Disclaimer: My direct students are all university students, and as such, they are at their prime physically and have a mature yet sponge-like brain that can absorb things quickly. I understand that I teach in the most ideal situation, and some of what is mentioned will not apply as much to Adult beginners or children.
When it comes to martial arts training, especially in the realm of forms and basic technique exercises found in karate-like styles of martial arts, one thing that a more naive martial arts student may believe is the idea that simply knowing the moves to the form and knowing basic technique is good enough! These students often forget that they not only need to know the forms and basic techniques to move forward, but they also need to perform these techniques at a high level.
When I’m evaluating my students at the time of testing, I evaluate them on their level of preparation and their “Stuff”. Preparation is how well the forms, one step sparring techniques and basic techniques are known and even memorized. “Stuff” is also a term that is used to describe baseball pitchers. A pitcher with good “Stuff” has high velocity on a fastball, and a nasty break on their curveball. This pitcher may not have good command of the strike zone and may be wild, but that is easier to improve upon than it is for a pitcher to improve their “Stuff”. When looking at my Tang Soo Do student’s “Stuff”, I look at how their stances are, how their kicks are, how their body mechanics are and how they move from one technique to the next.
Just like working with a baseball pitcher, it is often an easier fix to help a student with their preparation of a form: knowing the order of techniques, than it is to assist a student with their “Stuff”. As a younger instructor, I would look at a student with poor technique, but with good preparation with higher regard than I would look at a student with poor preparation and good technique. Today, I am more so the opposite in moderation. I am more likely to pass a student that does Bassai with solid technique, but fudges 1 or 2 moves than I am to pass a student that has the order correctly, but with poor technique. Correcting the one or two moves is much easier than solving greater technical issues.
The difficulty and importance of teaching and imparting “Stuff” makes it more of a focus when I teach. I often prefer to take time to assist a student with making sure they have the correct energy and philosophy applied to a technique vs. knowing which move comes next. After all, online resources can teach a student what move comes next whereas youtube cannot correct technical flaws. Class can be a more productive time if there is an emphasis put on correcting and improving technique rather than spoon feeding which techniques come next.
How is your “Stuff”? And how is your students’ “Stuff”? If you take the time to focus on both, you will find creating good martial artists to be easier!
