I have a love/hate relationship with the I-shape forms

[skribs]

I'd expect some things to be different, sure. But unless it's outright stated, a technique or form with the same name, I'd expect to be the same. There are many reasons to leave an org that aren't related to being dissatisfied with how the forms go.

Ultimately it doesn't matter as long as you're transparent to your students that the form is not the same as other versions of the form.

I don't plan to hide it, but I don't plan to advertise it either.

 

[Earl Weiss]

There's some things that at some time he says he created and other times says his Master created. I'm not sure how much was him and how much he brought in. There were a few students there when I started who had trained under his previous Master with him, and I believe a lot of it was carried over.

Did your Master specify the origin of this version for the form? Does he specify the rationale for the changes? Is there a written memorialization of this version that is provided to the students?

There's some things that at some time he says he created and other times says his Master created.

There lies the problem. From the Chang Hon perspective I spent time with some of the most senior instructors in the world and their progeny before we had reference works from the founder. Their versions were in fact a carryover of habits, errors in interpretation, and sometimes stuff of their own creation.
Some Seniors mad us crazy by claiming their respective versions were the standard.
Their students all thought they were following some universal standard. Fortunately when a text came out I had an instructor who agreed that we would follow the specs in the text unless there seemed to be an obvious error. When I went to courses with founder and he would say something different than what I learned a little voice inside my head would scream "That's wrong" but a review of the texts showed he was consistent and how things changed as they got passed from person to person.
I have heard stories where someone at a KKW course in Korea questioned the Instructor on the "Standard" he learned versus what the instructor was teaching to which that instructor replied "I am the standard" Point of all this is don't mistake what some senior teaches as a Change - it may in fact be a mistake.

 

[skribs]

There's some things that at some time he says he created and other times says his Master created.

There lies the problem. From the Chang Hon perspective I spent time with some of the most senior instructors in the world and their progeny before we had reference works from the founder. Their versions were in fact a carryover of habits, errors in interpretation, and sometimes stuff of their own creation.
Some Seniors mad us crazy by claiming their respective versions were the standard.
Their students all thought they were following some universal standard. Fortunately when a text came out I had an instructor who agreed that we would follow the specs in the text unless there seemed to be an obvious error. When I went to courses with founder and he would say something different than what I learned a little voice inside my head would scream "That's wrong" but a review of the texts showed he was consistent and how things changed as they got passed from person to person.
I have heard stories where someone at a KKW course in Korea questioned the Instructor on the "Standard" he learned versus what the instructor was teaching to which that instructor replied "I am the standard" Point of all this is don't mistake what some senior teaches as a Change - it may in fact be a mistake.

It's very clear from some of the forms that these are definitely his versions, and not just errors or habits. Some of the forms have a very similar set of movements, some there's maybe a handful of movements that even resemble each other. I think his Palgwe 7 is probably the most removed from the Palgwe forms, in that there's 1 or 2 combinations that look remotely similar.

Another question is...are these errors in interpretation? Or are these differences in interpretation? For example, I've seen a number of differences between how different schools perform Palgwe 1. They all match the general hand positions of every technique.

1. Different schools do a different ratio of back stances to front stances. My school (and a few other versions) are all front stance except for the double knife-hand block. Other schools are a back stance for every block and a front stance for every strike. Others are in-between, with a back stance on the low blocks or a back stance when moving left-right and front stance forward-back.
2. Some schools replace some or all of the inside blocks with outside blocks.
3. Some schools have a more traditional style of stance, some a more modern Taegeuk style of stance.
4. Variations in how you step, chamber, etc.

Even some simple like the step-and-punch. I've seen a number of ways to step.

1. Sine wave from ITF
2. Flat C-step (feet together, knees bent so that your head level does not change, then out into front stance)
3. Natural C-step (feet together, legs straight or comfortably bent, then out into front stance)
4. Flat straight step
5. Natural straight step
6. Check-step (I can't remember which style I've seen this in, but each step involves tapping the other knee with your foot, as if you were raising your foot for a leg check or stepping over someone)

Every instructor has an explanation for why they step a certain way. For those who do (the Korean equivalent of Bunkai), the specific movements in the forms aren't necessarily important for the application. I don't see why a specific movement in a form matters so much.

I think forms were more useful as a means of transferring information before we had rampant literacy and modern communication systems. Now that everyone can read the books, talk online, make videos, etc., I think the value of forms as a specific list of techniques to preserve the art has diminished.

 

[isshinryuronin]

Some schools replace some or all of the inside blocks with outside blocks

If the form serves only as a way of practicing individual techniques, this will not matter.

If the form serves to practice situational self-defense, such changes can destroy the form's integrity. Executing an inside or outside block will result in you ending up on the opponent's inside or outside. This, in turn, will open up a whole different set of targets requiring the next moves to be different to attack them. It's a chain. Changing one move will necessitate changing the following moves as well.

 

[skribs]

If the form serves only as a way of practicing individual techniques, this will not matter.

If the form serves to practice situational self-defense, such changes can destroy the form's integrity. Executing an inside or outside block will result in you ending up on the opponent's inside or outside. This, in turn, will open up a whole different set of targets requiring the next moves to be different to attack them. It's a chain. Changing one move will necessitate changing the following moves as well.

TKD forms don't.

This is based on what I've seen at 3 different schools, in every official forms video I've seen from the organization, and what I've seen of videos from people taking the Master's course.

 

[ButchN]

I've spent the last several years trying to develop my own set of colored belt forms. I've learned my school's version of the Palgwe forms. I've learned the Taegeuks. Looked through the original versions of the Palgwes. Looked at other styles of Taekwondo. Looked into older inspirations such as TSD and various styles of Karate. There's a lot to like out there. But nothing out there has really truly grabbed me as "the one." There's always something about a set of forms that makes me pause and reconsider. Sometimes it's almost everything about them (I'm looking at you, Taegeuks). But even the forms I spent the most time training and have the fondest memories with...I still don't know.

One of the issues I have with creating my own set of forms is that I don't want them to all look the same. The Palgwe forms all follow the basic I-shape pattern. In fact, most forms seem to. Those that abandon it often barely do so (such as Koryo). The Taegeuk forms at least have a middle line to break up the pattern, although that leads to a different flavor of sameness. The shorter stances benefit the Taegeuk forms in making it easier to flow while breaking up the vertical lines. But I'm not a fan of those stances, so that doesn't help me.

I keep coming back to the I pattern, because it's so easy to write for. It's a perfect template. You can plug-and-play a couple of short combinations and a couple of long combinations. It's like a haiku or limerick. The structure is there. The structure works. But that structure doesn't really offer much room to deviate. Small deviations and it just comes off as a mistake. Too far off, and the forms start to feel random.

I want to make forms that will fit me, my curriculum, and what I'm trying to do with it. It's proving to be much more challenging than I ever would've thought. I understand now why none of these sets are perfect, or at least perfect to my standards. I have a lot more respect now for the people who initially created them.

For what it's worth, I'm currently back to the drawing board. Several years in and I've got bupkis.

Why does your school have their own versions of Palgwe? Palgwe is 8 forms. Anything else is a different form all together.

 

[skribs]

Why does your school have their own versions of Palgwe? Palgwe is 8 forms. Anything else is a different form all together.

I don't understand the question.

They had 8 Palgwe forms.

 

[skribs]

Two reasons I'm not particularly worried about my forms being exactly the way everyone else does them...

1. Everyone else is doing slight variations of the Palgwes anyway, so even if I do the "official" versions, someone going to a new school that does the Palgwes is still likely to have a different version.
2. I've been to a new school that did the Taegeuks in closer detail to the KKW version than my old. That school may have had more technically correct forms. But they had less quality control in their forms than my old school did, and just generally less quality in what was taught. To the point that my 70-year-old mother left because she wasn't getting enough of a challenge there.

I put more stock into everything else than whether or not my forms look exactly how someone 60 years ago that I've never met did them.

 

[HighKick]

Different Karate styles have different versions of the same form (by name).

In the entertainment industry, you have changes whenever someone makes something their own. Adaptations and reboots, cover songs, even retcons in prequels and sequels.

I don't see how this is any different from all of that.

I would moreover say people/styles learned the forms differently or devolved them over time, due to memory or choice. While I have seen forms from various sets done differently from how I learned them, I could usually tell what form they were doing. For example, the Pinon and Heian forms are nearly identical in movements, but very different in how the movements are done and the footwork. If everyone that happened to started changing things, the MA's would have never gotten off the ground.

If you can make an argument that something in a form is so compellingly wrong that everyone else agrees, then I could see making the change. Changing forms that are getting closer to 75-100 years-old just to be able to call them Skribs forms is, well bad form.
I would say it is much better to search out the true origins of the Palgwe forms and really know them from the beginning, not bash them from a bad experience with a single instructor.

 

[skribs]

I would moreover say people/styles learned the forms differently or devolved them over time, due to memory or choice. While I have seen forms from various sets done differently from how I learned them, I could usually tell what form they were doing. For example, the Pinon and Heian forms are nearly identical in movements, but very different in how the movements are done and the footwork. If everyone that happened to started changing things, the MA's would have never gotten off the ground.

If you can make an argument that something in a form is so compellingly wrong that everyone else agrees, then I could see making the change. Changing forms that are getting closer to 75-100 years-old just to be able to call them Skribs forms is, well bad form.
I would say it is much better to search out the true origins of the Palgwe forms and really know them from the beginning, not bash them from a bad experience with a single instructor.

I never said it was a single instructor. In fact, I've been very emphatic that it has been every instructor.

But please, tell me more about my experiences than I know. It's always fun when people try to gaslight me and think they're getting away with it.

 

[Earl Weiss]

I would moreover say people/styles learned the forms differently or devolved them over time, due to memory or choice.

i would add "Or ignorance" Agree that there can be a variety of valid opinions about what versions are "Better" but that is not really what I consider as having a universal technical standard. It gives the student a metric to know and achieve and the observer an observational metric to see if the standard is known and achieved. That is why the forms are butt one component of the system. Other components like sparring (in various machinations) and Ho Sin Sul provide the training for variations on the Pattern Standard. The dilution and "devolution' is rampant in the Chang Hon Series where for example some may do the same "Side Kick" for for all instances of a "side kick" in TK-D be it, Sie - Piercing Pushing, Thrusting, Outward Pressing all done with different technical parameters for different purposes and not knowing they are doing something different than the standard.

 

[skribs]

i would add "Or ignorance" Agree that there can be a variety of valid opinions about what versions are "Better" but that is not really what I consider as having a universal technical standard. It gives the student a metric to know and achieve and the observer an observational metric to see if the standard is known and achieved. That is why the forms are butt one component of the system. Other components like sparring (in various machinations) and Ho Sin Sul provide the training for variations on the Pattern Standard. The dilution and "devolution' is rampant in the Chang Hon Series where for example some may do the same "Side Kick" for for all instances of a "side kick" in TK-D be it, Sie - Piercing Pushing, Thrusting, Outward Pressing all done with different technical parameters for different purposes and not knowing they are doing something different than the standard.

I'd argue that's what makes the art so rich. There are so many different ways of doing things, and different Masters have picked what fits their game and designs the best.

You see this as a weakness, but I see it as a strength. Because someone can go to the piercing school and learn a piercing kick from someone who is truly an expert in that kick, to the thrusting school and learn the thrusting kick from someone who is truly an expert in that, and so on.

And then the piercing kick guy can bring in the thrusting kick guy for a seminar, and that will further enrich his students.

This is what I've experienced in my BJJ training. My professor is a world champion. He loves to pull guard and play from the bottom, so the school mostly focuses on how to survive and win on the bottom. One of the brown belts has a very strong wrestling background. When he teaches, we learn a lot more about take-downs and how to win from on top. Another brown belt is short (like me) and so he has a lot of insights that the taller coaches don't. For example, some techniques with your legs simply don't work if you can't wrap your legs around your opponent, but there are variations you can make that the taller folks aren't as familiar with.

If everyone did things to my Professor's standard, I'd be stuck playing a tall man's game. Thanks to the other coaches, I'm able to learn a much more well-rounded skillset.

 

[HighKick]

I'd argue that's what makes the art so rich. There are so many different ways of doing things, and different Masters have picked what fits their game and designs the best.

You see this as a weakness, but I see it as a strength. Because someone can go to the piercing school and learn a piercing kick from someone who is truly an expert in that kick, to the thrusting school and learn the thrusting kick from someone who is truly an expert in that, and so on.

And then the piercing kick guy can bring in the thrusting kick guy for a seminar, and that will further enrich his students.

This is what I've experienced in my BJJ training. My professor is a world champion. He loves to pull guard and play from the bottom, so the school mostly focuses on how to survive and win on the bottom. One of the brown belts has a very strong wrestling background. When he teaches, we learn a lot more about take-downs and how to win from on top. Another brown belt is short (like me) and so he has a lot of insights that the taller coaches don't. For example, some techniques with your legs simply don't work if you can't wrap your legs around your opponent, but there are variations you can make that the taller folks aren't as familiar with.

If everyone did things to my Professor's standard, I'd be stuck playing a tall man's game. Thanks to the other coaches, I'm able to learn a much more well-rounded skillset.

You are not wrong IMHO. But you have to agree you are looking at it through the lens of someone who is advanced enough to quickly grasp techniques, which, in full is rare. I cannot say how many piercing kicks there off the top of my head, but it is surely more than one or two.

When you apply the logic to the teaching environment, teaching a kick to someone takes time and patience. TBH, it seems you think you can show a person the kick once and they will get it. This is ripe to cause frustration for both of you.

 

[Haruhiko]

You are not wrong IMHO. But you have to agree you are looking at it through the lens of someone who is advanced enough to quickly grasp techniques, which, in full is rare. I cannot say how many piercing kicks there off the top of my head, but it is surely more than one or two.

When you apply the logic to the teaching environment, teaching a kick to someone takes time and patience. TBH, it seems you think you can show a person the kick once and they will get it. This is ripe to cause frustration for both of you.

Yeah...

Don't throw Bloom out with the bathwater.

 

[HighKick]

Yeah...

View attachment 32677

Don't throw Bloom out with the bathwater.

Ah, Bloom's pyramid. One of the best jobs of explaining common sense out there.

 

[Earl Weiss]

I'd argue that's what makes the art so rich. There are so many different ways of doing things, and different Masters have picked what fits their game and designs the best.

You see this as a weakness, but I see it as a strength. Because someone can go to the piercing school and learn a piercing kick from someone who is truly an expert in that kick, to the thrusting school and learn the thrusting kick from someone who is truly an expert in that, and so on.

And then the piercing kick guy can bring in the thrusting kick guy for a seminar, and that will further enrich his students.

It is a weakness when the instructors do it because they are clueless that their are other types in the system that should be taught / learned / and practiced. So, they only teach one. Far different than someone who prefers a closed Guard game but understands others prefer a different game and teaches that as well or uses another instructor to do that. For instance my "Jumping Parts" don't work well but I still teach jumping kicks and use someone with working parts to demonstrate when needed.

 

[Earl Weiss]

I cannot say how many piercing kicks there off the top of my head, but it is surely more than one or two.

Therein lies another issue. Nomenclature. Certainly not standard across systems and for a particular system you have to understand what "Piercing" means vis a vis how it's performed and optimal utilization. In the Chang on System, IIRC there are only 2, Side and Back, and even the back doesn't perfectly fi the "Technical Parameters" stated for Piercing. So, again, universal nomenclature enhances universal teaching, learning, and execution.

 

[skribs]

It is a weakness when the instructors do it because they are clueless that their are other types in the system that should be taught / learned / and practiced. So, they only teach one. Far different than someone who prefers a closed Guard game but understands others prefer a different game and teaches that as well or uses another instructor to do that. For instance my "Jumping Parts" don't work well but I still teach jumping kicks and use someone with working parts to demonstrate when needed.

Which is part of why I want to get away from teaching the "correct" way and instead teach what's right for the situation.

 

[Haruhiko]

Which is part of why I want to get away from teaching the "correct" way and instead teach what's right for the situation.

You're explaining your struggles with differentiated instructional pedagogy. And your solution is creating an entirely new martial arts system?

That's like Pythagoras getting frustrated with triangles and going off to start an academy exclusively dedicated to non euclidean geometry.

 

[skribs]

When you apply the logic to the teaching environment, teaching a kick to someone takes time and patience. TBH, it seems you think you can show a person the kick once and they will get it. This is ripe to cause frustration for both of you.

I've coached multiple martial arts for over a decade and you think I don't know how different people learn martial arts?

This is such a wild baseless accusation. I can't understand how you even made it. Do you you actually believe that I think this?

You're explaining your struggles with differentiated instructional pedagogy. And your solution is creating an entirely new martial arts system?

That's like Pythagoras getting frustrated with triangles and going off to start an academy exclusively dedicated to non euclidean geometry.

Every single TKD school I've been to has done things different. They've taken what they've learned from their TKD Master(s) and from other martial arts and combined them together into their own curriculum. I'm doing the same.

This criticism that I'm somehow breaking some unwritten law by coming up with my own curriculum ignores the fact that every other school comes up with their own curriculum.

This would be like if someone were to try and publish a book and you were to get mad it wasn't a word-for-word copy of The Hobbit. Because that was a good book, why do we need a new one?