Kendo as a High School subject (outside Japan)

**ben** · 11th July 2005, 06:15 PM

KWF is a pretty small sample group but I was wondering if anyone knew of situations where kendo had become part of the local high school curriculum in countries other than Japan.

I have had the great good fortune to be allowed to introduce kendo as an official school subject this semester at the high school where I teach, and was wondering whether there was much of a precendent for this in other countries outside Japan.

b

**Lucien** · 11th July 2005, 06:45 PM

Kendo is an official part of the curriculum at the Bejart Ballet School. The founder of the school, Maurice Bejart, is a Japanophile who believes kendo builds character for the hard road dancers must travel. They practice 3 times a week and cover all parts of the kendo curriculum.

The dancer's teacher uses this board and may well add more details.

**Alex** · 11th July 2005, 08:27 PM

That's really interesting! Anybody keen to do an article for the mag in regards to this club/class?

Alex

**KhawMengLee** · 11th July 2005, 08:35 PM

Originally Posted by ben

KWF is a pretty small sample group but I was wondering if anyone knew of situations where kendo had become part of the local high school curriculum in countries other than Japan.

I have had the great good fortune to be allowed to introduce kendo as an official school subject this semester at the high school where I teach, and was wondering whether there was much of a precendent for this in other countries outside Japan.

b

Ben, one of your Victoria boys John Anderson(sic) was telling me about it. I am sooooooooooooo envious! Hahah...we got to 'see' kendo when our brother school visited from Japan but never to practce it. Will you be around during early November? I'll be in Melbourne for a week or so for the races and would love to train with you guys(and maybe take a few bets down for the punters..hehehe).

Originally Posted by Alex

Alex That's really interesting! Anybody keen to do an article for the mag in regards to this club/class?

Alex

If the article can wait I'd be delighted to do it when I visit Melbourne in November.

**ratdeau** · 11th July 2005, 10:44 PM

Originally Posted by Lucien

Kendo is an official part of the curriculum at the Bejart Ballet School. The founder of the school, Maurice Bejart, is a Japanophile who believes kendo builds character for the hard road dancers must travel. They practice 3 times a week and cover all parts of the kendo curriculum.

More info under
Rudra Kendo at Rudra

**Neil Gendzwill** · 11th July 2005, 11:00 PM

Not so much official, but a friend of mine started up a kendo club at the high school where he taught English in Calgary. It's now defunct as he no longer teaches. I think if you're on staff you can probably make something like that happen. When I went to high school, the last two years of Phys Ed were basically sports smorgasbord, try a little of this, that and the other thing. An enthusiastic kendoka staffer could probably sneak in a week or two of kendo into a program like that as well.

**JoonShik** · 12th July 2005, 02:04 AM

Korea has Kendo (or Kumdo in Korean) as a high school subject. The student chooses between various things to do and thats what they are stuck with. My father has told me stories and how over here in America, we are weak. He told me, that 1000 (One Thousand) Haya Suburi for warm-up is normal. 5000 (5 Thousand) would be a special trainning. Over there, its like, if one falls, everybody falls. If one fails, everybody does push ups in bogu.

**Andou** · 12th July 2005, 03:03 AM

Originally Posted by JoonShik

Korea has Kendo (or Kumdo in Korean) as a high school subject. The student chooses between various things to do and thats what they are stuck with. My father has told me stories and how over here in America, we are weak. He told me, that 1000 (One Thousand) Haya Suburi for warm-up is normal. 5000 (5 Thousand) would be a special trainning. Over there, its like, if one falls, everybody falls. If one fails, everybody does push ups in bogu.

Jesus...I don't even think my father did that when he was in Japan doing kendo in the 60's. But I have heard stories of them going up to their high school roof and doing their kiai to see if they could distract anyone outside the school...and if they didn't the sensei would just repeatedly yell, "KOE WA CHISAI!" (I think that was it which translates to: You're too quiet.) And would do this for quite a while.

As to Kendo in high school...Yeah. That would be so good. Not only would I be able to attend more practices, but I could actually have some "extracurriculars" on my transcript.

**ChaShu** · 12th July 2005, 04:49 AM

Seems like The Citadel (a military college in South Carolina) is offering kendo as a course in their athletic department. I ran accross the site this morning looking for a bogu stand. Course code RPED 150 if anyone is interested...

http://cee.citadel.edu/rped150/

**nodachi** · 12th July 2005, 07:43 AM

This is way cool! I can see schools having kendo clubs for after school, but to have it incorporated as part of the school day itself is just incredible. What kind of a school is it? In terms of public schools, I see the government putting so much pressure to cover all the other academic topics and then throw on top of that language requirements and things like that so I don't see most public schools being able to fit in kendo classes during the day. What is your school setting like? Sounds interesting.

**samurai999** · 12th July 2005, 08:17 AM

For us we have dojos located close to all these High Schools in California. Its sorta like reinventing the wheel IMHO. But, for enthusiasts who really want to start one at a HS, then why not? problem is here, renting the HS gym is pretty difficult as Volleyball, Basketball, and color guard (band) get first come first serve where I come from..

Tim

**ben** · 12th July 2005, 08:53 AM

Originally Posted by ratdeau

More info under
Rudra Kendo at Rudra

Very interesting! Unfortunately bad link with nasty pop-ups.

b

**ben** · 12th July 2005, 09:07 AM

Originally Posted by nodachi

This is way cool! I can see schools having kendo clubs for after school, but to have it incorporated as part of the school day itself is just incredible. What kind of a school is it? In terms of public schools, I see the government putting so much pressure to cover all the other academic topics and then throw on top of that language requirements and things like that so I don't see most public schools being able to fit in kendo classes during the day. What is your school setting like? Sounds interesting.

Thanks Nodachi, I think it's pretty cool too and a lot of the credit must go to the Principals of the school for going with something so radical. My school is a Government high school, so that makes it a bit more unusual: provate schools have more freedom to introduce things to their curriculum as they don't have to follow the standard curriculum framework. We are more accountable to the Education Department as well. You're spot on about Gov't pressure to cover a wide range of subjects and programs. If could teachers could spend more time teaching and less time on bureacratic stuff...

The class will be for a year 8 students. About 16 boys and 4 girls. My school caters to students from 45 different cultural backgrounds. We also have many students who were refugees and whose schooling was either interrupted or non existent before coming to Aus. We also have a select-entry accelerated learning program. So there are a whole range of abilities. I think kendo will offer a really interesting "level palying field" for these kids.

b

**Kingofmyrrh** · 12th July 2005, 09:24 AM

Originally Posted by Lucien

Kendo is an official part of the curriculum at the Bejart Ballet School. The founder of the school, Maurice Bejart, is a Japanophile who believes kendo builds character for the hard road dancers must travel. They practice 3 times a week and cover all parts of the kendo curriculum.

The dancer's teacher uses this board and may well add more details.

I think I've encountered this inadvertently. When I was at Keio a bunch of people who were speaking French (I assumed they were French, but I guess they were Swiss) came to our dojo and watched and filmed us. They seemed pretty surprised to see me there! Anyway, somebody explained to me that one of our shihan, Fukumoto Shuji sensei, had been instrumental in establishing a link between Keio kendo and a dance school in Europe. I don't remember perfectly, but I think he goes there every so often to teach people. I should be seeing him in a few weeks so I might try asking him. I can remember he was pretty enthusiastic about the whole thing.