still learning wrote: Richard Riehle wrote: still learning wrote: samsmith2424 wrote:What do people think of teaching techniques in the order of the Gokyo?
. Therefore, I think the instructor should focus on teaching those waza that s/he is most skilled at doing.
. If a student is lucky, s/he will have the opportunity to learn from many instructors over a lifetime. This includes visiting other dojos, attending clinics, and building friendships throughout the Judo community so we can all learn together.
Good post, very thought provoking. I've had the privilege of training with many great judoka over the years, Neil Adams for taitoshi and juji gatame, Inoue for uchi mata and Fallon for tomenage, to name a few. There is no better way of learning than from someone who has truly mastered certain techniques. The caveat is that as an instructor you must be able to teach, or indeed have supporting coaches to teach, all of the techniques so that your pupils can learn as much as possible and so choose what suits them.
I think the jury is out on this. These are two opposing schools of thought, whether a teacher should only be teaching techniques he knows well or not. Under the same rationale my teachers in my first three dôjô did not like to teach kata. They were not good at it because they thought that kata was stupid and made no sense, hence they avoided teaching it. In my first dôjô I insisted though on being examined on nage-no-kata for my 2nd kyû having heard how it was a requirement in other jûdô clubs at the time and not wanting to feel like my 2nd kyû belt was less worthy (I was a kid sitll, obviously).
In my personal view a jûdô instructor cannot afford to teach only the things he is best in. A jûdô instructor has the responsibility to teach other things too so that perhaps his students can get good in things he is not good in. In competition I threw with virtually the entire gokyô but there was one technique I could not for the life of me master: harai-tsuri-komi-ashi (I obviously also did not throw in those days with uki-otoshi and sumi-otoshi). I started hating HTKA. Yet my teacher knew it well.
The jury decided to ask me this technique a long time ago on my sandan exam. Luckily I had worked hard enough to show a decent enough version to pass. That year --I think-- I also became the instructor of the junior's division of another club. It was my task to teach them jûdô, not just the jûdô I liked. So, I also taught the HTKA. I still hated the technique. Later after returning from Japan and having worked hard on Koshiki-no-kata and having gained some proficiency in kuzushi, things were different. They again became different later after starting to understand what was really meant with the whole rhythm philosophy in Koshiki-no-kata. I can now do HTKA without thinking just like other throws, and I no longer hate the throw. It is actually a quite fun throw.
As an instructor I don't stop being a student. It was my task as student even though an instructor to get more proficiency in what I did not know. That's my personal view. I don't adhere the viewpoint of only teaching what you know well. In fact I would go even further and say that a really excellent instructor can teach things to his students with proficiency even though he might not be able to do them himself. I also think that there is nothing wrong as an instructor to honestly tell your students that when showing a certain technique that it may not be your forte. You don't have to be perfect. In fact, honestly sharing your technical flaws with your student gives you a more down-to-earth impression that might make it easier for your students to identify with you and not alienate them because you are at a level they will never reach ...
This is not so different from the whole coaching qualifications issue. In basketball, soccer, baseball, successful coaches often have not been absolute top and are middle age or even older. Only in judo is there a crazy expectation that you should be some kind of intergallactic champion ho no one can beat hence why so many national judo teams are stuck in rut, and the federations make the same mistakes over and over. Even when they advertise, you will see that in the end the person hired may virtually not have any of the qualifications but might e a past world or Olympic champions, and the recipe for the next disaster is set.
"There is no better way of learning than from someone who has truly mastered certain techniques. " (...) You would think so, but that doesn't mean you CAN actually learn from those who truly maser certain techniques. Sometimes you can, sometimes you can't. The skill needs to be transferred from that person to you, and the parameters for such successful transfer are a totally different pair of gloves.
The question to address really is: how are you going to transfer the skill of doing uchi-mata from Inoue to you ? Not so many outstanding judoka have the ability to transfer their outstanding skills. The reason is simple: most of the tranferee candidate are nowhere when compared to them in degree of being outstanding. Choose the best software but if you don't meet minimal hardware requirements, have no bottle necks, it will be a disaster. I am of course not pleading for the opposite and saying that techniques are best taught by incompetent people who do not master them at all.
How many judo clinics have not been announced on this forum taught by Olympian so and so ? Many of them are disasters and besides providing an opportunit for a photo shoot with a famous name in the world of judo, such clinics are mainly characterized by a sharp expiration date. Same problem.
Like you I could say "I've had the privilege of training with many great judoka over the years", sure but can I deduct from that that thanks to this experience I now know certain techniques ? No, not at all. Many of the names who made such impact on me were not normal people but true "freaks of nature", no disrespect meant. The Starbrooks, Geesinks, Ruskas, Van De Walles, etc. (by means of speaking, of course; I never did randori or anything else with either Geesink of Starbrook and I am glad I did not as I do not know how man limbs I would have been missing) You have them in every sport. I used to run at least twice a day, one time interval, other time endurance. I was fast enough that when I ran 400 m interval I ran past those who did 200 m. Except for some evenings when one guy stepped on the track who made me feel worthless. He ran 800 m intervals, one after another. If you know anything about running, to give you an idea, he ran the 3,000m steeple chase in like 8'10 and his personal record on the 3,000 m was something like 07'45. Yes, he ran the world championships track and field and has won medals there too. The man had all my respect, but I did not learn a thing from him except for realism that no matter what I did in running I would never reach that as the genetic gap was impossible to bridge. I mean 07:45 on the 3K ?? Yeah, by bike ! So yes, inspiration, dedication, respect, admiration, all you want, but learning ?? No. Coincidentally, he does not have students who ever got anywhere noteworthy. He could never transfer his abilities, and get a mediocre runner up to world elite.
The ability to optimally transfer abilities requires special knowledge, skills and abilities. Understanding what the throw is, how it works and what the problems are helps. But even intellectually knowing all that is still not sufficient. You need to be able to discern the shortcomings of the students, what precisely he is lacking, and you need to be able to communicate with him or her at every level. Sure, you will find near-retarded judo champions who can barely read or write yet can perform a near perfect technique, but that is not really the point, is it. The point is to what extent those near retarded people will be able to transfer that skill to someone else.
It is not a challenge (usually) to teach a new technique to a truly exceptionally gifted person. The challenge is to do so to a person with two left feet and two left hands.
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