Cristian Araya Umaña
Country: Costa Rica
IKMF Expert 2 rank Mandatory Essay
Can we define an adult with kid’s dimensions (physically small body) as someone
who should be training under Kids curriculum?
And can we define a kid with Adult dimensions as someone who should be
training under adults curriculum?
“Learning in children is fun and progress in adults”
Israel, 2018
TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. TABLE OF CONTENTS …………………………………………………. 2
2. INTRODUCTION ……………………………………………………….. 3
3. PERSONAL OPINION OF WRITER ……………………………………... 3
4. CHAPTER 1
1.1.1. THEORICAL FRAME ………………………………………………. 4-5
1.1.2. TEACHING ADULTS VS TEACHING KIDS ……………………... 5-6
1.1.3. ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES ………………………… 6
5. CHAPTER 2
1.1.4. TEACHING METHODS ACCORDING IKMF ……………………. 6-7
1.1.5. ONE RULE FOR ALL …………………………………………………. 8
6. CONCLUSIONS …………………………………………………………….. 8
2 Introduction
The main reason for the realization of this work is to explore the different
scenarios that we face as instructors of Krav Maga in two fundamental branches, civil adults and children. With this research I hope to see why adults and children should train separately and each with their own curriculum according to their physical and mental characteristics.
Personal Point of view Regardless of whether you like to work with children or not, understand the differences between both sectors, how they should work and make a study of how each of them should work, gives greater richness to the training to understand this gives an added value to the work of the federation, which denotes much interest in all sectors. Calling from my personal point of view to children as practitioners of the future, it is going to be that if practicing from small they will be great exponents of krav maga Definitely a child's training will be based on the components of their training, of which I can name the most important, self-confidence, discipline, passion to become high-level practitioners in adulthood. And the adult as head of household if you want to say, to ensure his life from the safety of training, the ability to achieve self-defense in real life and to be able to get home.
3 THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
Children and adults learn in fundamentally different ways. One thing is clear:
adults and children need to be taught in different ways to optimize the learning potential of the respective group. When teaching we have 3 valuable points to take into account, which will be explained below with the following comparative table:
Guidance
Children Adults
1. They need guidance in the
learning process.
2. The lack of structure generates
chaos, lack of attention and
minimal learning.
1. They are self-directed and need
to be stimulated to guide
themselves.
2. Instructors are facilitators of
learning.
3. Adults are responsable for its
own learning.
Purpose
Children Adults
1. They learn by heart.
2. They do not have a life of
experience to give context to
their education, so the simplest
thing is to give the information in
diferent ways, until they
memorize it.
1. they require a purpose or direction in
their studies in order to process the
new information together with their
previous experiences.
Time
Children Adults
1. They are not worried about time,
except for breaks. Since for
them the time value is almost
non-existent.
2. With them we cantake the time
to go step by step and explain
them with several examples.
1. In this case, time is valued and
the time spent on training must
be balanced with other
responsabilities.
2. Getting to the point is the most
important thing.
3. Generally adults do not want to
waste time in generalities and
prefer to go straight to the
subject, without many examples.
4 Teaching Adults Vs Teaching Children
At the time of teaching, age is a determining factor. Adults and children do not learn in the same way or at the same pace, and as instructors we must know how to adapt to each type of student. The mind of the child is made to learn, it is his mission. His brain captures very easily any kind of stimulus, and is programmed to imitate without fears or complexes. However, an adult does not learn at the same pace as a child, his brain is accustomed to consolidate learning, is made for another type of thought, more abstract.
Advantages and Disadvantages of both segments
Advantages of teaching an adult
1. Understands abstract concepts (ideas, theory) more quickly.
2. The classes are more agile and fast, this because you can minimize the
steps in the teaching structure, to skip so many examples.
3. Feel greater responsibility An adult takes their learning more seriously,
tries to study at home and get the most out of the classes.
Disadvantages of teaching an adult
1. The fear of being wrong with adults is more difficult, and often results in
tensions and forced postures that do not help learning.
2. You must work with different previous experiences that can cause
roughness among the members of the group.
Advantages of teaching children.
1. Ease to learn: they have a lot of capacity for imitation, with which the
explanations can sometimes be ignored, to move on to the demonstration.
2. Lack of complexes: when they are small enough not to fear "doing it
wrong" they will not care how they do it, enjoy it and try it.
Disadvantages of teaching a child
1. When teaching a child, we are forced to use more similes, games and all
kinds of strategies to understand the most complex aspects of learning.
With which it will spend much more time to advance.
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One of the defining characteristics of a child's learning is the desire to enjoy
doing something they have learned to do. Children are moved by the idea of
having achieved something relatively easily. Adults, for their part, conceive
learning as the fact of reaching an increasingly complex goal. Putting a child too hard on a target will cause him to become frustrated. They enjoy climbing smaller steps and watching the progress. With adults we can play another situation, put the objectives a little higher, if with an adult we make the mistake of setting too simple goals, they will not pose any intellectual challenge and will tired and demotivate easily.
In summary, in children the main thing is enjoyment and in adults the
progress.
Chapter 2
1.1.4 Teaching methods according to IKMF
By understanding how the mind of children and adults works pedagogically, we can focus on the work we do in IKMF with these sectors and in this way answer the question of this research. It is my thinking that it is not convenient to teach adults as children or vice versa, only based on their physical characteristics.
According to the curriculum of Krav Maga KIDS, we have that the main reason to teach children Krav Maga is so that children can walk in peace, but the most important goal is to have an impact on children's personality, their self-image and values. Form a better person. On the contrary, Krav Maga Civil gives us as adults the skills, skills and techniques to safeguard my life. Being that we do not require children according to the curriculum to perform exceptional techniques, it is not possible, children are not small adults, as we have seen they have different aspects; On the contrary, with adults we are more strict and it is our duty to know and execute the techniques in a great way, since for them that can be the difference between life and death.
Having clear the position of IKMF for both groups, we can break down in my opinion it is not viable what was raised in the initial question and we can conclude the following:
1. Mental limitations: The primary reason why a child can not train as an
adult is the ability to reason, as discussed in the theoretical framework, a
child can not understand the origin of an attack therefore will not have a
mental capacity of sufficient response to be able deal with it. An adult
therefore can not be trained with children, because mentally it will not
represent any challenge, will feel out of place, and will lose interest in
training.
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2. Physical limitations: A child is not a potential adult is a child, his body
physically has not finished growing, his skeletal part is not strong enough to
support adult training. The adult does not have physical limitations, more than in the motor part, but the training of children does not show any challenge for him, therefore he will be frustrated and will lose interest.
3.Techniques (class times, uses of techniques): The techniques of children
are designed to solve problems or situations according to their age, because of my experience in my country, there are no many cases where an adult directly attacks a child, therefore they do not face problems like these, they are more quarrels or bullying among minors that rarely reaches physical contact. Contrary to adults, who usually go with the blows, or assaults because they have more control of money and are directly targeted by the assailants. And for that reason, the civil curriculum teaches them how to survive these attacks.
As for the class, the children disperse very quickly, so the class times are
extremely short, at most 45 minutes in my opinion; since they quickly lose
concentration and all learning will be void. Adult classes, on the other hand, can be more extensive, since they are paying for it and have greater responsibility;
and with 2 hours of classes you can get a great benefit.
4. Responsibility with the training:
Children have no responsibility with the training, in fact they are brought by their parents, they enjoy the class without complexes and that’s it.
The adult on the other hand has to see his daily life (family, work, studies, etc.) and divide his time to be able to train. At this point, they are paying for their training and even so during the training it will be difficult to disconnect from its daily responsibilities, but he does so because he is committed to his training.
5. Parents of the children: we have a very complex point: the parents, basically the parents bring the child and they expect an evolutionary response from the teaching; for no one is a secret that most parents live through the experiences of their children and are always aware that they are the best and interfere in their teaching because they consider that by paying they have the right to direct the training; and if they do not see results, they feel frustrated. The most sensible thing is to get the parents out of the training place in order to move forward with the children.
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With the adult we do not have this situation; since he paids for his training,
commits himself, arrives alone at the class and depends on himself and his effort to progress; another point for which the idea of combining curriculum is not viable.
6. Teaching methodology: As children it is different from the adult as we have explained it extensively, so there is no availability of them to train as adults. And adults, on the contrary, could not train in a children's environment because they were bored, because their motivation is challenge and achievement. But in the child it is in motivation and enjoyment.
7. Expectations of both sectors: The child hopes to find an environment like at school, a fun place to meet new children, and have fun. The adult expects a serious, responsible environment and that their money invested brings progress with training.
One Rule for All
1.1.5. If I had to choose a rule that would fit for both sectors, according to what was studied and researched both at the pedagogical level and at the krav maga teaching level, the demonstrations would be. The demonstration is important in the child because they are going to try to imitate him, they learn by watching and in the adult it will give a better visión of what can achieve throught the wow effect.
Conclusions
1. When teaching both children and adults we must take into account: the
direction, the purpose and the time in each training.
2. Adults and children learn in different ways and have different needs,
therefore it is not advisable to mix the curriculum of both sectors solely
based on physical characteristics; the most important thing is to take into
account the mental capacities of each one.
3. The point of union between both would be the demonstration, with which in the children we will get their attention and learning will be easier; and in adults it will give you a vision of what you can achieve.
4. The child hopes to find an environment like at school, a fun place to meet
new children, and have fun. The adult expects a serious, responsible
environment and that their money invested brings progress with training.
5. In conclusion, we can affirm that learning in children is fun and progress in adults.
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