Episode 983 - Teaching Kids vs. Adults in Martial Arts
In this episode, Jeremy and Andrew are joined by Victor Guarino to talk about the differences between teaching kids and adults.
Teaching Kids vs Adults in Martial Arts - Episode 983
SUMMARY
In this episode, Jeremy, Andrew, and Victor discuss the differences in teaching martial arts to children versus adults. They explore the pedagogical approaches, curriculum differences, and the importance of adapting teaching methods to suit the developmental stages of students. The conversation highlights specialized training for instructors and the significance of creating a safe and engaging learning environment for young martial artists. They discuss the importance of defensive techniques, the limitations of curriculum based on safety, and the need for gamification in youth training. The conversation highlights the differences in attention spans, engagement strategies, and the necessity of individualized instruction. They also emphasize the importance of incentives and rewards in training, the depth of application in teaching, and the need to bridge the gap for parents observing classes. Ultimately, they conclude that while there are distinct differences in teaching styles, there is also a need for balance and overlap between youth and adult instruction.
TAKEAWAYS
Teaching methods for kids should differ from those for adults.
Curriculum should be adapted based on age and maturity.
Safety is a primary concern when teaching martial arts to children
Engaging activities can teach skills without exposing kids to violence.
The developmental stage of a child affects their learning process.
Martial arts participation is predominantly youth-focused in the US.
Instructors should be trained to handle different age groups effectively.
Teaching kids martial arts can be fun and educational simultaneously.
The importance of creating a supportive environment for young learners.
Understanding the psychological and physical differences in age groups is crucial.
Curriculum limitations often stem from safety concerns.
Teaching methods must adapt to the age of the students.
Gamification enhances engagement in youth training.
Attention spans differ significantly between children and adults.
Incentives and rewards are crucial for motivating young students.
Depth of application is more critical for adult learners.
Safety considerations are paramount in youth instruction.
Bridging the gap for parents is essential for understanding the curriculum.
Teaching styles should find a balance between youth and adult methods.
CHAPTERS
00:00 Curriculum Differences for Different Age Groups
5:55 Practical Applications of Teaching Methods
14:23 Defensive Techniques and Curriculum Limitations
21:57 Gamification in Learning
31:19 Incentives and Rewards in Training
40:05 Safety and Individualization in Instruction
48:22 Finding Balance in Teaching Styles
After listening to the episode, it would be exciting for us to know your thoughts about it.
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After listening to the episode, it would be exciting for us to know your thoughts about it. Don’t forget to drop them in the comment section down below!
SHOW TRANSCRIPT
Jeremy (06:35.55)
What's going on everybody? Welcome. It's another episode of Whistlekick, martial arts radio. And on today's episode, we're tackling the subject of teaching kids versus adults. I wanna welcome my oft co-host, Andrew Adams. Andrew, thank you for being here and joining us today. A bit more frequently of late, but not as much as Andrew, Victor Garino. Victor, thank you for being here. I appreciate it. A salute that we don't get a lot of salutes.
on martial arts radio. Maybe we should change that. We should have an official handshake or something. Should we do that?
Andrew (07:10.234)
I mean, if we were gonna have a salute, should be like the salute that Patrick Swayze does in Roadhouse.
Jeremy (07:20.754)
just indifferent to everything. We should.
Vic (07:22.303)
Just, yeah, or that.
Andrew (07:24.034)
It was very, it was very particular. It was like here. wasn't even, wasn't even, and those of you that are only listening are missing out because you're missing me. But it wasn't even like this. It was very here. And then just, you turn the wrist.
Jeremy (07:30.428)
you are missing out, you really do need to watch these episodes.
Jeremy (07:36.414)
I would prefer my salute to be the way Sam Elliott's mustache salutes.
Andrew (07:41.658)
Jeremy (07:43.132)
very stoic and simply exists, but still somehow works.
Andrew (07:45.722)
you
Jeremy (07:50.262)
There's a rabbit hole. not going to go down. But those of you out there, we did an episode on Roadhouse and you should go check it out because it was a heck of a lot of fun. But that's not why you're here today. You're here for, this general subject. And one of the things that we try to do is mix up what we talk about. And you can check out all the episodes that we've ever done at whistlekickmarshmortzradio.com. They're all on YouTube. You go the very early years were audio only, but we've been doing video episodes for quite a few years. They're all there. Go check them out.
Vic (07:52.508)
Yeah.
Jeremy (08:18.564)
You will be hard pressed to find a subject in the traditional martial arts sphere that we do not tackle. If you do find one that you think we have not done justice to, that there is more to talk about, please reach out and tell Andrew, Andrew at whistlekick.com. If you simply want to tell us how wonderful everything is, you can write to me, Jeremy at whistlekick.com. And if you would like to reach out about sponsorship or building a relationship with with whistlekick, you can reach out to Victor, Victor dot.
whistlekick at gmail.com, right? At some point, I'll make you a real email address. I don't know why we haven't yet, but until then, that's what it is. today we're talking a little bit about martiallytics and Victor, you're using martiallytics in your school. I'm using martiallytics in my school. And I think it's really important that we say upfront that isn't because they just came to us and said, here is some money. We are using them in our school because I found them and said,
Vic (08:48.144)
whistlekick at gmail.com. Yep.
Vic (09:05.03)
Mm-hmm.
Jeremy (09:17.468)
This looks cool, I wanna try.
Vic (09:21.427)
Yeah. Yeah. And, well, yeah, I'm, I'm getting there. No. And I, I spent a lot of time in conversation with, with, with Alan and Brad, are, who are the guys, you know, the, main guys that I communicate with. And one of the things that I always appreciate about them is their openness is that they, they truly made this software. I've worked at different fitness gyms before and all of the software.
Jeremy (09:23.42)
You should say something about them now.
Vic (09:49.114)
applies to people who want to bodybuild or people who want to run a facility for fitness, not necessarily what we would need as martial artists. And I'm constantly getting emails that are sent, you know, from the martial litics folks saying, hey, what do you think about this? Or what is useful for you as your martial arts school? Do you need this? And I love that openness and that willingness to cater to the needs of their client base.
Jeremy (10:04.104)
Yeah. Yeah.
Jeremy (10:14.654)
Yeah, they are specifically and simply a very easy to use tool for martial arts schools, regardless of size, because the price is right and the feature set is complete, even at that base price. you know, we've got a great relationship with them. If you sign up with them and you let them know, you can go to whistlekickmartialartsradio.com slash partners or go to the partners page once you get there.
There's a link to sign up and you'll get two months to figure it out, to try it out, and they'll help you do your conversion. It is a great tool. And here are the two main use cases that I see. You are not using software right now.
and you think I spend a little bit too much time on billing or whatever else. That is a great use case to start using Marshallitics. The other is you look at your monthly fee from the software you are using and you say, is there a way to do this less expensively? And the answer is yes, and it's Marshallitics. And you are probably not, not guaranteed, but you are probably not giving up features that matter to you. So check it out, Marshallitics.com.
Jeremy (11:26.588)
Let's dive in gentlemen. We're talking about teaching kids versus teaching adults. And this is a subject that I find particularly interesting. You've both listened to the show long enough that you know when we get somebody on who started training in the 60s or 70s as a child, I find that fascinating because there were very rarely youth focused classes at that time that the kids were training with the adults, but we don't do that very much anymore.
Andrew (11:31.46)
Mm-hmm.
Andrew (11:55.884)
No, and I think the things that we, back then, the things that you learned as a kid, you were learning the exact same thing that the adults learned. And I think that that has changed for the better. That I think that there are definitely things that you should not teach children, but that it's fine to teach those things to adults. And you can't do that if you have six year olds training with.
Jeremy (12:23.378)
you're talking about some of the more violent curriculum stuff.
Andrew (12:25.944)
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Yep. So I think, I think it's good.
Vic (12:28.475)
I was gonna.
Yeah, you actually just made a statement that I was going, a definitive statement that I was just about to make. So I'll make a different one that'll probably get me in trouble is you can approach teaching kids the exact same way that you approach teaching adults.
Jeremy (12:47.358)
If anybody disagrees with that, then I question their teaching abilities.
Vic (12:53.884)
Well, we, we have a student who currently is with us. They're one of the ones that started with us as a toddler. Yes, we have toddlers and how just graduated into, our five year old kind of class. and when they were at toddler age, their mother said that they took them to a jujitsu school and their daughter, her daughter hated it because they literally put her on a mat with another toddler.
And said, grab each other and try to pin each other to the ground.
Vic (13:30.33)
And well, I understand, because I've been to some jujitsu schools where the whole class was, all right, you're new, it's my first day in class. We just rolled. I found a higher ranking person who knew more than me. And I was like, can we, like, we're just going to roll and I'll learn as we go. As an adult who was in college, that works. As a three and a half year old, that's, that's liability to me.
Jeremy (13:53.278)
Yeah, what I'm hearing is that becomes poorly productive, high risk daycare.
Andrew (14:02.072)
Mm-hmm. Yep. Yep.
Vic (14:02.534)
Yes. But in this area, it's funny because you talk about how when you talk to someone who started training earlier on in the 19s, the 1900s, right? I substitute taught for music and one of the students found out that I was born in the 1900s and that's how they said it to me. And God, it hurt. It hurt. It hurt a lot. But anyway.
Jeremy (14:26.686)
That's not what that means.
There's a difference between the 1900s and you were born in the 80s, right? You're a couple years younger than me, you were born in the 1980s. That's not the same. Those are 80 years apart.
Vic (14:34.214)
Yes, yeah, right, but, right, but all the kids that I subbed for last week were bored in the 2010s. Anyway, so, but those people you said there weren't hardly kids, you know, training, it was mostly adults. Nowadays, at least in the area that my wife and I are, like everybody, as soon as their kid can walk and cognitively function, they're like, I need to put my kid in.
Jeremy (14:43.518)
Ugh.
Vic (15:02.092)
something and a lot of people have youth programs for regardless of the sport just yeah.
Andrew (15:02.724)
something.
Jeremy (15:07.302)
I would estimate somewhere between two thirds and 80 % of martial arts participation in the US is youth.
Vic (15:14.386)
Right. But I would say a lot of them just have it because they quote need it, not because they've given any thought or in depth, you know, why am I doing this? How am I doing this?
Jeremy (15:29.214)
Right. Okay. So the topic at hand is around teaching one group versus the other. I think we need to draw the line, not at age 18, but at like age 12, 10, 11, 12, 13, somewhere in there. Because when you take a look at most schools, that is the place at which they transition. Not because the mind of a 12, 13-year-old is fully baked.
Andrew (15:44.666)
Hmm.
Jeremy (15:59.23)
And to those of you out there who don't know, the brain continues to develop until age 25. But really it's about size and strength and safety. A 13-year-old can be really big and should probably not be sparring with a seven-year-old in a wide open environment. There are times that that student has control and everything and they're an assistant instructor. That's different. That's not what we're talking about. But the needs of a six, seven, eight-year-old are very different from the needs of a 13, 14, 15-year-old, even though legally they are all children.
Andrew (16:13.402)
Mm-hmm.
Vic (16:14.674)
you
Andrew (16:29.4)
Yeah, yeah. And I want to make sure that we talk. There's two things I think that we're going to discuss. And one is how they are taught. And two is what they are taught.
Jeremy (16:42.524)
Yeah. Let's start with the what because I think that's a simpler conversation.
Andrew (16:47.098)
I was gonna say
Jeremy (16:50.632)
Go ahead.
Andrew (16:53.974)
What they are taught obviously will be different based on size and whatever but there are some things that Ideas and concepts that we would introduce to an adult class that I don't think we should for kids in the same way But there are still ways that we can teach them and not have them know that that's what they're learning Here's what I mean by that. I
know of an instructor that in a kids class taught taking your the first three fingers and using it on another child to poke into the throat. Right. You all know that little spot right there. And I saw this and was like, why? And I actually saw a child student say no and walked out of class.
Jeremy (17:49.384)
Good for that kid.
Andrew (17:49.506)
and said, I'm not going to let you do that to me. To which my response was, yeah, that was good. Now, I'm not gonna say that there's not validity to learning that that is a vital striking point, right? That that absolutely is a vital striking point, but you don't have to teach that to kids. Instead, what you could teach kids is on a small bean bag.
hit that small beanbag in the air. I'm going to toss it to you and you have to hit it. And it now becomes a game. Now they're still learning a skill.
Jeremy (18:19.464)
Yeah.
Jeremy (18:26.014)
But I want to interject because what I'm hearing is not a difference in the what, it's a difference in the how.
Andrew (18:31.992)
Well, yes, I guess you're right. Yeah.
Jeremy (18:35.39)
And that's why I want to save that because I think this becomes simpler when we talk about curriculum questions. Victor, you teach young kids, you teach adults, and you have a jujitsu component in your curriculum. You do a bunch of self-defense stuff. Are there things that you and your wife, because you run your school with your wife, are there things that the two of you have said, you know what, this doesn't have a place when we teach this age group, but it does here?
Vic (18:45.842)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Vic (19:03.504)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, clear and I mean, one of the things that comes mainly to mind is a lot of sparring things. Like if we're talking about strictly just what, because we do a lot of what Andrew was just talking about and we'll get into it in a little bit, but we are little, little kids. And when I say little, I'm talking, we have two classes that cover that 18 month through seven or eight year old period. They...
They do any work that would, from the outside, simulate two humans physically engaged in fighting. They do a lot of things. Like we focus with curriculum-wise for them, every little kid is going to fall over because their body is growing, their body is developing.
Some parts of their body are going to grow at different rates. All of a sudden, you know, their arms are going to be longer or their legs are going to be longer or their head is bigger for their legs and their balance is messed up. So as far as the what is concerned for those, we do a lot of, call it, we call them obstacle courses and we just make things that are difficult for toddlers to walk on, difficult for young kids to walk on. We have them stand on an, on a pad while kicking.
another pad. Why? Because the pad underneath their feet moves. The ground that they walk on moves. So we put an emphasis less on hitting a person and more of a defensive thing. We focus on defensive both from, I guess, altercation because we do teach blocking and stuff, but also defensive from I'm falling. How do I protect my head from the ground?
Jeremy (20:44.446)
Mm hmm. So what I'm hearing and I think we can make a generalization here and tell me if you agree that in almost every responsible case when curriculum is held back from youth, it is because it falls into the category of
higher risk to practice, right? Andrew, you made the example, know, spear finger to the throat. That is a riskier maneuver for a student to receive. Or it is violent in, in discussion. Right? we, we don't have a lot of young children who listen to this show, but I'm still going to sanitize this the best I can. So perhaps this around the subject of sexual violence.
Andrew (21:14.98)
Mm-hmm.
Andrew (21:24.474)
Mm-hmm.
Andrew (21:38.714)
Mm-hmm.
Jeremy (21:39.324)
Right? I'm not going to And I hate that this is true. Young children can still be victims of this subject, but that doesn't mean we're going to talk to them about it. It doesn't mean we're going to give them curriculum where they practice getting themselves out of being pinned.
Andrew (22:01.346)
And we also don't teach children how to stab people with knives. Like that's another thing, like, the violence thing.
Jeremy (22:08.22)
So that again, to me, that's under violent subject versus safety.
Andrew (22:13.284)
Correct, yeah.
Vic (22:13.648)
Mm-hmm. Right.
Jeremy (22:15.198)
Right? Because the other, potential third, which to me fits kind of half and half under each of these, it's if we give them this tool, do they know when, how we're to use it appropriately? You know, anybody who's ever taught their children use of firearms understands that this is a very delicate subject, right? That's an exaggerated version of what I'm talking about. But if I teach a kid, hey, if someone's trying to hurt you,
Andrew (22:28.954)
appropriate.
Jeremy (22:43.73)
Here's how you poke their eye out with a thumb. That's a very risky move. They probably wouldn't have even thought of that in the first place. Okay. So I think, does it feel like we've closed the what so we can move on to the how? Cause that's, think that's more important. Okay. So there's the what I don't think there's going to be a lot of pushback. Everybody's curriculum is different. There is going to be variance in all of that. So that's over there. All right. Let's talk about the how.
Vic (22:51.282)
Mm-hmm.
Vic (22:58.79)
Yeah.
Andrew (22:59.972)
See you.
Jeremy (23:12.466)
We're talking about the differences between the way adolescent and younger learn versus the way post adolescent, teenager and adult and older learn.
Andrew, when you approach that, because you've worked with young kids, you've worked with adults of all ages, what are some of the main differences that you implement and how you, let's pretend the material was the same. How would you present that differently to those age groups?
Andrew (23:40.164)
Sure, sure.
I think the biggest difference, and I also want to recognize that working with a 10 year old class is very different from working with a five year old class, but the difference between working with kids versus adults is gamification. Gamification for sure. That there are still those skills that you can teach those from your curriculum, but teaching them in a different way and finding that way is sometimes
Jeremy (23:51.934)
Absolutely.
Andrew (24:12.37)
a challenge for you as the instructor, as a person presenting the material, but I think it's important to do exactly that, to find a way to still teach it, but that makes it in a fun way. Now, that's not to say that, and we've said this on the show multitudes of times, that's not to say your class has to be an hour of games, but gamification is different from
games.
Jeremy (24:42.398)
To me and Victor I'll pass it to you in a moment to me The difference between a drill that is a game and a drill that is not has to do with attention and When when it's a game there is something for them to pay attention to constantly when it is not a game attention can cycle and That's where that's where the issue comes in when the cycle drops when that that requirement for attention is is low
they go pay, they pay attention to something else that might not be what you want them to pay attention to. Victor.
Vic (25:16.56)
Yeah. Well, I mean, I know I've had the conversation with both of you and I've heard you guys say this separately as well on different episodes of the podcast. People in general, adults included, learn through play. If you're not playing, you're not learning. The difference is an adult's idea of play is different than a kid's idea of play. Like, I mean, last night I was teaching teen and adults and we were teaching outside.
Jeremy (25:32.808)
Yes.
Jeremy (25:41.982)
Mm-hmm.
Vic (25:47.022)
outside, inside, middle block. Right?
Vic (25:52.87)
I just taught through reps in the air. Then I did a normal blocking practice, had them all do reps. Then I showed them how the block can be used as a strike. And then we did that for reps. Then we applied it to our five technique drill and then we applied it to slow sparring. So for T for that adult age group that we're talking about, that was, that was fun for them. We did one thing for 30 minutes in class.
And we hopped back and forth, you know, and kind of I progressed it. But none of those things had a goal that the students knew about. So for the younger kid side, that would have never flown. It's almost like I have to trick them into getting them where I want to go by giving them tiny little, little goals. So one of the things that I use a lot is another thing that we do in our adult classes is we do forearm conditioning.
where we'll throw blocks against each other's arms and bang forearms. I can't do that with little kids. So what do I do?
Another thing that conditions people is break falling, shoulder rolling, all that stuff. If I tell a bunch of nine year olds, do 20 reps of this, they're going to be fine and then they're going to do it and then they're going to stop. If I create an obstacle course where they have to dive over a punching bag and then as soon as they roll up, my wife is standing there with an air shield and shoves them backwards and they have to break fall, hop to their feet and throw sidekicks. They cannot wait once they sit down for it to be their turn.
Jeremy (27:13.47)
Hmm.
Andrew (27:27.468)
it
Jeremy (27:28.316)
Right. So there's that attention difference. Right. So I think this is the first difference that we can say definitively is that when you're talking about children versus adults, adults are more tolerant and often need attention breaks because so much of an adult's life requires constant attention that to a lot of people, the play, the version of play that the adult is experiencing is I am going to do this thing.
Andrew (27:31.908)
Mm-hmm.
Jeremy (27:57.064)
participate in this activity that is not a requirement of my life. It's not part of my job. It is not part of my family structure. It does not make me money. The fact that it exists as an extracurricular is what makes it play to me. And I am there because I enjoy it. That's their play. Whereas that's not a kid's experience. Most of a kid's experience is that high level attention because that's what kids generally need.
to keep them focused and they are so used to that if you do not give them that, their attention drops out. Okay. So you're both illustrating this really well.
There's our first one, it's attention. How else do we teach things differently? And you've both already hit on some of them, but I don't want to tell you which ones we got to talk about next.
Andrew (28:51.482)
Well, I'm irritated that Victor brought up the obstacle course because I wanted to bring that one up. I think it's great because you can put a bunch of different things in the obstacle course and work on lots of different things. Something else that I think is useful is any prop. Right. How often do we in an adult class, the only outside thing we would typically, typically and
Obviously there may be schools out there that are different, but we will often maybe use an air shield or kicking shield or hand mitts or whatever or maybe the paddle. But that's usually it. How often do you in your adult class have something that's not that? schools I've trained at very, very little. Those are the things you're going to get and that's it. So even something as simple as for a kids class, bringing in folding chairs.
Vic (29:30.513)
Mm-hmm.
Jeremy (29:48.478)
Hmm.
Andrew (29:49.186)
and using that as a prop. Here's a chair. Actually, I saw a great one, actually, Gabe Trantz from this Portland, Washington area. He recently posted a great video, which I absolutely loved. He lined up in his school, staggered down, he had an aisle and he had folding chairs on either side. And students would walk down the aisle and have to,
Jeremy (30:15.294)
I saw that video. That's right.
Andrew (30:17.954)
kick over one chair and then take a step forward and kick with the other leg over the other chair and then kick and kick and it was a drill to keep their legs up and if they were littler kids then they had the the the seating part of the chair they had to kick over which isn't that high but for the the older kids they turned them around so you had to kick over the back of the chair so you had to kick higher and it forced the students to like lift their leg and keep it up as it came out and
In an adult class, don't need, you don't quote need to do that. You can just say, you know, Jeremy raise your leg higher so that you're kicking higher. And you can say that in a kid's class, but if you have an actual prop that they have to kick over, that becomes a way different drill.
Jeremy (31:04.51)
Sure. So, so I'm hearing two things. One, we're talking about the variety, which becomes a component of the attention span, but we're also talking about the adult's ability to influence their body, proprioception, their ability to control their body and how it operates in space is dramatically different from a child. A child, and people tend to forget this. If you're new to teaching children, we often...
especially as martial artists coming in, if you don't have a lot of experience teaching children, we treat kids like small adults. We're aware of the safety concerns, but maybe not aware of the fact that, again, the brain is not fully developed. The corpus claustrum, the part that connects the hemispheres of the brain is very undeveloped at that point. And I've watched children seven, eight, nine years old who...
they will start moving the right side of their body and their brain misfires and then moves the left side of their body because they're still growing in that way. And so by providing an environmental stimulus of I need to kick over this chair, it's going to be really hard for them to take the wrong leg and kick over the chair. So they don't have to think about it. It becomes more automatic. It's more of a nervous system response at that point. And that
Vic (32:19.698)
Mm-hmm.
Jeremy (32:25.404)
work. So we're so so there's our second thing that let's talk about for a minute. It's not the attention here, but it's the it's the individual's ability to guide their own training. If you tell an adult, I need you to work on this thing. If you tell the kid, I need you to work on this thing. For attention purposes, how long does that kid remember that very short period of time, whereas the adult could take that instruction and
Vic (32:39.633)
Hmm.
Jeremy (32:56.014)
maintain it for the rest of class and potentially future classes. Victor, how does that manifest in your school when you're teaching kids versus adults and you provide that individualized instruction?
Vic (33:05.19)
Yeah, it's interesting how just what you said right there is just the communication part of it because we do homework, we give homework sheets out to all of our students for Dojo Dollars. And Dojo Dollars is just for those listening who haven't heard me talk about this before. Yeah, it's like an old school 80s arcade where you play games.
Jeremy (33:25.576)
We've got to do an episode on what you're doing with that at some point, by the way.
Vic (33:34.042)
you get tickets and then you can redeem tickets at Frankie's item shop for different things. We're doing all sorts of stuff. I'm just actually, before I got on here, I was crafting an email to the student body about something that we just added to Frankie's item shop that they can use their dollars for. But one of the things that we did with the homework sheets, you know, the adults take part in it too, even though they don't need to be told to go home and practice, right? For the kids, we had a...
a homework sheet that just had Monday through Sunday, seven days, you know, have right in the date, have a parent sign it. If you bring a sheet back that's partially filled out, which means one to six, you get two additional dojo dollars. If you bring the whole thing back, you get five, right? So yeah, right, right. Cause we want them to practice seven days a week. No one was doing it except for these two kids who are teenagers.
So we said, okay, we gotta revisit the homework sheet thing. So then what we did was seven things where we got super specific. Practice this, practice this, practice this. Seven different types, each thing takes five minutes, maybe at most. And now we're getting more students to practice it. And we have another version that we're gonna roll out that is gonna be rank specific. So it's one that's specific for each of the things.
that each each class is kind of working on. And it's funny because last night I had one of my, one of my young adults who came in and that teen adult class, him and his sister always do their homework. And they're like, Hey, can we take another one and bring it back on Thursday? Cause they do all seven things, all seven five minute activities in a single day. And I was like, listen, this isn't for you.
I'll still give you the dojo dollars for it, but I don't have to tell you and your sister to train at home. I know you're training at home. And so the thing is, is that for the little kids, I say something generic like, don't forget to practice at home. And they're like, okay. And then I hear, I didn't know what to practice.
Jeremy (35:51.55)
So what you're talking about here, we're talking about a third difference, which is incentive or reward structure. In that, again, because of the way a typical child's life is structured versus the way a typical adult's life is structured, so much of what the kid does is perceived as fun, reward, benefit, that if you're going to alter behavior, right, we're back at value exchange, concept we talk about on the show often.
If you're at value exchange, you have to provide something that is perceived as significantly more value. So you've hooked into that with physical goods, tangible rewards, whereas not only do the adults not want that, usually it can be perceived as cheapening their experience because you're telling them you are doing this for the tchotchke on the shelf versus your own personal edification.
Vic (36:30.8)
Mm-hmm.
Jeremy (36:49.606)
Right? And Andrew, I see you nodding along. So when you're, you know, we've talked about games for attention purposes, but, when we talk about goals, rewards, aspirations, you know, that kind of setting an expectation for, let's keep it as short future, right? Like end of class. If this, then that. If we are able to accomplish this material or whatever.
Vic (36:49.679)
you
Jeremy (37:19.024)
then this thing happened at the end. How is that different in a kid's class you might teach versus an adult?
Andrew (37:27.705)
Hmm.
Jeremy (37:29.31)
How do you reward adults versus reward kids?
Andrew (37:32.406)
Yeah, mean, kids, it's certainly easier, I think anyway. You know, we we have. I mean, I'm not actively teaching kids much anymore, but when I did, I had four or five different games that we would usually play at the end of class, not the entire class, like five, ten minutes at the end of class. And there were some that were the fake quote favorites for the kids. And so if they came into class, can we play?
You the sumo game today and it's like well if if we can get through this this this at the end of class Maybe that's the game will play and so that was the reward that they would get to play the game that they wanted Adults, it's a little it's a little harder a little more nuanced I'm not sure. I don't know
Jeremy (38:22.372)
For me, the goal is that I will often express when I'm working with the adults is setting the expectation. The expectation is that we do this. The goal is that we check these boxes. But Victor, how do you do? Do you handle that differently?
Vic (38:38.642)
Yeah, nuance is a really good word because I can, to our youth class, I can say, all right, listen, if we get through, when we get through all of the curriculum stuff that I want to go over today, we'll do an obstacle course or we'll do dive roll drills over pads to see how many pads high you could do. And almost overarchingly, every kid gets jazzed about the same reward. If I said the same thing in my
adult class, I'm going to have two. I'm going to have two people who are like, spending the whole end of class rolling sounds fun. And the rest of them are going to be like, that's a punishment. So it has for me, it has to be kind of more individualistic. So to to what there's your word again, to what that adult values. What it's so the thing that we're adding to.
the item shop is more for the adults honestly than it is for the younger students is I'm gonna let them to a degree spend their dojo dollars on 30 minute one-on-one sessions with either myself or or sensei. Some of the youth students are like I guess that sounds fun if I'm maybe like getting ready for a belt test. I've got two adults
in particular who are like, would much rather come in this room with you and no one else and ask you specific questions and work on the specific things I want to work because they value that more. And they see that as a reward versus if I said to a 10 year old student, hey, if you do really good on this, you get to come to my dojo by yourself alone with an adult. And we're going to just work out.
Jeremy (40:09.287)
Mmm.
Andrew (40:31.918)
Yeah.
Jeremy (40:33.118)
I wanna acknowledge something that you said. In fact, I wanna discourage a word choice and I hear this word choice often and neither word on its own is bad but when you use them together, get through. If you use those words with your students when you're setting up expectations for class, it suggests to them that what you are asking them to do is less valuable to them, that it is akin to punishment.
Vic (40:55.484)
Hmm.
Jeremy (40:59.556)
or less interesting or a requirement, an external requirement, but they know that you're the one determining what they're working on. So when you say get through, you're telling them, you this is, you got to eat your peas and carrots if you want dessert, right? Like that's, but there are plenty of parents out there who taught their kids from a young age that peas and carrots taste good and the kids like them, right? So just, just be aware of that. This might be the last one.
Vic (41:13.478)
Mm-hmm.
Jeremy (41:28.56)
And I'm a little we kind of hinted at it, but we didn't get into it. It's depth of application. When when I teach kids. Will show them movements, but the primary drivers are.
What and where when we talk about adults, we're adding in why and when and how and who, right? When we teach, for example, when we teach round kick roundhouse kick, we'll tell the kids, hey, here are the two striking surfaces. Here's when you might use them.
Vic (42:15.538)
Mm-hmm.
Jeremy (42:16.136)
That's a longer conversation with the adults. We're talking about wearing shoes versus not wearing shoes. We're talking about, well, if it's self-defense situation versus a competition situation versus a training situation with your friends here, right? Like it becomes a lot more detailed. When we talk about, Andrew, you brought up fingertips to a throat. We don't teach the throat to the kids. We teach the spear finger.
Andrew (42:18.714)
Mm-hmm.
Jeremy (42:44.046)
And we teach them when they're young to imagine that they can spear through someone. And I'll take my fingers and I'll poke at them at the ribs or, you know, maybe a little bit in the armpit just to reinforce what it feels like. And they giggle and everything. But when we're talking about adults, yeah, without a doubt, I'm showing them, you know, and I will even whether it's them, you know, I'll start with them with themselves, you know, have them depressed until their voice changes a little bit. Right. And
I'm not going to have a kid do that because the rest of class kids are going to go and I will never get them back. Right. So to me, that's the biggest difference because not only are the kids not served by the depth because they need more repetition because their bodies are not fully developed. They're not fully baked yet. The adults generally learn better by being able to correlate
body movement to why. Why becomes a lot more important. So, Andrew.
Andrew (43:41.582)
Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And I think the other thing that I have made sure to talk a little bit about in the adults class that I never talk about in the kids class is legal ramifications. Like, you know, I just threw this guy out of the ground. Yeah, like, you know, I threw this guy out of the ground and.
Vic (43:44.102)
Mm-hmm.
Jeremy (43:57.918)
That's a when question, yeah.
Andrew (44:04.012)
In the form, like maybe we're doing applications, the form shows me stomping on his head. Well, I mean, in real life, we're not going to do that. And obviously I don't teach that to the kids regardless, but in the form, it shows us this and this is what it is. those are the kind of the why things, but that leads into some legal things that I don't want my students to have to deal with. So I talk about it with the adults. I don't talk about that at all with the kids.
Vic (44:07.41)
Mm-hmm.
Vic (44:31.952)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. We have some similar things too, just in some of the one, we do a lot more one steps versus kata bunkai, at least in our karate classes. And we have one move, like one of them where it's just, it's a bottom fist. Everything up until that point has always been a back fist. And we had one of our teenagers say, how come we're throwing a bottom fist here and not a back fist?
And the simple reason, which we don't tell the kids because the kids just understand, yeah, this is just a bottom fist. It's like, well, because of where you're standing adjacent to them, if they look at you or turn their head the wrong way, your knuckles gonna go into their temple. And that's just a dangerous spot to hit really hard from that close up. We have another one that ends with a dropping of an elbow to a back. I don't have any youth students who are currently learning that E-Pod. The few of them that are getting close to there, I teach them to not drop
Jeremy (45:22.311)
Hmm.
Vic (45:31.196)
directly in the center of the back on the spine, I teach them, and this drops to the back of the shoulder where the lung is to knock the wind out of them, right? Not something that's gonna drop to be dangerous and permanently damaging the person who is attacking you.
Jeremy (45:47.432)
So we're talking about curriculum modification for safety and you are adjusting the what and the where because of their inability to conceptualize the why, the when, the who.
Andrew (45:51.055)
Mm-hmm.
Good.
Jeremy (46:05.81)
I don't think how really gets into that. think how is the what, right? So I think we're starting to wrap this up. I kind of want to revisit and make sure that we haven't missed anything. So we talked about safety and I think that that should be the first consideration when we're talking about adults versus children. Adults are better able to manage what is safe. They have more experience. Does it mean that you can't let, that you can let them do anything but
Vic (46:09.362)
Mm-hmm.
Jeremy (46:37.062)
I think we can all agree that, you know, the very fact that children need to be parented and not left alone means that they are more prone to safety issues. So there's, there's number one. Number two, we talked about individualization and providing instruction that they, that adults can be semi responsible for their own development. Whereas children need to be coached more and more constantly.
because they can't contextualize what the broader goals are because they don't have that understanding. So this wraps to the last point we talked about. Kids can be given what and where, adults can also handle who, when, why.
Andrew (47:24.994)
Yep. Yep.
Jeremy (47:27.046)
And then the last piece, actually the very first thing, maybe it was the second one, we talked about attention span and the need for youth to be able to remain engaged by keeping their attention at a very high level, at a very high frequency, whereas adults not only can tolerate, but often require some cycling of intense focus versus break so they can
Andrew (47:34.222)
Thanks.
Jeremy (47:56.518)
breathe otherwise they and they they may remain in fight or flight aka sympathetic state and stress themselves out before the end of class. Did we miss anything? Does that cover all of the differences that you're aware of?
Andrew (48:17.062)
I think for me the thing to remember, I think, no, I didn't think we missed anything. I think the key points to remember for me, your adult classes and your kids classes need to be taught differently because kids learn differently from adults. I mean, I guess you could go the other way. You could teach your adult class like you teach your kids class, but your adults might not enjoy that as much. Some of them probably would. I probably would.
Children learn differently from adults, so you have to teach them differently. And then I think your curriculum, the things that you are teaching to... I'm going to back up a little bit. You may have things that you teach in your adult class that you should not teach in your kids class. You might not. You might not have anything in your adult class that would be inappropriate for kids.
Jeremy (49:08.104)
Hmm.
Andrew (49:15.042)
I'm speaking for the schools I have trained in, there absolutely were things in the adult class that we would not want the kids to learn or things we would not want to teach your kids. And you might want to consider looking at your curriculum for children to make sure that you don't run any risk. That's what I would say.
Jeremy (49:33.128)
Victor.
Vic (49:33.18)
Yeah. I think the last thing that I would add, which I, which could probably be another subject itself, but it's just going to.
Jeremy (49:41.576)
This that's the most Victor set up to a Victor sentence ever.
Vic (49:45.018)
I know, I know, but...
think one of the first episodes that I was on, I was with a bunch of us and we were talking about whether or not parents should sit in and watch their class. And so I think we all agree that when you're teaching kids and when you're teaching adults, you need to teach differently. As instructors, I think it's important to remember that when we're teaching kids whose adults are watching, the adults understand on an adult level. They may not.
I've talked before about how there is a huge gap between where your floor ends and where your seating area begins. Like I've told my parents this, even if you come and watch, you do not understand until you step onto the mat. Like there, it's like sitting in another country. Like it's like sitting in another country versus going in lit, you know, going to a college class and learning about their culture. There's a difference there. And so sometimes
Jeremy (50:33.918)
It's powerful statement.
Vic (50:45.188)
As instructors, it's important to continue to have an open door to parents who may view what you're doing as, come I bring my kid here to learn discipline and they're just playing games? Well, you see games, but you don't see the purpose behind the games. Your kid has to be tricked into getting to the place where when they're an adult, they can stand for 40 minutes and take part in these drills and learn these things.
All of it connects. So when you have adults observing the kids' classes, you have to help them bridge that gap more so than you have to explain it to the children.
Jeremy (51:24.338)
Yeah. And I think that could be another episode. That sounds like a great subject for us to really dig into. The last thing I want to leave people with is it's not a binary state. It's not a line. It's not that the way you present material to children and the way you present material to adults has no overlap. And in fact, I would go so far as to say that a typical adult class would benefit from more youthful style instruction.
And a youth style class in most schools would benefit from setting the bar a little bit higher and holding children to slightly higher expectations. Because when you do that, they are more likely to perform better. Now, the specifics of that are going to vary dramatically per school. But if you are an instructor, if you are responsible for the style of education in your school, I would simply encourage you to contemplate that and see what it might do.
for your school. As always, if you have questions or feedback, the best place to leave it is in the Facebook page, Martial Arts Radio. But of course, if you want to share something privately, you can email us. If you have not already, please go check out Martiallytics. It will serve your school well. If you have questions about that, you can reach out to us about that as well. If you have private questions you're not quite ready to share with the Martiallytics staff, we can help you. We are not them, but we, you know.
Victor and I are using it and others on the team are using it. So we will get you some answers, but it is absolutely worthwhile. If you want to go deeper on this or any other episode, whistlekickmartialartsradio.com is the place to go. Whistlekick.com for everything that relates to our mission to connect, educate, and entertain. Gentlemen, is there anything else before we wrap?
Andrew (53:13.882)
I think that's good.
Jeremy (53:14.876)
All right, then let's see how this is gonna roll. Until next time, train hard, smile, and have a great day.
Vic (53:15.058)
think it's Train hard, smile, have a great day.
Andrew (53:24.612)
Train hard, smile and have a great day. Yeah, that was a lag. Sorry, that's just way it was.
Jeremy (53:28.126)
I love it. I love it. All right. Good job, guys.