September 3, 2008
Kata in the Classroom
I collected my first assignments from my students yesterday. I imagined it would take me little more than an hour to get through their outlines. I figured I would finish both classes easily in one evening.
I barely finished my first class.
I don’t know. I guess I assumed that college freshman knew how to write an outline. I assumed that when I gave them a template to follow, they’d follow it. I assumed that a textbook full of examples that I explicitly pointed out to them would be enough to insure they used the correct format.
Wrong.
Tomorrow it’s back to the drawing board. How can one possibly put together an organized piece of writing without proper planning? I am hoping that my speech class follows directions better than my writing class.
In other teaching news, I actually used kata in my speech class yesterday. The lecture topic was controlling nervousness. We talked about different techniques that the students can use to release excess adrenalin before a speech and how to calm themselves down. I told them what my karate teacher always says: "The person who controls their breathing controls the fight." I told them that it’s really no different with public speaking.
We talked about pausing in appropriate places and I even had them do some calming lamaze breathing. After that I told them about breathing kata and we practiced tensing up muscles and then releasing the tension, and how doing this before speaking helps calm nerves. It was a cool way to incorporate my karate training into everyday life. Looking around the classroom, I think the students thought so too.
I may not be back in the classroom (dojo) myself yet, but I am getting the itch to return in a major way. All this stress from going back to work part time (out of the house) could use some release. It’s been almost a year now of pent up stress. I can’t believe that it’s almost been a year since that horrible night that literally changed my life. I know my leg muscle isn’t ready yet, but I’m starting to think that it might never be ready, so why wait? I’m going to put my brace on this weekend and run through some kata at a very slow speed and see how it goes. If all goes well, I’m heading back very soon.
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It’s amazing how stupid students are, isn’t it?
Good luck this weekend. Hope you’re able to ease back into it.
I’m scared for the future of America when college-aged kids can’t write an outline. Something has to change!
I’m glad to hear you’re feeling so much better that you can head back to your martial arts.
I love being able to incorporate martial arts into my everyday life. I feel like I have this little secret that nobody else knows. (Unless of course, I share it like you did)Your example was a perfect one, too!
My wife taught freshman english at Arizona State University for a year when getting her MFA. She, too, was appalled by the writing skills of the students and has some great stories about grammar gone wrong. But despite her initial despair, she ended up with a couple of students each semester who really listened and worked hard to learn what she was teaching. I’m sure you’ll find a few in your class, too.
P.S. I’m finding that my knee is in some ways stronger and in other ways weaker than my good knee. It doesn’t have the stamina yet, but I think running and weightlifting are helping.
Sounds like you teach writing the opposite of the way I actually write, bbm!
Speaking as a semi-pro writer, it is entirely possible to write an organized, logical piece of writing without having a written plan in place (or sometimes any plan at all). For myself, every single time I had to do an outline for a writing class, I would write my essay (paper, what-have-you) first, and then do the outline to follow the paper. If I wrote the outline first, the paper would organize itself in some completely different fashion when I wrote it, causing the teacher to grade me down. I say teacher, not professor, because I learned my lesson on this score before I ever got into high school, let alone college.
This is not to downgrade outlining. It works beautifully for some people and it’s a valuable skill to have. Your students should decidedly be able to write a proper coherent outline. I just couldn’t leave the implication that you can’t write an organized paper without one alone!
who knows huh?
best of luck