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Old 03-08-2009, 11:27 AM   #70
mathewjgano
 
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Dojo: Tsubaki Kannagara Jinja Aikidojo; Himeji Shodokan Dojo
Location: Renton
Join Date: Feb 2005
Posts: 2,276
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Re: Aikido IS a practical contemporary martial art

Quote:
Don Magee wrote: View Post
It has helped my job, my teaching, and my personal life. The best part, my teacher just taught me how to choke, pin, and armbar people. The rest just came from that.

Now as a part time teacher I also do not try to push my values on my students or even mention them. Instead I focus on building their abilities, confident that they non-physical things they gain will be their own.
I would argue against the idea that your teacher "only" taught chokes, pins, etc. But I completely agree with your point that these kinds of things you describe are usually learned best in an indirect way.
Below is a good description of this issue in terms of public education, where we simply must teach ethics (directly or indirectly) as a part of classroom management. I think it provides a good basic framework for how to approach this idea.

"Instructors are competent in their subject area. One question being discussed in the media, at teaching conferences, and by society in general centers around teaching values in the classroom. Should we teach values? How should we teach them? Are we being judgmental if we teach our values? How do we assure that we present material in such a way as to remain open to new ideas? According to John Dewey in Experience and Education, "Perhaps the greatest of all pedagogical fallacies is the notion that a person learns only the particular things he is studying at the time. Collateral learning in the way of formation of enduring attitudes, of likes and dislikes, may be and often is much more important than the spelling lesson or lesson in geography, or history that is learned. For these attitudes are fundamentally what count in the future." Collateral learning is the invisible curriculum."(http://college.hmco.com/instructors/...urriculum.html)

Gambarimashyo!
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