Leadership Schedule
This is the process that our Taekwondo students take to become Black Belts. It is a well tried and tested method and it has evolved into the most efficient process to produce Black Belt since we began teaching Martial Arts in Norwich 28 years ago.
Basic; This level of membership allows the student to discover if he/she enjoys Martial Arts and would like to commit to becoming a Black Belt Leader. Basic membership is ‘no frills’ just the basic membership, no; weapons, musical Kata, XMA, sparring etc. This level of membership is to teach the student what it means to become a Martial Artist and for them to enjoy the environment at the Academy whilst getting to know more about our positive coaching methods. The length of a basic membership is 3 months maximum, we would however, expect a student who recognizes that Martial Arts is for them, to upgrade to Leadership or BBT before the basic membership expires.
Black Belt Training (BBT); Once the basic member has decided that he/she will become a Black Belt. This level of membership/commitment will ensure that the journey to Black Belt is both fun and life enhancing. A student who chooses BBT as their course to Black Belt Excellence will enjoy all the physical and mental benefits that learning Martial Arts within a caring, modern Academy includes.
Black Belt Training takes approximately 3 to five years.
Leadership Training (and JUNIOR leadership); as the name suggests the people who upgrade to this level of membership have identified themselves as potential LEADERS at the Academy and in life. This means that the senior instructors have been informed of their level of commitment, their attitude/approach, their interactions with other students and have decided to offer to train them to become LEADERS. Leadership students have committed to going beyond Black Belt to at least 2nd Degree.
Leadership training includes all of the BBT syllabus, to ensure your technical ability reaches its full potential.
Leadership students are able to take part in ‘life skills’ training. This includes the S.T.A.R. programme for those under 12 years and other seminars/workshops/tutorials on subjects such as;
Are you Audio/visual/kinaesthetic?, How your brain works, Nutrition, Clean speaking, Brain Dojo – the mystery explained, Giving Without Receiving, Body Language & Physiology, Iridology, Making Good Choices, Nutrition Fuelling your body efficiently – food preparation, Doing What You Say You’ll Do, Financial Planning/review, Energy Healing, The six human needs, How To Explain With Words and Your Body, The Seven Habits of Highly Efficient People.
Leadership students pay a lower price for all Academy activities as they are already investing more time and money in their development. We actively encourage Leadership students to fastrak through the Kyu grades to reflect their high level of intensity.
In short Leadership Training is the mental and spiritual training that we give to our instructors. It is the level of personal and interpersonal expertise that we expect our teaching staff to hold. In fact it is Martial Arts Career Training without the business side. Leadership students are also able to attend ‘Leadership’ only physical training Martial Arts sessions. In these sessions students will receive extra tuition from our instructor team, this may include some extras such as weapons training, advanced sparring techniques, tactical advice and XMA. This will depend upon the area of personal speciality of their instructor. These ‘extras’ are not the main purpose of having separate ‘leadership’ martial arts classes however. The main purpose is to bring together those students who have committed themselves to excellence beyond First Degree Black Belt, beyond the attainment of physical skills and beyond the ordinary into the extra-ordinary. Our goal is to have these groups of high achievers stimulate each other to even higher levels of physical skill.
We want to create Leaders in society with this programme.
If you have any thought that you would like to have Martial Arts (with the Black Belt Academy) as a career then choose Leadership Training as your path to Black Belt.
The STAR Programme for children up to 13 years
Our STAR Prograame has benn especially designed to help children of all ages understand that life skills can be developed with a little effort. This is a 12 month programme and each month the Leadership Student is given a task and a worksheet to complete.
Junior Leadership students need to complete all 12 as this is part of their assessment for Junior Black Belt.
The monthly tasks include topic area such as;
- Kindness
- Focus
- Concentration
- Taking Action
- Making good choices
If you would like your child to receive eductation and guidance in these areas please contact us.
Becoming A Black Belt
In our view becoming requires an awful lot more than simply learning physical techniques. To us it means living life as a Black Belt would live, facing up to and overcoming challenges as a Black Belt would. Having the confidence that a Black Belt would have when meeting people and showing the respect that Martial Arts Black Belts are renowned for. It means conducting yourself with control and respect when you are at school or in the workplace and taking responsibility for your own health and wellbeing. It means doing the things neccessary to achieve and maintain health of both body and mind. To think like a Black Belt would think, to avoid being judgemental or cynical.
We enjoy teaching these aspects of life and consider them vitally important for living life to its full potential.
Continued Pursuit of Excellence For Black Belts
There are two types of Black Belt; active or inactive.
A person who was once good enough to pass a physical examination of techniques may have been awarded a Black Belt but a person who IS a Black Belt is someone who lives life according to Black Belt Principles.
We are certainly not saying our Black Belts need to be perfect, we understand that perfection is an unatainable state. What we do ask however, is that our Black Belts continue their quest for excellence for as long as they wish to call themselves 'Black Belt.'
We have a 'continued excellence' programme called 'Chosho' (literally meaning excellence) for those students who have achieved Black Belt Status.
| | Choshos Presently available for Black Belts. |
| | Junior Black Belts |
| | Description |
No1 Combinations | Hand; Downward block, reverse punch, upper block, reverse punch, step back fist, inside block, ridge hand (back), front leg sweep, reverse punch to floor. Foot; Round kick, turn back kick, front kick, step sweep/stomp, step side kick. Hand/foot; Snap punch, inside block, back fist, step round kick, reverse punch, heel kick (back leg), turn heel kick, step round kick, reverse punch, ridge hand. |
| No. 2 semi free sparring | Block and counter attack against any given techniques in the style of sparring. |
| No. 3. advanced basics (moving forward only) | Downward block, reverse punch Side block, reverse punch Upper block, reverse punch Inside block, reverse punch Knife hand block, reverse punch. Chop and three punches. |
| No 4 Tsukuru | |
| Plus 1 other chosho test from the following list. | |
| | All Black Belt Grades |
Description | Detail |
Double kicks | Front kick, round kick. Side kick, heel kick. Double round Kick. Heel kick, round kick. Turn heel kick, round kick. Turn back kick, heel kick. |
Sweeps | Drop sweep Drop turn sweep Scissor sweep Turn scissor sweep Hand scissor sweep Reverse punch sweep Front leg sweep Back leg sweep Hook n hold sweep |
Drop Kicks | Drop side kick Drop round kick Drop front kick Drop turn back kick Drop turn heel kick Drop scissor take down or strike. Drop heel kick |
Pad Work, punches/strikes | Snap punch Reverse punch Back fist Ridge hand (front and back hand) Palm heel strike Bottom fist |
Pad work, kicks | Lunge punch Front kick Round kick Side kick Heel kick Turn back kick Turn heel kick Downward kick Outside crescent kick Inside crescent kick |
Pad work, Thai techniques | Forward elbow Backward elbow Downward elbow Upward elbow Thigh kick Straight knee Circular knee |
| Takedowns | Inside take down (as with front kick) Outside takedown (as with Side kick) Back to back Takedown (as with heel kick) Momentum sweeps Any centrifugal/rotation takedown |
Boxing Punching Combinations | jab cross cross and hook jab cross jab jab and uppercut (same hand) double jab, cross jab, cross, hook retreatring jab jab ,slip, uppercut slip, hook, cross jab, cross, roll ,hook retreating jab, uppercut retreating jab, hook (same hand) retreating jab, uppercut, hook (same hand) retreating jab, uppercut, hook (same hand) and cross retreating jab, cross, spinning back fist. |
| Chokes and locks | Demonstrate 3 chokes as a defence to an attack Demonstrate 3 locks as a defence to an attack. |
| Jump Kicks straight | Jump front kick front leg Jump front kick back leg Jump front kick scissor Jump side kick front leg Jump side kick back leg. |
| Circular Jump kicks | Jump round kick back leg Jump round kick front leg Jump round kick scissor Jump heel kick front leg Jump heel kick back leg Jump crescent kick scissor |
| Jump reverse kicks | Jump turn heel kick Jump turn back kick Step through jump turn heel kick Step through jump turn back kick Jump turn crescent kick Jump turn round kick |
| 360 degree + jump kicks | 4 kicks minimum |
| Reverse Kata | Any Kata from our system (Sa Jang or above) performed in reverse. |
| Long Kata | Pinan to Koryo performed as a single Kata without pauses. |
| Sparring against 2 opponents | Sparring (in a controlled and precise manner) against tow opponents. |
| Superfit 1 | Performing 60 repetitions of all 4 fitness test exercise (pushup, alternate leg raise, alternate squat thrust, crunch) with each rep being high quality and good speed. There must be no pause between the exercise other than to adjust position. |
| Superfit 2 | Performing 60 repetitions of the following exercise (back lunges, hip lifts, reverse leg raise, crossover crunches) with each rep being high quality and good speed. There must be no pause between the exercise other than to adjust position. |
| Superfit 3 | Performing 20 repetitions of the following exercise without any pause other than to change/adjust position when changing exercise.
|
| Bag work | 3 x 3 minute rounds on the bag/wavemaster. Demonstrating excellent focus, precision and power. |
| Iron Shirt | Examinees to hold forward stance with either arm in punching position and have 2x2 (inch) wood broken across;
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| New Drills | Devise 2 new drills or games that develop a particular skill or muscle group that will benefit our training. |
| Four kick combination no 1 | Front kick, side kick, round kick, back kick (slowly then full speed) |
| Four Kick combination no 2 | Step heel kick, round kick, turn heel kick, round kick. (slowly then full speed) |
| Judo throws | 4 hip or trip throws to leave your opponent on the floor. |
| Ju-Jitsu escapes | Demonstrate 3 ju- jitsu style escapes from ground positions eg side guard, guard and mount positions. |
| Grappling Submission techniques | Demonstrate 4 submission techniques from ground fighting/grappling situation. |
| Stick defence | Demonstrate 3 defences against an attack with a stick/cosh. Eg right side, left side and downward attacks. |
| Kubotan | Demonstrate 3 Kubotan techniques. |
| Combination strikes | Demonstrate 5 combination strikes designed to distract as well as disable an opponent. |
| Capoeira | Demonstrate 5 Capoeira kicks |
| Rear defence | Demonstrate 3 defences against an attack from behind |
| Knife defence | Demonstrate 3 defences/disarms against a knife attack. |
| Aikido | Demonstrate 3 Aikido manoeuvres to unbalance and throw your opponent. |
| Destruction (Board Breaking) | A minimum of three breaks using at least one hand and one leg technique. The student must make a successful break from at least 3 of every 5 attempts. Students may use the black rebreakable board or supply their own 1 inch thick pine board 11inches wide by 11inches high. |
| Weapons Form 1 | Minimum 30 moves. |
| Weapons form 2 | Minimum 30 moves. |
| Weapons form 3 | Minimum 30 moves. |
| Weapons form 4 | Minimum 30 moves. |
| Freestyle form | Minimum 30 moves |
| Non syllabus TKD form 1 | |
| Non syllabus TKD form 2 | |
| Japanese Kata 1 | |
| Japanese Kata 2 | |
| Japanese Kata 3 | |
| Chinese (Kung Fu) set | |
| Chinese (Kung Fu) set 1 | |
| Chinese (Kung Fu) set 2 | |
| Chinese (Kung Fu) set 3 | |
| Freestyle form | |
| Kata Bunkai | Take a form or Kata and explain what each move may be used to represent. |
| | Kickboxing, Tai Chi and/or XMA belt ranks above Blue belt/sash count as one ‘chosho’ grade. Only one Kickboxing and one XMA grade can be used as a chosho’ grade between each Black Belt rank. For example the student may achieve 4 belts in Kickboxing between 1st Dan and 2nd Dan, This would count for one ‘chosho’ grade towards 2nd Dan and one towards 3rd Dan. |
| Kickboxing Grades (above Blue Belt) 1 | |
| Kickboxing Grades (above Blue Belt) 2 | |
| Kickboxing Grades (above Blue Belt) 3 | |
| XMA grades (above blue sash) 1 | |
| XMA grades (above blue sash) 2 | |
| XMA grades (above blue sash) 3 | |
| | Video |
| 1 create a 30 video clip of a dynamic and exciting demo presentation (Not anything exactly the same as choshos listed here). | |
| 2, create a 1 minute clip of ‘Martial Arts Movie’ scene. | |
| 3 create a 1minute clip of ‘real life’/ ‘street awareness’ self defence situation. | |
