In today’s class, the children were introduced to the equipment used in striking martial arts such as Kickboxing, Karate, and Taekwondo. We quickly covered the various training aids commonly used in martial arts, including the Bo Staff, Kali Sticks, and Nunchaku. training aids we will pick up over the term.

We then moved into the session, covering the following: A gentle warm-up consisting of push-ups, sit-ups, and squat jumps. Introduction to pad work focusing on cross punches, hook punches, and two variations of the front kick (defensive and striking).

We also introduced the children to nunchaku, used solely for demonstration purposes, and provided guidance on best practices (such as maintaining distance) and emphasised that they are not to be used against one another. It was impressive to see all the children maintaining proper spacing and self-control, contrary to what often happens when handling nunchaku. We worked on the figure-8 movement and shoulder throws but limited this to a 5-minute activity due to time constraints. The children thoroughly enjoyed this segment.

Finally, we concluded the session with a quick self-defence technique, focusing on an arm grab/release manoeuvre. This was an introductory lesson, and we plan to revisit and expand on this technique next week.

Today we had a very quick recap on what we learnt last week and William and Reuben were quick to remind and demonstrate the push and snap kicks.

Today we emphasised that Martial arts are for self defence only and so worked at defending ourselves first with blocks, focusing on an outer block and upper block. this was achieved with the older kids using paddles simulating strikes to the head.

As a practice exercise we followed up by giving the kids boxing gloves, and had them play shoulder tag (simulating sparring) the aim was to tag the shoulder of their opponent and once hit the child has to perform a pushup. Pleased to see not many pushups as the entire class were blocking like pros.

We then moved onto Roundhouse Kicks looking at placement of the foot and will work on this again next week. and will revisit the foam training weapons.

Hello everyone!

Today we picked up on where we left last week and looked at a couple more techniques to add to our arsenal of kickboxing techniques.

We started first by playing a game of shoulder taps, making sure that we blocked incoming tap attempts and countering with our own tap attempts.

We then lined up into two groups and worked on upper cuts, ensuring we bent the knees slightly to give us explosive power straight up and crossing between the pads.

We then added Side Kicks making sure we "chamber" the leg before kicking out with the bottom of our foot.

We played a game this morning called bulldog. it somehow got confused several times with stuck in the mud but still worked well as an early morning warmup.

We taught the back fist today whereby the child uses the back of the hand for the strike. its really useful as can be used as a block if needed. We briefly looked at combinations of punches before moving to our kicks.

For kicks Lenka demonstrated the axe Kick. bringing her leg up as high as she can before dropping the hill down hard on the pad. being so flexible already she was demonstrating at head hight and this only encouraged the team to bring their leg higher and higher for every attempt. Some amazing Axe kicks in the class today.

We finished the class with a chest grab self defence technique. the kids learnt how to 'Anchor' the attackers had before using their body/arm to twist the attackers body onto the floor.

Great class Well done team!

Today we introduced the kids to the jab reverse punch. We explained that if standing in a strong stance, one arm would struggle to reach the opponent with a rear arm, thus by bending our leg and pivoting a reverse punch is able to extend further. This reverse punch is also great for lower strikes when the opponent has a strong guard.

We looked at the hook kick, Marcus and Jacob both did an excellent job of aiding the smaller kids with this one.

Today we introduced the kali sticks to the kids. we emphasised the importance of holding the stick in the right place and how force is increased at the tip of the stick decreasing towards the "BUTT" and made sure the kids knew the importance of avoiding the tip in attack situations. we started working on a small drill and will carry on with this over the net three weeks.