TSD Curriculum

[dancingalone]

How many new one step sets and self-defense techniques do you typically have per belt level? I've come across GM Ho Sik Pak's manual and it is a nicely produced book. The amount of material per grade seems a little light to me though. (not meant as a criticism of GM Pak - just a personal observation, and I am curious if his curriculum is relatively sparse in the colored belt grades to allow for lots of practice on each element which is certainly a valid way of doing things.)

 

[SahBumNimRush]

1 Step Requirements:

As a white belt there are 5. The basic 5 are all that are learned as a white belt.

From there to 5th gup, 15 per rank (5 hand, 5 feet, 5 combination). However, these are not set. They are "free style;" ranging from techniques taught by higher ranks or "made up" by the practitioner themselves. As long as they are efficient and effective, we give the students leeway.

from 4th gup to 1st gup, 20 (5 hand, 5 feet, 5 combination, and 5 take downs). As above, these are free style.

As for the Hoshinsul type of SD, we teach a handful of defenses for each scenerio (choke, various grabs, kicks, etc.) to the intermediate/advanced gups.

The structure is fairly loose when it comes to 1 step and self defense in our dojang, it is more individualized for what works best for each student depending on ability and individual limitations.

 

[cdunn]

Il soo sik: There are 2 hand, 2 foot each rank from 10th to 5th gup, 3 hand, foot @ 4th gup, (Total 15), 15 total from 3rd through 1st gup, and I believe there's ~20 formal dan 1 steps. Each has an accompanying sam soo sik.

Hosinsul: 2 each rank 10th - 5th gup, 3 @ 4th gup, and 15 3rd through 1st gup, plus knife defense at the dan level.

Philosophy is that we would rather you have a handful of techniques that can be built upon, and do them fast and effectively, rather than a broad, shallow pool of techniques.

 

[SahBumNimRush]

I am curious, for those of you who teach more than just the kick, punch, block applications of forms. When and how do you introduce these concepts?

Coming up through the ranks, these techniques were introduced in one step/ self defense during gup ranks. It wasn't until black belt were they shown as part of the form.

Now that I run my own dojang, I'm contemplating introducing these techniques as part of the forms as they learn them. This would create a more structured curriculum of one step and self defense, teaching from the forms.

 

[dancingalone]

It needs to be right from the beginning IMO, Benjamin, or else most students NEVER gain an appreciation for forms until they hit the dan ranks. I always explain that basics, sparring, self-defense applications, and forms are merely different ladders to the same destination. You can get there using just one ladder, but often times people can benefit from multiple approaches if they are given the tools as part of the training from the onset.

Basics teaches you movement and core tools/technique. Sparring teaches timing. Forms teach you precision along with the fighting tactics of the system. Self-defense and form applications are where you display what you learned with the first three.

 

[SahBumNimRush]

It needs to be right from the beginning IMO, Benjamin, or else most students NEVER gain an appreciation for forms until they hit the dan ranks. I always explain that basics, sparring, self-defense applications, and forms are merely different ladders to the same destination. You can get there using just one ladder, but often times people can benefit from multiple approaches if they are given the tools as part of the training from the onset.

Basics teaches you movement and core tools/technique. Sparring teaches timing. Forms teach you precision along with the fighting tactics of the system. Self-defense and form applications are where you display what you learned with the first three.

From my observations, I tend to agree with you that most do not gain a true appreciation for forms until they hit the dan ranks with the curriculum that I grew up with. I very much like the idea of teaching these concepts early, but it is a big change in the curriculum. Most of my students will be playing "catch up." I have started teaching these concepts to higher gups with the hopes that by the time they reach their first dan, they will have a better grasp of the concepts. But teaching a structured set of one step and self defense at every rank mirroring their new form is a difficult change, because there will be advanced students that have a larger chunk of new material to learn.

Thanks for the input, Dancing. As always, you are very helpful.

 

[dancingalone]

From my observations, I tend to agree with you that most do not gain a true appreciation for forms until they hit the dan ranks with the curriculum that I grew up with. I very much like the idea of teaching these concepts early, but it is a big change in the curriculum. Most of my students will be playing "catch up." I have started teaching these concepts to higher gups with the hopes that by the time they reach their first dan, they will have a better grasp of the concepts. But teaching a structured set of one step and self defense at every rank mirroring their new form is a difficult change, because there will be advanced students that have a larger chunk of new material to learn.

I've got another nasty wrinkle to throw at you. Implicit within forms can be some of the nastier stuff, starting with knifehands to the neck, culminating into things like chokes and neck breaks. How do we make sure this material only is imparted to those we can 'trust' with the knowledge? Do you have multiple sets of applications based on the audience? Or do you teach only the more sanitized stuff, reserving the more guarded material for only 1 or 2 of your closest pupils?

My teacher took the latter approach.

 

[SahBumNimRush]

I've got another nasty wrinkle to throw at you. Implicit within forms can be some of the nastier stuff, starting with knifehands to the neck, culminating into things like chokes and neck breaks. How do we make sure this material only is imparted to those we can 'trust' with the knowledge? Do you have multiple sets of applications based on the audience? Or do you teach only the more sanitized stuff, reserving the more guarded material for only 1 or 2 of your closest pupils?

My teacher took the latter approach.

My teacher took this approach as well. However, these techniques were never presented until after earning your black belt or higher dan rank (depending on the technique and student). I think that for the most part I would only teach the more sanitized stuff to the gup ranks, and teach more to the students once they reach black belt. At this point I have only taught some of the more "nasty techniques" to 2 of my students.

I have been tossing around the idea of opening these techniques up to all black belts who achieve a certain rank. After all, if they then open their own dojang I don't like the idea of being responsible for techniques being lost. If I hold the standard that all black belts who earn 3rd or 4th dan rank in my dojang are trust worthy individuals then this could be a viable option.

Techniques like knifehand strikes to the neck and chokes are techniques that I currently teach to higher gup ranks. The more deadly techniques I have reserved for those who I trust with the knowledge. Beyond the integrity of the student, age comes into play as well. However, going along with the idea that the more deadly techniques are not taught until higher dan rank, that takes age out of the question (atleast in my dojang).

These are things I've been thinking a great deal about since opening my own dojang 6 months ago. I do not wish to reinvent the wheel here, but at the same time, if there is a more holistic way to impart the knowledge of the system I study in a responsible and "safe" manner I would like to do so.

** Side note, I took over after my instructor retired from running a dojang, so I have had the luxury of starting my own dojang with a broad range of ranks (beginners all the way through 3rd dans). So even though I have only had my own dojang for 6 months, some students have more than a decade of training.

 

[SahBumNimRush]

In some cases techniques are explained as the student learns the form so that there is intent of movement, but it is never practiced against a partner until much higher rank. For example the cresent kick, shin rake, foot stomp, elbow strike, back fist combination found in Pyung Ahn Sam Dan is taught as such when the student learns the form. But for safety reasons is never practiced against a partner (most intermediate students have not conditioned their shins to take that type of punishment).


The other night I asked one of my female black belts to execute a side kick to the knee, shin rake, foot stomp combo in response to a grab/abduction scenerio. What took place really opened my eyes! She had trouble executing it, because she had never physically practiced kicking someone in the knee or raking their shin. In this scenario, I was the assailant and out of 10 attempts, she only landed one of the kicks and the rake slipped off the shin.

This shows a weakness in my teaching method that a 1st dan could not execute a rather simple technique.

 

[SahBumNimRush]

So last night I experimented with boonhae daeryun (bunkai kumite/ form application sparring) in both my beginner and advanced classes. During the beginner class we worked strictly on the Kicho Hyungs and Pyung Ahn Cho Dan. Before we began, I asked all of the students if they imagined engaging with an opponent during forms, to which they all answered, "yes." However, when we started actually performing the form against real bodies, a whole host of problems arose (in a good way).

Problems such as understanding how to attack in such a way that the basic interpretation of a block in a basic form could be useful, distance and timing in a multiple step sparring situation (when I started back in the 80's we did 3 step sparring, which was later dropped from the curriculum and replace by 1 step sparring), focus and intent of movement, and knowing where to strike effectively.

In the advanced class, we worked more on concepts of applications and broke up in to groups for one step (attacker using various attacks; chokes, grabs, kicks, punches etc) and developing counters derived from our forms. This worked better than the beginner class, but the advanced students had had some exposure to these concepts previously in my classes.

I still believe that adding this to my curriculum is going to be beneficial, but it took up nearly the entire class, and didn't allow for a good sweat. I'm hoping that in the next few weeks, the students will become more proficient at this and we can spend less time teaching and explaining and more time working.

 

[Makalakumu]

In my view, in order to truly incorporate bunkai into the TSD curriculum, we need to redefine our practice of basics, forms, and sparring. The old way of doing it does not access the applications and simply does not allow the students to practice realistic self defense scenarios. Dr. Rush's observations about his student are spot on. I've seen this in almost every TSD dojang I've gone into. It's not enough (and it's not fair IMO) to start teaching bunkai correctly at shodan. Students literally have to put aside everything they know and start over in order to master the techniques. The connection between modern material and the real applications exists, but it is so obfuscated it's like trying to learn how to play tennis by playing baseball.

I start teaching bunkai at white belt. I don't use the gicho hyung, we move right into the pyung ahn sets. Itsosu Sensei designed these for beginners, btw. I have differentiated curriculum for kids and adults and I differentiate the bunkai that I teach based off of the students needs. Therefore, for each hyung, my students practice two "one steps" and they know exactly where in the form it comes from and can explain in detail why they interpreted it like that.

For sparring, we practice our bunkai with resistance and then gradually up the level of chaos until it starts to brush up against the various safety boundaries that I lay out before hand. We do many forms of sportive sparring, but this is only to familiarize my students with it and to test out an extremely limited amount of techniques.

My suggestion for anyone wanting to include bunkai into the curriculum of their dojo is that they start at white belt. If you already have an established base of students, start slowly by adding a new section to your requirement sheets call Additional Requirements. My TSD sensei started teaching in 1987 and by 1994 had a huge base of students. He learned about bunkai and was one of the only people around who started to incorporate it into his practice. In 1994, all of his students were old school TSD and he gradually started to teach more techniques, concepts and principles at each rank with the Additional Requirements section. By 1996, when I started with my teacher, the whole dojo was familiar and well practiced at various bunkai.

Eventually, we have to move beyond the old "modern" approach to karate though. By 2000, we left the Federation and completely redefined the Kihon-Kata-Kumite cycle back to our interpretation of the original version. I wrote my book in an attempt to clarify this vision.

When I opened my dojo in Hawaii, I started with a clean slate and it's been great! I have students who are new and students who have trained in karate before and they tell me that this is the first time the material has really made practical sense. And it's worked in real self defense situations as well. Back at my old dojo in Minnesota and at my new dojo, a few of my students have had to defend themselves and have been successful with as little as six months of training.

So, all I can say is go for it. If you are thinking about Bunkai and want your students to learn it, go for it!

 

[SahBumNimRush]

In my view, in order to truly incorporate bunkai into the TSD curriculum, we need to redefine our practice of basics, forms, and sparring. The old way of doing it does not access the applications and simply does not allow the students to practice realistic self defense scenarios. Dr. Rush's observations about his student are spot on. I've seen this in almost every TSD dojang I've gone into. It's not enough (and it's not fair IMO) to start teaching bunkai correctly at shodan. Students literally have to put aside everything they know and start over in order to master the techniques. The connection between modern material and the real applications exists, but it is so obfuscated it's like trying to learn how to play tennis by playing baseball.

I start teaching bunkai at white belt. I don't use the gicho hyung, we move right into the pyung ahn sets. Itsosu Sensei designed these for beginners, btw. I have differentiated curriculum for kids and adults and I differentiate the bunkai that I teach based off of the students needs. Therefore, for each hyung, my students practice two "one steps" and they know exactly where in the form it comes from and can explain in detail why they interpreted it like that.

For sparring, we practice our bunkai with resistance and then gradually up the level of chaos until it starts to brush up against the various safety boundaries that I lay out before hand. We do many forms of sportive sparring, but this is only to familiarize my students with it and to test out an extremely limited amount of techniques.

My suggestion for anyone wanting to include bunkai into the curriculum of their dojo is that they start at white belt. If you already have an established base of students, start slowly by adding a new section to your requirement sheets call Additional Requirements. My TSD sensei started teaching in 1987 and by 1994 had a huge base of students. He learned about bunkai and was one of the only people around who started to incorporate it into his practice. In 1994, all of his students were old school TSD and he gradually started to teach more techniques, concepts and principles at each rank with the Additional Requirements section. By 1996, when I started with my teacher, the whole dojo was familiar and well practiced at various bunkai.

Eventually, we have to move beyond the old "modern" approach to karate though. By 2000, we left the Federation and completely redefined the Kihon-Kata-Kumite cycle back to our interpretation of the original version. I wrote my book in an attempt to clarify this vision.

When I opened my dojo in Hawaii, I started with a clean slate and it's been great! I have students who are new and students who have trained in karate before and they tell me that this is the first time the material has really made practical sense. And it's worked in real self defense situations as well. Back at my old dojo in Minnesota and at my new dojo, a few of my students have had to defend themselves and have been successful with as little as six months of training.

So, all I can say is go for it. If you are thinking about Bunkai and want your students to learn it, go for it!

I like the idea of requiring a small number of boonhae/bunkai one steps from each form per rank, as defined as "additional requirements." As an instructor that is incorporating more focus on this area into an existing dojang, I think it will make the transition easier. I have already delineated applications for different ages, maturity and ability to best suite the students, but putting I Hadn't thought about it as an additional requirement.

 

[Makalakumu]

Take any number of bunkai, break them down into the actual techniques they use, if it's not covered somewhere in your list of basics, add that as an additional requirement as well. Also, try to incorporate some element of resistance so that uke and tori can behave more naturally. This is how I see the concept of kumite fitting into the needs of self defense.

Eventually, this list will grow and it will beg to be included more substantially. It's really exciting actually. TSD has so much potential because our traditions aren't very strong to begin with. There is so much difference already!

 

[mattkulma]

I have enjoyed reading this particular thread and I agree that there could be more enphasis placed on hyung application it students training. I believe the USSBDMDK federation has noticed this as well by their reintroduction of 3 step sparring at dan levels and the requierment that the motions come from their level hyung. I personally am going back and looking at all of my hyung and developing applications for them that I can use at my dojang when it gets up and running. besides figuring out how to apply hyung to sparring can be a lot of fun.

 

[Makalakumu]

I have enjoyed reading this particular thread and I agree that there could be more enphasis placed on hyung application it students training. I believe the USSBDMDK federation has noticed this as well by their reintroduction of 3 step sparring at dan levels and the requierment that the motions come from their level hyung. I personally am going back and looking at all of my hyung and developing applications for them that I can use at my dojang when it gets up and running. besides figuring out how to apply hyung to sparring can be a lot of fun.

That's a huge step for them! Which hyung are they going to use? The Chil Sung and Yuk Ro hyung have some great applications. It would be cool to see how the creator envisioned their usage.

As far as the classical hyung go, there are a lot of techniques that simply aren't taught in SBD. Or at least they weren't when I was part of the federation eleven years ago. Is there any video of their three step techniques?

 

[mattkulma]

The requierments as they are right now is that each testing candidate needs to create 3 separate 3 step sparring demonstrations using motions from their level hyung. These are for testing for E Dan and Sam Dan, so the hyungs that they use are chil sung 1, 3, and 4, yuk ro 2 and 3, Jin do, and lo hi. I personally am going to start looking back through all he hung that I know and creating applications based on each hyung.

 

[OldKarateGuy]

In answer to the OP, in WTSDA, at each colored belt level, student must learn 5 hand one-steps and 5 kick one-steps. On the in-between tests (stripes to colored belts), they learn 5 grabs or throws. These are very much a part of the curricula, and they come straight from a book (or video). So, by the time of a 1st dan test, students must know 30 hand one-steps, 30 foot (kick) one-steps and 30 throws or grabs. All of these through 1st dan are keyed by attacked from a right hand punch or kick only. At 2nd dan test and up, the techniques may come from attacks from either side (meaning right or left), must include a follow-up technique which, on local option, might have to be a take-down, a strike, etc. Dan testing students, in addition to demonstrating all of the book versions, may be required to demonstrate a practical self-defense application (using similar but not identical) responses from one or multiple attackers. So, by dan test, rote versions morph into (hopefully) more realistic applications.

 

[MasterPistella]

What isn't listed in GM Pak's book is that in addition to what is shown, each student is required to also know whatever their individual instructor teaches. In my case I teach 3 additional at each level. They are also required to do 2 of their own beginning at red belt level. Yes, to the original comment, this is done to allow personal growth of the student. Instead of confining them into our set confines, we want the students to learn and grown on their own. This may include bringing in any aspects of other arts, ju jitsu, hapkido etc into their own techniques.