’m addressing that situation today. I “grew up” in judo outside the national organizations by the deliberate choice of my father and his judo

Part Three: Coaches: What do you need? (Third of a Three-Part Series)

2013-09-04T11:08:00.000-06:00

I’ve talked about the instructional staff in general and instructors, specifically, so far. Now it’s time to cover coaches. Coaches are different than instructors. Even if your coaches are instructors as well, in their role as a coach the outcome is different. A coach is not there to teach a student how to perform a technique; the coach is there to help the student perform their techniques

Part Two: Instructors: Buy or Build (Second of a Three-Part Series)

2013-08-26T00:00:00.000-06:00

Wait a minute! Buy or build, what do you mean? I can imagine some people are saying just that right about now. I promise, I’ll explain! Part one talked about the differences between the two main types of instructional staff and even touched on the term sensei. Part two’s only talking about instructors and how you get them. You can hire them from outside sources (Buy) or you can train them

Part One: Instructional Staff (First of a Three-Part Series)

2013-08-23T00:00:00.000-06:00

Since I didn’t really talk about instructors last time, today (and the next two blogs) are about instructors and coaches. Every martial arts dojo has to have instructors (coaches, sensei, whatever you call them). Without instructors, perpetuating the arts is a very difficult task. Today is a general discussion about instructing, coaching, and whatnot with regard to what I’ve seen and what I

Staffing for Judo

2013-08-21T00:00:00.000-06:00

Gerald Lafon commented on Monday’s post saying “The key will be staffing and good equipment.” I absolutely agree with that. That’s what we’re discussing today: Staffing at the martial arts dojo. I’m putting this in the perspective of the business owner not the customer. A martial arts dojo is like every business because it has employees. The big difference is that some of its employees are

Fast Food and the Martial Arts

2013-08-19T00:00:00.000-06:00

Last time, I mentioned fast food and consistency. This time I’ll go into a little more depth. The fast food industry is amazing. In most cases it’s decent food and ultra-simplistic service yet it is huge! Their brand recognition is amazing and they are a $160 billion dollar industry. Most martial arts schools, and especially judo schools, are making barely enough to keep the doors open,

Judo as Business

2013-08-15T17:35:00.000-06:00

The title’s combination of words were anathema to my dad and many of the students that learned under him. For a long time I felt the two were irreconcilable. One of the last things my dad told me about judo was, in essence, “it is good to teach judo, but don’t pay for the privilege.” That’s a very odd sentence construction for an English teacher, as far as I’m concerned. Parsing it, prima facie,

Drilling and Sequencing

2012-10-21T09:03:00.002-06:00

This year has been a very busy year for me with judo. I recently made Third Degree Black Belt and earned certification as a National Level Coach, both of which through the United States Judo Association. I'm also teaching a lot of judo at New Mexico Military Institute and my own Roswell Judo Club. It's been very busy. I noticed, after looking at what people are visiting most on my blog,

Developing Promotional Requirements for Junior Students

2012-08-28T12:03:00.001-06:00

Key Questions: 1. Does my governing body already have a plan in place for promotions? 2. What sort of training program do I want to run for kids? 3. How much information do I expect my

Developing Promotional Requirements for Senior Students

2012-08-19T18:59:00.000-06:00

Key Questions: 1. Does my governing body already have a plan in place for promotions? 2. What sort of judo students will I cater to? 3. What is my expectation of knowledge at each stage of my student’s development? If the answer to the first question is yes and you aren’t a member of the curriculum

A Debt of Thanks

2012-08-10T20:18:00.004-06:00

I’ve been having a difficult time coming up with topics, obviously! I came home tonight, got on Facebook and started talking to AnnMaria DeMars. All of a sudden I thanked her for her teaching me. She said, “What a nice thing to say.” Later I thought about it and decided I need to write a thank you post to those people who’ve taught me and, since this is a judo blog; I’m going to concentrate on

Thinking about Deshi

2012-05-29T22:18:00.001-06:00

Defining Deshi According to Wikipedia, deshi (弟子) means either “pupil; apprentice” or “disciple” (弟子, 2010). Further research on Wikipedia reveals two types of deshi, the uchideshi and the sotodeshi (Uchi-deshi, 2012). An uchideshi “usually live[s] in the dojo” and “serves the teacher all day, every day.” A sotodeshi is a student who lives outside the dojo. Looking at those Definitions

Developing a Lesson Plan: Ukemi

2011-09-19T12:00:00.001-06:00

This time, we’ll talk about Ukemi, especially as they relate to the Weekly Goals. Again, as I mentioned the first time, I’m going to use my templates (PDF or XLSX). If you have Excel, I suggest downloading the XLSX file (if you don’t have Office 2010, you can still use it, you just have to get the patch from Microsoft to open the file), otherwise use the PDF and hand write out the guide

Developing a Lesson Plan: The Warm-Up

2011-09-07T12:00:00.002-06:00

This time, we’ll talk about Warm-ups, especially as they relate to the Weekly Goals. Again, as I mentioned last time, I’m going to use my templates (PDF or XLSX). If you have Excel, I suggest downloading the XLSX file (if you don’t have Office 2010, you can still use it, you just have to get the patch from Microsoft to open the file), otherwise use the PDF and hand write out the guide. One more

Developing a Lesson Plan

2011-09-05T17:20:00.001-06:00

Last time I discussed creating training plans in general. This time, I’m going to break down developing a lesson guide in specific. I’m going to use my templates (PDF or XLSX). If you have Excel, I suggest downloading the XLSX file (if you don’t have Office 2010, you can still use it, you just have to get the patch from Microsoft to open the file), otherwise use the PDF and hand write out the

Training Plans

2011-09-03T12:47:00.000-06:00

I’ve said before that I’ll write up how to develop a training plan, including calendars and lesson plans. So here we go. The first thing any club instructor has to do before they think of calendars or lesson plans is to figure out what exactly they want to do and when it has to be accomplished. Because I can’t give you all the possible variables, I’ll tell you what I did and why I did it that

Fall 2011 Judo Sign-ups

2011-09-01T11:14:00.002-06:00

We’re going to be very busy this semester. We have four classes, three of which are at the Yucca Center and one is for the cadets at New Mexico Military Institute. So far we have right around 50 students signed up, a little over half of whom are at the Yucca Center. This semester the college class doubled in size with about four students returning for the class, but most all of them returning

Growing Judo in the United States

2011-08-17T12:00:00.001-06:00

One of the big concerns I hear a lot online about judo in the United States is its lack of growth. Most of the time, the concerns are expressed in tones of distress as though there’s nothing that can be done to grow judo or that the concerned don’t feel that national organizations are doing enough or are just doing the wrong thing. The lack of growth is a great concern for judo in the U.S. but

Personal Work This Year

2011-08-15T12:00:00.000-06:00

I have some grand plans for myself this year. I’ve spent a lot of time over the last five years teaching judo with very little time dedicated to my own personal growth. I’m not going to change that either! But I do have some work I’d like to do and three major goals by May. The first is to finally get my Yawara rank and USJA rank in synch and finally get ranked as a Nidan in USJA! I’d also like

Ronda’s MMA Match (12 August 2011)

2011-08-14T21:19:00.000-06:00

Friday night, Ronda Rousey had her third professional MMA match. Her opponent was Sarah D’Alelio. It was a very quick match ending in 25 seconds by “verbal” tap out. Immediately at the stoppage, D’Alelio and her corner were protesting, declaring that she didn’t tap. Instant replay and slow motion confirmed that there was no physical tap. However, Ronda reported that D’Alelio made some sort of

Judo as an Academic Pursuit

2011-08-09T14:47:00.000-06:00

If you weren’t aware I just finished my Master of Business Administration degree (concentration in Marketing). It was a great experience, but let me tell you why I pursued it. When I started the Roswell Judo Club, I had no clue how to run a business or a club so I was just winging it. The first several years were difficult and I’m just now getting over that, but it is still slow going. About

The Omoplata and the July Issue of "Growing Judo"

2011-07-22T16:44:00.001-06:00

In the July issue of the USJA's "Growing Judo" e-magazine, I apparently made an error about the legality of the "omoplata" of Brazilian JiuJitsu and its legality in judo tournaments. The error was pointed out to me by "funjudo" of the JudoForum in the July Issue of USJA's Growing Judo now available. Essentially the omoplata and sankaku garami are the same technique, but, like many

18th-19th June 2011 Clinic

2011-07-10T11:42:00.000-06:00

It’s been a little bit since the clinic. It’s been busy around here. Here’s a little clip and the write-up submitted for the July issue of Growing Judo (http://www.usja-judo.org/GrowingJudo/GrowingJudo2011_07.pdf).The 18th of June was blistering hot with temperatures reaching past the century mark, yet 19 judoka travelled to the New Mexico Military Institute in Roswell, NM for a day long clinic

2011-05-24T16:08:00.000-06:00

I know, I know, I take forever to write my blogs. I must apologize, but it’s been rough, I’m trying to finish my Master’s (4 weeks left!), get a job that pays well enough for me to support everything, and, well, the whole ball of wax. Well, suffice it to say that things are getting better. Yesterday on a judo forum (not the JudoForum) someone posted a video of some wonderful ukemi. So without

Las Cruces

2011-04-20T14:12:00.002-06:00

Last weekend I had the opportunity to go to Las Cruces and help out at a tournament. I’ve been to a few so this wasn’t that big I thing, I thought. However, it turns out that I was running a scoreboard, brackets, and helping others learn how to keep both match time and osaekomi time! This I had never done before.Thankfully I paid attention when I went to Denver for their tournament and discovered