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Sports

Karate School Focuses on Respect, Discipline and Focus

Martial arts is not the most important lesson being taught, instructor says.

Second-grade student RJ Kolander has gained more as a student at Okinawan Karate than just increased physical fitness and martial arts knowledge.

“Since starting karate, RJ is more disciplined, calmer, and more respectful,” said Rebecca Plotecher, the youngster's grandmother.

RJ has been taking karate for about two years, and has recently passed his test to become a purple belt.

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Kelly Pfersch, mother of third-grader Hannah and first-grader Nick, said karate has taught her children life skills.

“Hannah has learned to be more focused, which helps her in school. Nick now has more self confidence, which helps him stand tall and be more respectful,” said Pfersch.

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Hannah and Nick have been taking karate for almost five months, and recently earned their orange belts.

Students at Okinawan Karate start out with a white belt, and as they learn new skills and pass tests in kata and sparring, they earn higher ranking belts.

Katas, also known as forms, are a sequence of movements against an imaginary adversary, including blocks, strikes and kicks. Advanced students also practice sparring, a form of fighting practiced according to rules and wearing protective equipment. Students practice how they would use the techniques on an opponent, but they take care not to injure each other.

It will take a student about three to five years to earn a black belt. 

While students are learning a lot at the school, Sensei Brian K. Ounkham say the most important lesson are about respect and courtesy.

Ounkham opened Okinawan Karate on Main Street in Sussex in 2009 and he now has about 45 students who study karate and kobudo (weapon arts) with him, as well as three instructors and two assistants.

He plans to expand his facilities and classes over the summer to make room for 300 to 400 students starting in the fall. He plans to offer after-school classes at local schools, a Little Warriors program for pre-kindergarten students; and more classes at the studio.

“We teach Shorin-Ryu, a style of karate from Okinawa, Japan, that uses a soft block, hard counter system built on speed, agility and technique rather than brute force,” Ounkham explained.

Older and more advanced students may start to learn how to incorporate weapons in their training.  Ounkham's students range from age three to 50.

“The weapons you see on the wall we use to study Matayoshi Kobudo, a weapons training system developed historically when the military took the weapons away from the common people, so they practiced defending themselves using basic farming implements, including the bo staff, sai, and tonfa,” said Ounkham.

The students learn katas using the weapons in a series of blocks, strikes and kicks. The bo staff is a stick about 6 feet long. The sais are three-pronged daggers, and the tonfa are a pair of wooden sticks which are held one in each hand, and require hand dexterity and skill. For those familiar with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, cartoon characters popular in the 1990s, Donatello used a bo staff and Raphael used two sai.

Ounkham is a fourth-degree black belt in Shorin-Ryu karate and a third-degree black belt in Matayoshi Kobudo. He has been learning karate for almost 20 years, and has taught at Authentic Ancient Arts in Waukesha and East West Connection in Hales Corners before opening his own studio.

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