1st Kyu Grading System -New Zealand ; report on amendments, a view from the plebs.

Hi Team,

Let me throw my two cents worth in.

Brent – Awesome to see the amendments that you have made already I think that they are good step in the right direction.

Johan and Jordan – I agree with where you are coming from as well. 

I would add one note of caution.  A degree of centralized control and bureaucracy is one of Judo’s key strengths.  The fact that parents can bring their kids to registered and warranted Judo clubs confident in the fact that the instructor has been vetted by his peers before ‘putting out his shingle’ is very important. Also being an Olympic sport/martial art and part of a disciplined wider international community is very important. 

This said though I believe we can find a happy medium between centralized control and technical innovation. 

This is where Johan makes particularly pertinent points about the grading process and I would like to extend this point to look at the whole TAG concept.

The TAG is supposed to be the backbone of our syllabus. It is designed to outline the essential skills that a Judoka should have by the time they reach Black Belt. I don’t object to the overall concept but if anybody has read the TAG they may have noted that as the grades get higher the list of throws gets more esoteric and the document’s discussion of the fundamentals gets more sketchy replaced by a list more and more esoteric techniques.

This creates an essential paradox (that Johan and Jordan are both illuminating) in that we are currently assessing the capability of best and brightest young players, who should experimenting and pushing the boundaries technically by asking them to demonstrate a series of un-used, esoteric techniques.  What value does this add?

Not sure but it does keep people employed writing syllabuses and testing people on techniques that they will never use.

One of the reasons I love Judo is that it essentially dynamic and always evolving. We need to resist technical conservatism.  The non-martial artists among st us love conservatism because rigid grading structures empower them allowing them to ‘shut out’ people that challenge the system. 

This is my great fear for Judo.  Young people coming up against some of our potential graders (people with high grades that have never have had to prove themselves on the mat acquiring their Dan grades administratively or politically) being graded on esoteric techniques that they have only had to learn for the exam. Then failed by these ‘experts’.  Not right is it? Next move is likely to be to the nearest BJJ club. Where that Judoka’s technical understanding will probably be welcomed and rewarded.

This is the reason that I have always supported grades being tied to competitive performance in young players and administered pretty flexibly.  If their skills work on the mat then they are proving themselves worthy of the next grade. If not they need to wait awhile. 

Firmly believe that centralized intervention should only be at Dan level (if at all) because the second mistake that I believe we make is confusing grade (a technical measure) with instructional expertise.  If we are aiming to build Judo I believe we should be more worried about producing good instructors and guess what – quelle horreur - most don’t need to be black belts. 

Some BJJ schools do this very well. They make a clear distinction between fighters and instructors. Fighters grade by fighting (in contests) and instructors grade on their technical ability (which still has to be demonstrated in training). Both sides respect each other’s differences and work together. 

Rather than creating ‘Stalinist’ grading commissions to impose order at increasingly lower levels and empower all those that sit on them to ‘shut the gate’ on the people they don’t like we should instead think about the following:

• Let any Black-Belt grade to 1^st Kyu
• Only have grading panels from at 1^st Dan but make them small (two people) and regionally appointed – Do we really need to ‘license’ our graders?  If someone is appointed locally that is not up to speed then the Technical Commission could intervene and a transparent review and supervision process could kick in.
• Retain the rule that younger players must accrue competition points before they can grade to Dan grades
• At higher Dan grades have a national panel
• Develop a proper well thought out programme for developing instructors that is separated (as much and practicable) from the grading process. The key characteristics would be:
• It is easily understood
• It is inclusive i.e. rather than be compelled to attend people participate because it is useful interesting training
• Instructors and coaches are recognized for their teaching skill rather than their grade. This recognition is important. There are lots of young players who are OK contest player but will never be elite athletes. This is the pool of players we need to make feel that they can still contribute to Judo.
• It is centrally organized and mandated.  While we want our young players experimenting and trying new things we probably want a bit more control over the coaches that are our ‘brand’ in the community.
• It transparently recognizes prior knowledge and learning.
• The more esoteric technical elements in the TAG can be retained in this environment where people are learning them to round out their technical base so that they can be better instructors

So in summary, good start but I think we should put less effort into trying to regulate grade standards and more into making sure coaches deliver good instruction 

That’s my thoughts 

Ben Stallworthy M.A. 

-----Original Message-----
From: Jordan Reynolds [mailto:jordanlaurence@hotmail.com]

Subject: Re: 1st Kyu Grading System - report on amendments

There is something fundamentally wrong:

In judo we have black belts who don't have the knowledge required to be a black belt, so we add more processes and identify that as quality control.

In BJJ there is no formalized quality control, and no national standards (or even global) yet they have no problems with knowledge transference. 

Maybe it's the culture of the sports? Judo players want to get black belt as fast as possible with minimum work (at least that is in keeping with Kanos teachings). Coaches measure success in how many black belts they can produce with the set process. People just learn based on the exam criteria.

In Bjj gradings are 100% holistic at brown and black belt, so there is a culture of learning everything, creativity and keeping up to date with latest techniques. 

Maybe we need to move towards a more holistic system of grading rather than a regimented taekwon do McDonald's dojo system? It's

Obvious that Johan, Rick And Lawrie are developing fantastic brown and black belts without the need more any more Judo WOFs and centralized federation control.

Basically, systems create culture and the more processes and systems we have in place the less creativity and self driven learning we will see.

Hi Johan

Well said, my thoughts entirely.

I have been talking about this for quite some time to no avail.

I cannot understand why we charge a minimum amount for kyu grades and a fortune for Dan grades when we are expecting them to know everything as a kyu grade.

I believe it takes the emphasis of doing the black belt.

Unfortunately I don’t think anything will change.

Regards,

Lawrie Crooke

Howick & St Heliers Academy of Judo

Phone: (09) 577 3361

Mobile: 027 328 5775

From: Johan Boshoff [mailto:bosjudo@hotmail.com]
Subject: RE: 1st Kyu Grading System - report on amendments 

Hi Lawrie and specifically Brent,

A thorough document with obviously a lot of time invested in the details.

However, my personal opinion is still that a system such as this, is addressing the perceived problem of the lack of knowledge and technical skills in NZ judo, at the wrong level. I don't want to enter into a debate about this, so I will just provide my brief feedback, and then leave it at that.

Firstly, this is an additional burden on club coaches and administrators. Not all those people running judo clubs are fanatics (or judo tragics) like some of us. So this is an extra administrative burden on them, and it sometimes is just in the too hard basket to even bother doing it. After all, we are only talking about kyu grades here.

Secondly, most of the new 1st kyu grades (my guess would be somewhere in the 90 %)  are probably around the age of 15 to 17. At that age, players could not be bothered going through a strict grading procedure, jumping through hoops doing techniques they will never encounter again, as most of those drop out of judo before the age of 20 anyway. This grading procedure will not keep them in judo, and they only store this knowledge in their short-term memory, giving it back during the examination, and then forget it again after the grading. So there is very little long-term "up-skilling". And I have more than 20 years of coaching experience taking many players from white to black belt, so I do have a vague idea of what is happening in reality.

I have no problem if players over the age of 20 or 25 go through this system, as they have the maturity to grasp these concepts and retain this knowledge. It is also at that age where they will start looking at doing coaching and that knowledge will be useful. The feedback received from older players about the 1st kyu grading on a panel basis, is largely positive so far, but the younger players  see it as a useless exercise. And I agree with them.

The focus, in my opinion, should be on getting the required knowledge and skills established when players do their dan grades. A dan grade is a masters degree, players are more mature in age and attitude when doing this examination, and they will retain more of that information at that time. 

I can go on about the proposed system for dan grades, but I will refrain from doing that. Bottom line for me, is that we burden coaches with administration in stead of encouraging them to attend national technical workshops where they can rub shoulders with old colleagues (friends and foes) and get energised when going through forgotten techniques and get information about the latest coaching methodology.  

I rest my case!!! 

Johan

> Subject: FW: 1st Kyu Grading System - report on amendments
> Date: Sat, 5 Apr 2014 16:41:22 +1300
>
> Hi All>
> Just updating you all on the pending changes to the 1st KYU grading's> >
> Regards,>
> Lawrie Crooke
>
> President of Auckland Judo
> Phone: (09) 577 3361
> Mobile: 027 328 5775> >
> Subject: 1st Kyu Grading System - report on amendments>
> Hi people,>
> At the 2013 Judo New Zealand AGM (Congress) I was instructed to undertake a review on the 1st Kyu Grading system and report back to the Congress with an update by the end of February 2014. Please find attached my report.>
> While not required, please feel free to provide any feedback you may have either to me personally or to the group of recipients in this email as a whole.>
> Regards
> Brent Cooper
> National Technical Director