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The Little Ninjas Program is designed for children age 4 to 6 using age appropriate activities to introduce students to martial arts activities. Not all 4 or 5 year olds are ready for karate classes because their skills of focus and concentration are not sufficiently developed. Karate does wonders for further developing these skills, but students need to be able to follow directions and pay attention for the 30 minute class times for our teaching to be successful. The Little Ninjas program is designed to serve as a bridge program for students who are too young for conventional Youth classes but want the fun of learning Martial Arts at an early age. They learn real martial arts skills and by the time they are 6 can join in the Youth classes and continue working towards a Junior Black Belt. It is not uncommon for children who start in the Little Ninjas program at 4 or 5 to test for their Junior Black Belt at age 9 or 10. We recommend that all students "try out" a few classes before any decisions are made about enrolling. We have turned away some 4 year olds who were not ready who have come back 6 or 8 months later and do just fine in the classes. Our philosophy is to challenge the students to their age and psychological developmental levels, but not to frustrate them with tasks that are too complex for they to follow or beyond their physical capacity. Students attend two 30 minute classes per week The Little Ninjas curriculum focuses on eight topics in a constantly rotating fashion.
The teaching approach is mostly game oriented to keep these young minds active and engaged. Little Ninjas develop strong legs by having "Frog Races, Bunny Hops, Spider Races, etc." not realizing they are doing Plyometric Exercsies. They play a martial arts version of Simon Says we call "Uechi Says" to practics punches and kicks and improve their listening and concentration skills. They learn balance by having leg circle contests to see who can stand on one leg the longest while making circles in the air with the other leg. Our mission is to teach people the martial arts, not to teach children to fight in the schoolyard. A big part of our teaching deals with anger management, how to deal with bullies without fighting, and awareness of strangers. Students are taught that fighting is a last resort and that they should never boast of their karate skills or offer to "demonstrate" the latest kick they learned in class on their friends, families, family pets or furniture. The topics are covered twice in an eight week period. Students receive a colored belt stripe each time they successfully complete a topic. After completing two cycles the students receive a belt promotion and continue working on the same topics, but doing activities that equire more skill and mental effort. Working for stripes in each class and striving for the next belt rank gives students immediate and longer term goals and rewards. This keeps interest in classes activities high and teaches important lessons about setting goals and working toward them. When Little Ninjas have received two sets of stripes they are ready to be promoted to the next belt rank. The belt ranks are:
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