The bigger the dream, the more important the team.
— Robin Sharma
3 Treasures Tai Chi Forest Festival
2019
Jing, Qi, Shen are the 3 treasures that capture the spirit of this event, which is in its 8th year.
June 21/22/23 2019 is your diary date.
3TTCFF is held in the New Forest, Hampshire which makes it accessible from the south coast of England and only 90 minutes from London's Waterloo station.
A weekend festival of all Tai Chi Martial Arts training and Qigong in the New Forest.
A time to be able to share ideas and concepts with other artists - whatever your level and whatever your style.
Three 1 hour workshops every morning and then if you wish to join in the afternoon sessions of push hands.
Suitable for everyone and anyone.
This year’s teachers:
Anthony Ulatowski – Straight stick form and partner play
Cherry Collins - will teach a shortened version of the Chen Taiji single Broadsword (Dao) routine, which will be suitable for all levels of experience from nil upwards.
Mark Corcoran - Middle frame of Yang Jian Hou as taught by Tian Zhaolin. Plus Dalu
Albert St Catherine -Push hands skills with self defence, sensitivity and structure.
Tuition costs: £90.00 Pre-booked
CLOSING DATE 4th of June
- £100.00 at the event.
To book your place email
tony@tonyulatowski.com
Contact
Tony: 0795 636 2743
Jane: 0773 446 9949
Venue confirmed
Just call To book your pitch with one of the team.
Ashurst Campsite
Lyndhurst Road
Ashurst
Hampshire
SO40 7AR
Tel:02380 292097
Just a couple of the natural sights
Positive interventions
Positive interventions and how to apply them. It is always work in progress which makes it so much more enjoyable.
https://positivepsychologyprogram.com/positive-psychology-interventions/
Teachers feedback end of term from yr 4
Tai Chi Childrens Push Hands
At the start of summer term with Jasper class, in PE time, this is the response from the teacher.
Jasper the class as a leading doing Tai chi for three weeks and it is obvious that the children enjoy it. Some children have managed to focus and so during the session. They have begun to use some of the language in class and on the playground. I have used breathing techniques such as scholars breath to help them regain focus. Children that are often fidgeting in class benefit from the big breath. With constant reinforcement Jasper class could gain the full benefits of Tai chi in PE time.
At the end of the term this is what the same the teacher had to say.
Children have become more aware of their bodies and the breath. They have learned in various stances and have developed a better understanding of the language. They have learnt what is expected of them during the sessions and are using their knowledge of Tai chi to regain focus in class i.e. big breath. I recommend this to children when they need to calm down after being involved with a conflict towards goal I use this technique with the whole class to break up lessons and to help children regain focus. Children have also learned to describe the impact of the exercises that has had on their body i.e Relaxation, it made them feel calm, tired, soreness. Children also shown an interest in continuing Taiji in year five and are excited to have the opportunity to compete. Overall the children learned discipline, focus and self-awareness.
Tony has been an amazing instructor and the children always look forward to doing Taiji with him thank you Jasper class.
End of term response from teacher Shane O’Neill Topaz class.
The benefits of Taiji for my class are
· Improve listening skills
· Improve coordination
· Increased knowledge of why we exercise, to the Taiji
· Children are more interested in Taiji and the benefits of it
· Children have strategy is trust techniques to calm down de-stress
· They enjoyed doing a variety of activities
· Big breath, scholars breath, greetings, warriors breath
They want to continue in year five
Improved awareness of body movements, control and what muscles they use during activities, and why those muscles may at
Increase self-awareness-they can describe how they feel after activities, how they felt during activities.
July 2017 was the Children’s first time doing Taiji they’ve responded brilliantly plus learned a lot, made great progress.
Great achievement for primary school students
Children’s primary school Tai chi
7 Golds. 13 Silvers 14 Bronzes
Two minibuses full of primary school students from St Johns of Ealing year 5 and Berrymede of Acton years 5 and 6 attended the London Tai Chi championships Sunday the 20th of June 2017.
What they achieved was fantastic, the attitude, the smiles and the enjoyment they all showed while waiting to compete was heart warming to see along with the respect they showed to other competitors was just brilliant.
San bao Zhong Ding
Junior Female Moving Light Heavyweight Silver Grace Fogg
Junior Female Fixed step Light Heavyweight Silver Grace Fogg
St Johns:
Junior Group Hand Form
Bronze
Haris Razadeqh, John Najem Abdullah,
Mohammed Adeyemi, Tarick Johnson,
Youssef Hasan Mohammed, Elias Azimi
Junior Group Hand Form
Bronze
Ahalaam Dahir, Parsana Foroughi,
Eylul Komur, Lara Folad, Ying Guan, Mira Okajima
Junior Female Fixed Featherweight
Gold
Eylul Komur
Junior Female Fixed Lightweight
Bronze
Lara Folad
Junior Female Fixed Lightweight
Silver
Ying Guan
Junior Female Fixed Middleweight
Bronze
Ahalaam Dahir
Junior Male Fixed Lightweight
Bronze
Mohammed Adeyemi
Junior Male Fixed Middleweight
Bronze
Youssef Hasan Mohammed
Junior Male Fixed Light Heavyweight
Bronze
Tarick Johnson
Junior Female Moving Featherweight
Gold
Eylul Komur
Junior Female Moving Lightweight
Bronze
Lara Folad
Junior Female Moving Lightweight
Gold
Ying Guan
Junior Female Moving Middleweight
Silver
Parsana Foroughi
Junior Female Moving Middleweight
Bronze
Ahalaam Dahir
Junior Male Moving Lightweight
Bronze
Mohammed Adeyemi
Junior Male Moving Welterweight
Silver
Elias Azimi
Junior Male Moving Middleweight
Bronze
Youssef Hasan Mohammed
Junior Male Moving Light Heavyweight
Bronze
Tarick Johnson
Berrymede
Junior Group Hand Form SilverHonya Rasoul, Jennifer Abreu, Kenijah Duberry, Sumaya AhmedJunior
Female Fixed Middleweight Silver Jennifer Abreu
Junior Male Fixed Lightweight Silver Anis Chiekh-Lounis
Junior Male Fixed Middleweight Gold Joshua Adeleye
Junior Male Fixed Middleweight Silver Marcos Bordalo
Junior Female Moving Featherweight Silver Maraki Zekarias
Junior Female Moving Welterweight Bronze Honya Rasoul
Junior Female Moving Welterweight Gold Paris Marfo
Junior Female Moving Welterweight Silver Sumaya Ahmed
Junior Female Moving Middleweight Gold Jennifer Abreu
Junior Female Moving Light Heavyweight Bronze Kenijah Duberry
Junior Male Moving Lightweight Silver Anis Chiekh-Lounis
Junior Male Moving Middleweight Gold Joshua Adeleye
Junior Male Moving Middleweight Silver Marcos Bordalo
Junior Male Moving Light Heavyweight
Beat the blues
The beautiful mindful movement of Tai Chi has always supported mental health and well-being.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-4545472/Are-depressed-Tai-Chi.html
Mental Health in Primary School.
Primary schools positive psychology and physical literacy for mental health and emotional well-being.
A class room experience.
The class sessions started with me saying good morning, the response from 28 year four students was like a drone, a dull sound lacking energy. I asked the students about the characters from Winnie the Pooh and explain that my character, my favourite character was Eeyore.
I then proceeded to show them physically and walked around with my head down repeating the words ‘I think I’ll go home now.’ In an Eeyore tone, how they laugh at me.
I shared with them that this feeling, that I was felling, was because of the dull un-energised response to my question, so we tried it again and they totally understood for the response was positive, constructive and controlled. My body language then changed to be fuller more upright and proud and this I thanked them for. I explained that it made me feel more engaged, energised and happier to be in the hall.
At St John’s primary school Ealing they have four quadrants of emotions, four colours with faces and words within them. This is to help the students recognised and understand their emotions.
We started the class with 21 big breath breathing cycles, this is something they learn on their first lesson and we repeat in every class. Completing this I asked them to show me an angry body that is full of anger but without sound. This is to get them used to what their body does and what it feels like to be angry. There was lots of facial expressions, a lot of pointing fingers and some fists there was also some almost sulky expressions. Then I asked them to show me what it looks like to be scared, some of them showed the same so I encourage them to explore what the body feels like and looks like being scared. I would select one or two students who displayed it well to show the rest of the class what scared looks like or what anger looks like. This peer example encourages and motivates the others to explore the two different emotions.
What we have just covered here is the colour red so that the young students can now associate and start to connect emotions and feelings. It was at this point, after we have explored anger and scared but I asked them what they feel. Receiving this feedback from the students engages them more and when I praised them for their feedback, good or bad and give my reasons why we then have more involvement from other students. Some of the students said that they ‘felt hot, sweaty, dry mouth, not happy.’ And when you have a happy student they tell you they’re still happy even when they try to show you anger. So, we must explore some of those feelings and body expressions.
Then we come to the next quadrant yellow so I asked the children to show me what annoyed body postures were, this was interesting as some showed anger so I then changed to disappointed then we have a change of body language which is good. Show me worried, the facial expressions and body language changes again, so their beginning to differentiate between words and the body, what it feels like. I ask again to show me annoyed and then there is a significant change between the body language of annoyed and anger they begin to differentiate between the two. Similarly letting them express silliness, without sound. We then talk about these feelings, the body language and then put the association of the colour yellow. Asking them would you like to be in the yellow space or in the red space and they all said as they worked in the yellow space. Positive connections are being made.
Next quadrant Blue. Tired and Sick are in this one, a lot of them would lie down on the floor tired and sick. I asked them to stand up so I could see how they showed it. This is about body language and communicating using the body, emotions and feelings. Next was bored very good at bored I try to encourage students to understand bored because it is actually quite a nice place to be and to progress from. Sad, this one I shared with them a story of my experience of putting one of my pets to sleep. I spoke about my feeling at the time and how I now think of all the fun I use to have with my pet who died, passed away, 15 years ago. During this they could hear my voice change along with my face and body and when I told them a funny storey of my pet the obvious change in my sadness has become positive. Hungry the classic holding the belly, hungry sad shoulders dropping, facial expressions. So again, associating the colour blue with these emotions is important and again identifying and differentiating between blue, yellow and red. How their body feels, how their emotions combined with it.
And now the green quadrant, we now explore happy, how wonderful the body feels to be happy and then calm they start out doing the big breath, so they show that they know the connection that the breath helps to calm them down, now instinctively. Beautiful feelings of calmness and happiness together showing in their body. We talked about the colours the different emotions and we jumped from them to yellow shown the yellow emotions worried annoyed nervous or disappointed. So, become a game for them as we went to each quadrant. We spoke about the choices of what quadrant we could be in and how we can choose to be in a different one when needed. How you choose to change. And how the breathing helps them change, so if they are angry and focused on their breathing it would help them to calm down and be happy, they established they could go from red to green.
At this point I added in a new green one a new green expression and this was the Positive Posture of Power the three PPP’s
First, I asked the children to show me how would they would celebrate when they achieve something good or if there was and an athlete crossing the winning line like Mo Farah. Or any form of sporting star, how they celebrate that, how they show their winning posture. This engaged their body and their expressions, good fun, but encouraging all the students to take part walking around the hall to encourage and praising them for their efforts, helping them to understand how good it feels to find those feelings and positively sharing them. Then I asked them to think about their favourite superhero, whoever that maybe, it doesn’t matter, but to show me the body posture of a superhero. Some are obvious Superman, Spiderman and then we get to the fun bit. I asked them to combine their feeling of achievement with their superhero so they create their own Positive Posture of Power. I explained to them that they can use this at times when they are struggling, if they were feeling a bit yellow or even blue they can use their PPP’s.
This at this point I take photographs of all of them in their PPP’S so that we have evidence which can be used as photographs within the classroom to remind them of the positivity of their posture. This can also be used as a spot check of fun for the teachers to randomly ask a student to demonstrate their PPP. This I recommend you do in the corridor because in the playground you will have all the whole school wanting to show you.
This should always be with and at a time when a student is feeling good as this begins to build a constructive understanding of their body and emotions. It will broaden their field of emotional understanding, and it can also assist in supporting a constructive mindset of change. The longer it is engaged the better the response.
It should not be used to pull a student out of a deep spate of sulking or anger, in a major Red.
I then instruct the students to embrace the posture, a Tai Chi posture, which is static, and is called embracing the tree. I have renamed this as koala bear resting this is where they have a wide, horse stance, and the hands are at shoulder level creating a circle around their body as if they’re holding a large balloon between their hands and chest. When they are in koala bear resting, I asked them to apply their The PPP into their posture as if the bursting out, but they have got to keep the shape of koala bear resting. This develops an understanding of positive calmness, develops mindfulness, cognitive discipline, breathing awareness, standing meditation, strength in stillness and much more. It must have the element of challenge for the individuals development.
This one experience of Tony Ulatowski teaching Tai Chi in primary school’s physical education curriculum time. Tony is the UK’s leading authority in this field.
He is also qualified in positive psychology, teamwork, coaching and the CEO of Consciousbreathworks tm.
*The mood meter http://moodmeterapp.com/
*Barbara Fredrickson, Broaden Build theory
*Amy Cuddy, Power Poses
Praise from a yr5 Teacher
Opal Class year five.
A teachers perspective.
The whole class are showing a huge increase in awareness of their focus and what makes them focused. When asked "what helps you learn?" they were able to discuss and reflect on their own mental state, ( normally they list things the teacher can do!,) They acknowledge responsibility for their own learning and their first suggestions for helping with this was Tai Chi.
We have used Warriors breath, deep breathing, following lunch to reset the atmosphere and the energy in the class ready for learning previously the children saw this is just something they "had to do". Now they look forward to it and place importance on it as a way of helping them learning for the afternoon. I absolutely love love having Tai Chi on a Monday morning. I feel it sets the tone for the whole week and it has such an impact on behaviour and learning-especially on Mondays when normally the children take longer to settle into a lesson.
J Reed
St Johns Primary
Children's Curriculum Tai Chi in action
This particular year 6 class was challenging due to a request from the headmistress to help support disciplining this year group.
I covered emotions, what they look like, what they feel like and how to deal with them in a competent efficient manner. So we started off on how Confrontation can begin, is it visual or is it sound, is it a combination of both. Then how does this manifest in the body, that gut feeling and then mentally, what are the thought processes that support those feelings and gut sensations that you would wish to engage in the physical. we discussed the awareness of where this starts where the Confrontation begins and how you deal with it mentally with intelligent use of emotions. They all understood the term of gut feeling, gut sensation, butterflies in the belly. We talked about the animal kingdom and how they avoid fighting unless it is for survival, why would they fight for survival, when they actually thought it was necessary to fight. We communicated about the strength and what type of strength it takes to walk away from confrontation and how it emotionally creates well-being mentally and physically. what those feelings are and to give them a name/ labels so that they are easily identified then the right course of action can follow.
Not letting the negative emotions take control and to let the mind the prefrontal cortex influence the outcome, by explaining some simple neuroscience of the reptilian brain the amygdala and the prefrontal cortex, helping them to undearstand how to control negative emotions mentally and then the benefits physically.
The drill we did was the Embrace the tree challenge, face-to-face, focusing and looking each other’s eyes. I have used this for all the years I’ve been teaching in primary schools and this was taught to me many many years ago from my taiji teacher Nigel Sutton and recently from my positive psychology teacher Sue Langley. taiji we have to be focused, staying clam under physical pressures so we can apply the postural principals and controlling mentally, unwavering, dealing with it. Mentally alert so it does not get physical, full awearnes so it does not happen in the first place.
From positive psychology this interaction, face to face eye to eye process, evokes emotions and is how we deal with those emotions when facing a fellow human being. believe it or not 2 or 3 of the children started to shed some tears, saying their eyes hurt, we are talking about 10 year olds here. Understanding those emotions they were feeling they could then apply the focus of breathing awareness so the emotions do not dominate mentally and physically. They could use the prefrontal cortex to make the right decision in the right situation and not let, let’s say, blind anger take control. Just one of the ways how we share the beauty of Tai Chi but remembering for us we have put the years in and we don’t always have the years for our children. But believing it is planting positive seeds of progress for humanity.
One of the children brought up the subject of a fight between a hedgehog and a lion and how the lion would win. On a positive note I said my money would be with the Hedgehog because it would yield to the Lion and roll up in a ball for self defence this in turn would cause a problem to the lion with the sharpness of the spikes along with the fleas it would take onboard. The hedgehogs defence mechanisms could become a longer-term irritant to Lyon which I personally would not enjoy.
I thank you for reading this for the experiences and knowledge that I’m gaining from teaching childrens curriculum taiji, deep down, find astonishing and very blessed to be doing so.
Breathing and Tai Chi
To breathe or where to breathe in Tai Chi that is the question and there is not one definitive answer and yet there is one, let Tai chi teach you.
If you listen, inwardly, when practising your Tai Chi your movement and your breath will communicate and harmonise, or so it should.
When the student has roughly learned the moves, motor skill, muscle memory then they can research where they hold their breath for example in Snake Creeps Down they tend to hold the breath mainly because they perceive that it is a strenuous move. If they listen and feel what they are doing and they are applying the principles of Tai Chi the breath should be smooth.
So as they do Snake creeps down i ask them to count out loud so they do not hold the breath in and create a restriction in the flow of movement and breath.
In Tai chi all the forward movements should be an out breath and when that concept is understood and felt it should then be applied to push hands. The research then really begins, for if the ego kicks in the Qi/breath raises and an understanding where the energy is wasted and the bodies internal balance is being compromised. Touch sparring a more free-flowing two person practise ups the energy used and therefore helps the student understand and feel their breathing under pressure.
Static training, holding postures,standing post, what is the breath doing when you hold a shape/form for any length of time, what fight is going on within, what dialogue is happening.
This is your self-study, self-development learning to understand the breath by being mindful, conscious of your being.
Bring that all back to the form and listen to the forward out breath/movement, which by the way stimulates the Autonomic Parasympathetic division of the Nervous system the rest and digest, for me it is rest to invest.
Which is why Tai Chi can be described as moving meditation.
So the up shot is , sense and feel what the Tai chi is teaching you at that moment in time.