May Events Review!

 

May at the dojo has flown by! With events meant for learning and even more just for fun we’ve been busy and happy this month.

BELT PROMOTIONS

May started with belt promotion ceremonies for our under black belt youth participants who tested at our second quarterly belt test of 2023. Sensei spent the night recognizing this group of students individually for all of the growth and progress they’ve made this quarter – more than 60 students were promoted.

The families who attended our promotion event also watched Sensei demonstrate some of his martial technique – the crowd favorite, as always, were his jump spinning kicks!

MELTON CENTER @ THE DOJO

We were so excited to welcome some of our friends from the New Directions program at the Melton Center back to the dojo for a fun night of karate. Twenty New Directions kids joined us for a karate lesson, glow in the dark Nerf battle, and movie with pizza. It was a fun night that was supported by Leadership Team volunteers. We are grateful for the opportunity to continue to strengthen our partnership with the Melton Center through these events. We are looking forward to seeing them again in July for our second karate camp experience sponsored by our Magnus Foundation.

TONFA WORKSHOP

This month we had a technical development workshop featuring a special guest instructor for our Leadership Team students.  A long time friend of Sensei’s, Sensei Dan Verbeke 5th degree black belt in Okinawian weapons came to the dojo for this event.  Sensei Verbeke taught us two person drills and advanced tonfa kata during his time with us. It was a well received workshop – we looking forward to inviting Sensei Verbeke back for more follow up trainings in the future.

STEEL MACE WORKSHOP

We had the pleasure of hosting Joe Chaitkin and Greg Olmo of Align Fitness for a special workshop at the dojo this month. Joe and Greg taught a steel mace flow introductory workshop for Magnus students, parents, and Align Fitness clients.  They generously donated all proceeds to our The Magnus Foundation scholarship funds.

It was great to have Joe and Greg in the dojo for this special event and we look forward to learning more with them in the future.

LEADERSHIP

Our Leadership Team attended their 9th of 10 all levels team trainings of the school year this month. Sensei, Mr. Lippatt-Cook, and Mr. Sinowitz taught this month’s sessions in which the Team worked on learning to teach beginner kata and to coach Junior Magnus one-on-one partner drills.

GRAPPLING

This month we held our two grappling sessions. At the beginner/intermediate session the students learned how to invade open guard and had the opportunity to do multiple rolling sessions. Our advanced students worked on arm bars from side control this month.

MAGNUSTHON – KICKATHON

Our annual Magnusthon – Kickathon event to benefit our Magnus Foundation scholarship funds took place this month as well.  The students who participated in this event had family and friends sponsor their kicks so each kick thrown during the event brought in donations. Our kickers worked with Teaching Team and Leadership Team members who held paddles and guest kicked for them – kickers also had the chance to have parents and siblings jump in to do the same. This event is always a fun time for the whole family!

We are once again so grateful for our kickers and their families for their support of our work through our Magnus Foundation. Our Magnusthon event is always our biggest fundraising event of the year! To date our Foundation has awarded 7 “Ted Newell Educational Scholarships” to Magnus Karate seniors pursuing higher education beyond high school and we have provided 3 full year karate tuition scholarships to children from the Melton Center’s New Directions program. The Foundation will also be funding our second karate camp week for the kids of the New Directions program this summer.

PNO: NINJA TURTLES

Our May Parents’ Night Out event was a Ninja Turtles night of fun! It was our 5th PNO of school year with over 25 children in attendance. Sensei taught a nunchaku class where the kids learned the basics and then practiced partner drills and battled the teachers. Nunchaku practice was followed by our dojo favorite – a glow Nerf party. The night wrapped up with a viewing of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Out of the Shadows, pizza, and pretzels! Dojo Parent Night Out events are always a blast.