 The black belt is one of the most symbolic things in the martial arts. That status and rank will vary and change of course between different arts and it's not coveted only just by adult students but children as well. So today in this video we're going to talk about and ask the question, can kids get a black belt? Okay, big question, a lot of people ask it. Can kids get a black belt? There's a lot of ways to approach this question, technically the answer is yes, kids can get a black belt. The more important question is, should kids get a black belt? You're going to have to look at different requirements and obviously every school is going to be a little bit different but what makes a black belt? Is it just because you're in art for two years, three years, four years, you're automatically a black belt by time based or what are the achievements that you have to accomplish in order to get it? Typically, in most systems, at least as adult black belts are concerned, to qualify for a black belt you are basically, you have to have a pretty good understanding if not mastering of the basic material, your basic stances, punches, kicks, blocks, techniques and you have to be proficient in application. So you have to know your material and be able to perform it at a reasonable level to be considered a black belt. Now of course from there, training continues but how does that apply to kids? Can you expect an eight year old to get a black belt and take on an adult male? Questions kind of up in the air and there's a lot of controversy from this. A lot of schools, especially traditional schools, don't even allow children, students or you have to be a certain age requirement like 12, 13 before you can start to train because a lot of schools will put an age restriction on the black belt. I've heard 16 being a common one, even 18. That's really going to be up to the school and what they're trying to teach. Realistically, is a five year old going to be able to take an adult male? No. But is it possible a five or eight year old can learn enough where they can fight out of someone's grab and get away? That's a different story altogether. So what would qualify a child to become a black belt? Well, once again, we talked about the understanding of the base material and being able to apply it. With kids, that's kind of a relative question. It's kind of hard to compare a child to an adult but what about a kid to another kid? Eight year olds in school. They beat a black belt level compared to other kids. So this is where a lot of schools will bring in what's called the junior black belt. And I know there's a lot of mixed feelings about this and there's pros and cons. The whole concept of a junior black belt is a child starts usually five, six, seven years of age, will spend a few years going through the ranks, so a yellow belt, white belt, whatever belts are in your system. And after about three years, maybe four years, they will test for their junior black belt. This is not equivalent to an adult black belt. The curriculum is usually streamlined. It's simplified. It's not as in depth because kids, you can't go to the same, depending on the age group of course, a five year old, you're not going to spend an entire class on a stance, you know? You're going to work with more of them on coordination and their ability to perform a task and understanding concepts. So a junior black belt is a great way for a child to see the progression to the ranks. It's great for self-confidence. School I teach for and other schools I've been at and taught did offer the junior black belt. So kids would start at white belt. They worked their way up after a few years. They test. They go through the same requirements for testing. They've got to do the physical education part. They have to, they get quizzed. They have to write an essay. They've got to run two miles. They've got to do all their workouts, perform their techniques on another student and trigger a sparring. So they do earn it. They achieve the junior black belt and from there they will begin the adult curriculum. So of course at this point, you know, they've trained for three, four years. So they will start from there to work their way up with the adult curriculum. And by the time they get to that adult black belt, you're talking another four years, five years. They will be an adult. And at that point in time, there's a very good chance that person will be a black belt level student. So that's just some idea of the junior black belt. A lot of schools don't even offer it all because like I said, some have age restrictions. I mean, again, you have as kids start from a five-year-old, they're not going to be a black belt by age eight or nine. Now, comparative to another student, they might still be able to defend themselves if they're bullied or attacked and the discipline is certainly there and the attitude is certainly there and you'd be surprised what students can comprehend. I had a student, he was maybe nine years old, came out to me, Mr. Dan, can you explain to me the concept of purposeful compliance? All right, that's something we teach our adult students. I didn't expect him to know it, but some kids can pick up a lot of material. So the junior black belt is a great middle rank for that. And speaking of middle ranks, some schools will offer, especially for the kids, almost like intermediate belts. So we go from white belt to yellow belt to orange belt. Some of our kids start really young, three and four. Obviously, they're not in class to learn karate. They're in there to learn focus, attention, coordination. So naturally, they're not going to progress as fast as an eight or nine-year-old would. They just can't comprehend the material as fast. At the same time, you have a kid that you're trying to focus on attention and you've got the same color for nine months, while they see everyone around them go up ranks, that kind of works against you. And psychologically, the kid gets bored. So sometimes we do middle ranks. So you like a half yellow, half orange belt or a half white, half yellow belt. They see the progression. They get stripes on the belt. They test for it. They earn an achievement. I've seen a lot of kids turn around. They come into school. They're wild. They've got no attention span whatsoever. But you give it a few months. They start earning a sense of accomplishment and you see the attitude turn around. Some schools, once a student achieves their black belt, they'll do, you'll see some striped belts. So it'll be a black belt with a colored stripe around the middle. And what that usually signifies is either a junior black belt with, okay, so your black belt with an orange stripe. Okay, you're a junior black belt, but you're now working on an adult curriculum orange. In my personal training, my school actually split curriculum. So I was almost towards black belt when my instructor switched over. So he actually had a few of us that were kind of caught in between the split. He let us dual train. We worked on the old curriculum to finish it up while on the new curriculum. So by the time we got our black belt for the first curriculum, we got the black belt, but then he would always, then he would also give us the stripes through the middle of the belt to correspond to the second curriculum where we're at. So he could see where we were at. Then the other thing to realize is whether you believe a kid should be a black belt or not, or if you agree with the junior black belt or not, a lot of people view black belt as an end game sort of thing. Oh, I could put my kid in class in three years. He's going to black belt. He's done. He knows all the karate. No, anyone who's ever trained in the martial arts knows that black belt is not a destination, but that's where your real training actually begins. As I mentioned before, you use those years of training, you learn your basics, you learn your concepts, your stances, your kicks, your blocks, your techniques. You then you're able to apply them when you're proficient in that. You are awarded the rank of black belt because you have earned it. You've shown an understanding of the material. But from there, most martial arts have multiple degrees of black belts. You know, you get a first degree of black belt. Great. Now you got to work towards your second degree. Third, fourth, most arts go up to 10. And that's like a 40, 50, 60 year commitment to do that. There's that much material and that much level of understanding. So can kids get a black belt? Yes. Should they get a black belt? You tell me, what do you think? What is your school offer? What have you seen? Have you seen any black belts that are kids that perform at a great level or tell me what your opinion is? So thank you very much for watching this video. Please subscribe and share and I'd like to bring more material to you and tell me what you think. Thank you so much.