Karate has been known for many years, over 1,500 years. It has been taught from generation to generation. There are many different types of karate and tae kwon do. Karate is not all beating up and hurting. It is the discipline and knowledge that they could learn and respect their instructors. They would never misuse tae kwon do and desiring to be a champion of peace and justice to cause a more peaceful world. This is what everyone says before the class starts to inform people that this is not just for the fighting.


Karate has four main areas they are called: Goju Ryu, Shorin Ryu, Uechi Ryu and Shorei Ryu. Goju Ryu is a hard and soft technique with circular linear movements. Shorin Ryu is using weapons of the Okinawa?s. Uechi Ryu is more the kicking and striking techniques. I take the Uechi Ryu more than the others.
The basics for karate are, the belt colors in order go: white, yellow, orange, green, blue, red, brown, black. Each belt has its own form and skill test. The form for each belt has a certain amount of strength and understanding. The skill tests all have expectations that will test your skill and ability to keep trying. The skill tests are many different kinds of kicks and punches and strikes.
In order to test for the next belt you need to know the current forms and the lower ranking forms too. You will need to know your current skill test and the lower ranking skill tests. Lower rankings, such as white, yellow, orange, and maybe green are able to make more than a few mistakes, since they are still knew. But once you get to the intermediate, such as, maybe green, blue, red, brown and black you are expected to catch your mistakes and fix them.


Once you get to blue belt, to test for your red belt you need to break one board with your hand or your foot. You get 4 tries. It is ok for you to not break it. But your score for everything else must be able to bring you through. To get from red to brown you need to break with your hand and a foot technique. You have two tries for each limb. It is ok if you miss or not break both of these! Your score is able to bring you through. The hard one is testing from a brown to a black belt. You have to break four boards with each limb. You will use two hands and two feet. You cannot miss or not break one of these, if you do, you will not be able to get the next belt (the black belt). If you do fail the testing you will automatically get permission to test again, for the next time testing.
At the end of each class we bow out. The 5 tenants of tae kwon do: courtesy, integrity, perseverance, self-control, and indomitable spirits. These all mean something to us, we have to follow these and respect these rules. If you really want to learn something about karate you should find a karate class and join! You will love the experience too!