# Wing Chun: Typical Curriculum?



## arnisador (Oct 21, 2005)

I know that most Wing Chun substyles include the following:

 3 empty hand forms
 1 wooden dummy form
 1 butterfly knives form
 1 long pole form
 sticky hands/sticky legs
 trapping exercises

 I know it will differe between orgs., but is there anything else that is a standard, named part of the curriculum at a typical school? Are there other standard types of drills? Also, are the trapping exercises a named list of exercises (like "Trapping Set A, Numbers 1-12") or just things drawn from the forms that different instructors might select differently?

 I'm sure that there are other drills, self-defense moves, and sparring people do at their schools, but I'm really asking about the things that would show up on a list of rank requirements or some other formal description of the contents of the style.


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## bcbernam777 (Oct 21, 2005)

arnisador said:
			
		

> I know that most Wing Chun substyles include the following:
> 
> 3 empty hand forms
> 1 wooden dummy form
> ...


Yes the curriculum pretty much follows what you have outlined. When you move from school to school there are drills that differ, accordingto the instructors interpretation of the forms. I know that there where some drills that YM did with his students, and if you do study under a first gen. teacher then you would do these, inc. lop sau drills, or jeet kune which I have mentioned in another post, however the main drill is Chi Sau which should never be underestimated, it does take some patience to get used to it, but it is worth it.


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## Flying Crane (Oct 21, 2005)

arnisador said:
			
		

> I know that most Wing Chun substyles include the following:
> 
> 3 empty hand forms
> 1 wooden dummy form
> ...


There are actually several different lineages of Wing Chun, that differ somewhat from the Yip Man lineage. Some of these systems have more forms than the three named above. In the US, I think the Yip Man lineage is the most famous due to the Bruce Lee phenomenon, but it is by no means the only. 

I don't know where the other forms came from, or who developed them, but I think at least in some cases, they may have been borrowed from other systems. 

My teacher is from the Yip Man lineage, and he has a fourth set that he calls the "slant set". I have not learned it, but I did see him do it once. He learned it from his teacher, who was a 1st generation student of Yip Man, but I think his teacher may have actually learned it elsewhere and brought it into his wing chun curriculum. Over time, a lot of borrowing tends to happen within the Chinese martial arts. This is one thing that causes systems to grow and evolve.

More information can be found in the book "Complete Wing Chun", by Robert Chu, Rene Ritchie, and Y. Wu.  They don't try to promote one lineage as better, but rather just profile the different systems.  It is pretty well written, and I think it offers a fair comparison.


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## arnisador (Oct 21, 2005)

Thanks to both of you. I thought I had heard that some substyles had a fourth empty hands form or maybe an extra butterfly knives form, but wasn't sure. I'll look for the book.

Are lop sau drills like the pak sao/lop sao (sp?) entering and trapping drills of JKD, that are whole defensive sequences, or do they train just a particular movement rather than a whole technique?


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## sifupr (Nov 5, 2005)

arnisador said:
			
		

> I know that most Wing Chun substyles include the following:
> 
> 3 empty hand forms
> 1 wooden dummy form
> ...


I hope this helps:
http://www.wingchunkwoon.com/grading.asp
PR


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## arnisador (Nov 5, 2005)

Thank you, it does! I'm new to the system and trying to find my way!


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## yrwca (Nov 28, 2006)

One additional activity that my Sifu gave me the first time I met him has always stood out in my mind, and my students like it as well, because it catalogs basic hands really well, is BaiSao. I like to fit it in early because it gives a partner-feel to SNT's hands and acts as a good springboard into DanChi and ChiSao.


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## Changhfy (Nov 28, 2006)

Actually there are quite a few systems that teach alot more than the three basic hand forms.

Such as Yuen Kay San, Pao Fa Lien, Hung Fa Yi, Chi Sim, Malaysian Wing Chun, Cho Gar has the three forms trained as one, thats just to name a few, so the three forms isnt generally the standard. 




take care,
Chang


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## Kensai (Nov 29, 2006)

Our syllabus is quite varied as well.

We start with roughly 10-15 minutes of heavy warm up, press ups, sit ups, squat thrusts, then chain punching sets to get the body nice and tired/warmed up before we start. 

From there we'll go straight into a series of techniques to take in turns applying them on various partners. We'll pad up some times and spar, or do some focus work. We don't do anything with the likes of wooden dummy training yet as we have new guys join all the time, so we have to be flexible.

As the group is quite large, my sifu places one or two of the more senior students that have been training with him for a few years to "take" a smaller more advanced group and to develop other techniques with them, while sifu spends more time with the relative new guys. Works well, a good all round conditioning, full speed drills, bit of sparring, and good explanations of technique and when to use them.


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## profesormental (Nov 29, 2006)

Greetings!

Wing Chun, from Yip Man is usually structured the following way:

Sil Lum Tao, Interpretations and Applications, including Dan Chi Sao up to Chi Sao

Chum Kiu, Interpretations and Applications, including light San Da to close distances

1st half of the Wooden Dummy, Interpretations and Applications, including Chi Sao with more movement and Chi Gerk

Biu Jee, Interpretations and Applications, including regaining the structure and much more heated Chi Sao and San Da... thus the need to regain your Wing Chun structure

2nd half of the Wooden Dummy, Interpretations and Applications, including exploding attackers away with Po Pai, throws and controls over attackers

Then come the weapon forms, the 6 1/2 pt pole, with emphasis on rooting, explosiveness and development of strength

and the Butterfly swords, with emphasis on wrist and grip strength, with explosive elasticity, and strengthening Wing Chun Structure.

For weapons, I personally train modern weapons, (more available ones, actually), and concentrate on the empty hand training of Wing Chun.

It can be argued that the most important use of the weapons training in Wing CHun is to improve the attributes of the empty hand training, and I agree, yet that is another story.

THe difference between instructors and schools is mainly the Interpretations and Applications, which dictate the drills and training methods preffered by the instructors and Sifu's.

You will notice that the forms are almost identical from school to school.

Hope that helps!

Sincerely,

Juan M. Mercado


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