Welcome to our great martial arts school! You have taken the first step to providing your child with a powerful array of tools that will empower them for the rest of their lives. Here at Karate America we are dedicated to three core values:
Believe: Your child will learn that the first step to any success is belief in themselves. Belief turns into goals, achieving goals builds confidence, and soon you have an unstoppable child!
Work Hard: We believe in hard work at school, at home, and in life. We know that short cuts don’t work. Hard work builds discipline, character, and strength. Watch as your child grows physically fit, mentally strong and socially prepared.
Be Nice: The foundation of our program is built on courtesy, respect, and honor. Rather at home or in school, students carry their responsibilities with them at all times. At Karate America we still say yes sir and yes ma’am. Our environment fosters an attitude that will supercharge your child and propel them to reaching their full potential.
Six and seven-year olds are the most enthusiastic students. They love creativity and problem solving, which makes them ideal students in the Martial Arts. The problem we discovered is they are so progressive in following tasks some teachers tend to treat them like their older peers. This is a problem because they still do not have the basic skills necessary to keep up with children ages 8 and up. The solution we found is to provide them with their own program that targets their stage of development in a manner that adapts to their social and intellectual curiosity while at the same time building skills that set them up for success. With that said a structured program introducing basic skill-based training in Martial Arts has proven to be very successful.
Here's an overview for the stages of development of children ages 6 and 7:
Physically - they typically do not know how to apply their muscles so they fall often when their body is in constant motion. Also, they have a basic foundation for leg, arm, core, and abdominal development, but they still lack a lot of strength.
Intellectually - they typically have a hard time retaining beyond three commands. They also have a hard time distinguishing between their left and right.
Emotionally - they typically focus on things that make them happy. They also have slow brakes when they are excited.
Socially - they love to play with others, but are typically very competitive.
By understanding the stages of development of 6 and 7-year olds, we were able to select 8 age-appropriate skills that make up the Little Champion Program:
We cover one of the above skills per class (in order.) During each class we run a warm-up; deliver a mat chat about the skill; run two or three skill-building drills; and then we have them demonstrate the skill to prepare for or earn their skill-stripe. Once a student earns all their skill stripes they are ready to graduate to their next belt.
Here is an example of what a student must demonstrate for each of the 8 skills above in order to earn their next belt:
As you can see we take Martial Arts training to a whole new level! We use basic elements of traditional Martial Arts curriculums to build skills that are appropriate for 5 and 6-year olds. This means that your child will learn and grow at a pace that is not too easy, nor too challenging. The best part is the Little Champion program will equip your child with skills that they will utilize in every area of their life!