WYKKO Summer Camp, Part II: Quality of Instruction & the Importance of Evaluations

This is the second of a series of 3 articles about our coming Summer Camp on June 12, 2015.

The planning team works hard to craft a schedule with some of the best instructors in our style. Our camp instructors want to help you and are excited to share their knowledge and experience with you. Our instructors plan ahead and prepare to teach, so please remember to thank each of your instructors this Summer Camp because we could not hold such excellent events without their dedication and support.

Many of our instructors cross train and have a lot of skills to share with you outside of our traditional Yoshukai curriculum that will help you augment your training. Our goal in offering these non-traditional classes is to expose you to other areas of study that may help your Yoshukai skills, for example when designing self-defense routines or combinations.

Kaicho Mike Culberth - Shihan Dennis Trawick

 

You’ll notice that the majority of our camp instructors are certified WYKKO instructors, many of whom have their own schools and/or are fourth degree black belts or higher.  Camp instructors who are not official WYKKO instructors get to teach at our camps because they have been recommended by other instructors and have extensive teaching experience in their own dojo. If you are a black belt and are interested in teaching a class at one of our camps, please email or talk to any of the organizers.

Finally, every summer camp, we’ve asked you to complete course and instructor evaluations. We want to take a moment to thank you so much for doing that. We take them seriously and the information you’ve given us in the past is a large part of what determines what classes we’ll offer in the future. That said, as wildly popular as they may have been, you won’t see some classes (like environmental fighting or weapons disarming) offered every year. But absence makes the heart grow fonder, and you’ll surely see them offered again in 2016.  We’re always looking for new classes to offer, so if you have any ideas (no matter what your rank is), please contact me. We appreciate any feedback that we receive from participants, parents, guests, and our instructors, as that is what ensures that each camp is better and better than the last.

We hope that you are as excited as we are to attend this year’s Summer Camp, and we can’t wait to see you all there.

Osu!
 

Sherrie Hines, on behalf of the WYKKO Camp Planning Team

Victoria Cup

On April 25, 2015, the Pacific Institute for Sport Excellence (PISE) at Camosun College Interurban campus played host to the 5th Annual Victoria Cup Karate Tournament.  Directed by local karate instructors Hanshi Masanobu Kikukawa and Renshi Greg Turnbull, this year’s event featured over 100 competitors from Vancouver Island and the lower mainland.  

Kyoshi Mike Puckett addresses competitors 

and spectators during the opening ceremony.

In attendance were special international representatives from the WYKKO (World Yoshukai Karate Kobudo Organization): USA WYKKO Presidents Kaicho Hiroaki Toyama & Kaicho Mike Culbreth and Yoshukai Japan Vice-President Fuku-Kaicho Nobuyuki Matsumoto. Local long-time karate instructors Mike Puckett, Kurt Nordli, Frank Clayton, Sukwinder Manhas, Don Shapland, Pat Byron, Chris Barclay, and Carl Scott were also at today’s event providing their support and officiating expertise.

The Sheung Wong Hung Fut Kung Fu Lion Dance team kicked off the opening ceremonies which also included a group gesture, “Y for Yamamoto” to ailing Yoshukai founder Soke Katsuo Yamamoto. Soke Yamamoto was unable to travel to Victoria as he is currently in the fight of his life battling cancer back in Japan.

Competitors and officials raise their arms in 

the shape of a “Y” in support of Yoshukai 

founder Soke Katsuo Yamamoto

Hanshi Kikukawa on behalf of Soke Yamamoto presented Kaicho Mike Culbreth with his 8th degree black belt, and local Yoshukai members also received black belt rankings:  Greg Turnbull (4th degree black belt) and Arlin Ablaza (2nd degree black belt).
The morning’s competition started with Raj Basi from Canada’s Best Karate (CBK) taking 1st place in adult black belt kata while Ethan McKenna, also from CBK, took the gold in junior black belt kata and Shihan Paul Turner from WYKKO in Alabama won the senior black belt division.  Weapons kata divisions featured wins by Nick Graves from Yoshukai Canada in adult short weapons, Kyoka Shapland from Chilliwack Tenshinkan in junior black belt short and long weapons, and Paul Turner once again taking 1st in senior long weapons.
       

    

Ethan McKenna performs the Tonfa kata 

while Tyler Linel works with the Bo

From L to R:  Renshi Greg Turnbull, Shihan Mike Lilley, 

Shihan Paul Turner, Sensei Erin Halstad-McGuire,  & 

Hanshi Masanobu Kikukawa.

Another feature of the morning’s events included  kata and point-fighting divisions for special needs competitors.  The brain-child of local instructor Nancy Puckett, 6 competitors bravely stepped forward in front of the supportive crowds to demonstrate their abilities and inspire others facing the same challenges to do the same. 

The afternoon saw the sparring competition in 3 categories:  point-fighting, full-contact, and “bogu kumite”.  Similar to the morning events, Canada’s Best Karate students Raj Bassi took 1st in adult point-fighting and Ethan McKenna took 1st in the junior black belt division.  David Lee, from Puckett’s Noble House of Karate, placed 1st in both black belt full-contact and bogu kumite divisions.  All competitors showed good fighting spirit and technique along with good respect towards their opponents.

David Warburton receives a left hook delivered 
by Dave Lee in their Bogu Kumite match

Head kicks a plenty during youth 

point-fighting divisions.

Overall, the event was a success with competitors and spectators providing positive feedback to the tournament organizers.
 
Shihan Dai Greg Turnbull, Victoria, CANADA DojoPhotos by Don Osbourne

WYKKO Summer Camp - Part 1 : Philosophy

Summer Camp is coming up on June 12, 2015, and we hope that you are all signed up and ready to go. The planning team (Josh McCullars, Erik Hofmeister, Chris Mattison, and Sherrie Hines) is busy at work finalizing the schedule, and we expect that it will be our biggest and most varied camp yet.  Why does the WYKKO host camps and why should you attend them? To help answer these questions, we’ve prepared a series of articles about our camps and the planning process behind them.

This is the first of this series of three articles.

World Yoshukai has been planning and hosting Winter and Summer Camps for over three decades!  The current camp philosophy is that Winter Camp will be the more traditional camp and that Summer Camp is time to step outside of the box a bit and practice things that might not usually be offered in class. This year we’re excited to present a large roster of classes related to sparring and knockdown fighting. This is also the first time that we’ll be offering intermediate classes in grappling and hapkido for students who’ve taken the introductory classes at previous camps. We’re also excited to continue offering classes for parents and guests, as well as other unique classes like sabaki, yoga, wrist locking techniques, and judo throws.

After 35 years of camps, there are many reasons why people continue to come back to each one. Part of it is the camaraderie of getting to train with other students from all over the nation and getting to socialize with them afterwards. We often form strong friendships with other practitioners, and these events are a great opportunity to meet up with each other. It’s also a great opportunity to work with high-quality and high-ranking instructors. It’s also exciting to have the opportunity to meet and socialize with some of the highest-ranking members of our organization. For some, it’s the desire to support our organization through participation, which also helps ensure that when we go to black belt testing, instructors won’t find themselves asking “Who is that person? Has he ever come to a camp before?” But we hope that one of the most important reasons you’ll attend our camps is the high quality of classes and instruction offered at each camp.

We hope that when you come to a camp that you’ll walk away having learned something new, whether that’s a new technique, a new drill, or even a new method of teaching something. One of the best things about our camps is that you learn material that you can then take back to your own dojo and share with those who were not able to attend. Some dojo even strategically discuss who is going to attend what class to ensure that they have as many people attending as many different classes as possible so that they can all report back about what they’ve learned later.

For 2015, we have instituted something relatively new in determining eligibility to take a course. From now on, kyu grade students may not attend kata classes (open hand or weapons) unless they know the kata well enough to walk through it.  This allows the instructors to focus on refinement, rather than having to split the class into those who have and have not learned the kata.  Trying to learn a new kata in a single class is tough!

The philosophy is to encourage students to focus on refining and polishing things they have already been practicing rather than on trying to learn something totally new in a rushed setting. We’re positive you’ll learn new things at all of the camps.  Even if you take a class on something like basic blocks and striking or 27 movements, you’ll learn something new and fun.

Camps give us all a chance to come together and train and make sure that we’re all on the same page. This is why recent camps have held mandatory sessions for certified instructors to make sure that all of our teachers are up to date on any changes that may have been made to the curriculum. Similarly, if you learn something at camp that’s different from what your instructor has been teaching you, that is an opportunity to begin a discussion and consult the Yoshukai handbook with your instructor. Some schools teach things differently and some aspects of our training are stylistic or aesthetic where hard and fast rules may not apply, but others are determined by Soke or the Kaicho. Your instructor will be able to help you further understand our material and advise you as to any changes that you may or may not need to make. Overall, camps help us ensure that we are all practicing our art the way Soke and Kaicho intend us to, and we look forward to training with you soon.

Osu!

Sherrie Hines, on behalf of the WYKKO Camp Planning Team

Your Dojo’s Promotional Video

Athens Yoshukai recently finished creating a video to promote our school.  The project was run by one of our students, Krystina Francis, who has experience with video making and editing, but this was her first promotional video.  

Making a video for your dojo is easier than you think, and is a great way to highlight how your school is different from others out there.

    Ms. Francis has written a detailed description of how to create a video.  

In synopsis, you need to make a script, film it, edit it, and find music to overlay it.  The cost varies depending on how much you want to do personally versus hire out to others.  For the Athens Yoshukai dojo, we did everything ourselves (mostly Ms. Francis).  This included students practicing timing their kata together, coming up with some quick weapons combinations, and having a semi-choreographed semi-knockdown fight.
 

    My student, Dala Griffeth, said this about making the video, “I thought the whole experience was a lot of fun. It was interesting to work with each other to find a way to show Yoshukai in an effective and entertaining way, while still showing the traditional technique we pride ourselves on. I thought the end result was really cool and am extremely proud of it.”  

Another student, Hali Serrian, said, "Working on the video was a lot of fun. It was good experience in coordinating weapons against weapons realistically and without anyone getting hurt. ... The video turned out great and my overall impression was quite positive."  

Other students who helped were Robert Bishop, Ben Dawkins, Daniel Williams, Susan Elrod, Ludo R, Timothy Pierce-Tomlin, and Craig Cheesborough.

    In less than a month, the video has over 170 views.  For a small dojo without financial promotion, that’s not bad!  I send a link to the video to all prospective students who email me, since I think it represents the school and WYKKO well.  

Having a social marketing presence, including YouTube, is important for getting people interested in karate.  Making a video is fun and productive - I’d encourage everyone to give it a go!  Osu!

Shihan-Dai Erik Hofmeister - Athens Dojo.

Sensei Gallop Franklin Tournament.

The 33rd Annual Karate Tournament of Sensei Gallop Franklin will be held in Tallahassee on next Saturday May 23rd at  the FAMU Jake Gaither Gym, 1755 Wahnich way, Tallahassee, FL 32307

Sensei Gallop has always been supportive of our Dothan Yoshukai Tournament. It is a good occasion to practice your skills - Kata, Kobudo and Sparring, and show our appreciation for his support of Yoshukai.

For more information call (850) 216-1212

or visit Sensei Gallops website.

Kaicho Mike Culbreth 

Hachi Dan !

Congratulations to Sensei Mike Culbreth who was awarded his Hachi Dan (8th degree Black Belt) at the Victoria Cup tournament in Canada last week.