What is the goal of student or karate-ka? Is it to win everything? or to become a good black belt? This is an important question and one that does not preclude the other. Students should learn their system as it was designed. Beginning, intermediate and advanced. Sometimes parents or coaches may want to speed things up to get ahead of other competitors. This can often do more harm than good. Kata is an essential element of training. It gives the student ample opportunity to learn, practice and understand what they are doing. If you skip past earlier forms you may be missing out on important basics that will be necessary to understand more complex forms. A beginning student (no matter how good) should do the forms for their rank. Doing a higher form at a tournament tells the judge’s panel that they have a higher understanding. A yellow belt running a brown belt kata can have the reverse effect if you want to score highly. Excelling at the rank you are at will help improve everything after it. Plus, the student who jumps through and past forms will be more likely to become bored, and what do you do when they’ve gone through all of the forms in your system?
