Karate Lessons

Last week my son's school had a health fair. I stopped by because the flyer had mentioned that a karate school would be there. My daughter has been asking about karate lessons for a while, and I thought they might be good for my son who has Aspergers Syndrome (autism spectrum disorder). But my concern has always bee that the schools would all turn out like that school in The Karate Kid. Silly, of course. That was just a movie.

The guy at the fair seemed nice enough and I asked lots of questions about their ability to teach a child with special needs. He said that they do have some autistic students, but at the same time, he said that they tend to ignore inappropriate behavior. The rationale is that they want to reward appropriate behavior and not give attention for misbehaving. But, anyone who has been involved with autistic kids knows that they often need a lot of redirection. So immediately I wondered if my son would be running around the room, being ignored.

I also asked if the school was geared toward competition. That's not really the environment that I want either of my children in. I want them to have fun and gain confidence, even to learn a bit of self defense ( especially my son, who is at risk to become a target for bullies as he ages) but not to become obsessive with tournaments or winning. For one thing, we can't make the financial commitment that the tournament path can often require. Heck, I'm not sure we can afford to have them both enrolled at all. I'm not sure about this because they refused to give me any fees until AFTER my kids had their trial lesson. Then when he gave me the appointment card, there was no address. I'm also not interested in having a child so focused on winning at such a young age. They have plenty of time for that later.

There was a phone number, so I called to get the address so I could get directions online. Three calls and still no one has answered the phone and after 3 days, no one has returned my call. I'm not feeling so great about this place.

I went online to see if I could find anything and I did find a website (originally I had been told there wasn't one). The information I originally wanted about pricing wasn't there, but I saw some other interesting things.

There was a student featured and also a parent featured. Both were being lauded for their intense commitment to their practice and to tournaments! One parent brings his child to lessons every day! I may be overreacting, but that doesn't sound to me like the laid-back vibe that I heard about at the fair.

I'm going to keep the appointment, mostly because I already mentioned it to my kids and if we don't go, there will be major drama. But I don't have a good feeling about it.