April Newsletter

Easter Schedule

We will be closed from Friday, April 6^th to Monday, April 9^th, we will re-open on Tuesday, April 10^th.

Student of the month

This month’s Student of the Month Award goes to Quincy Rodway for winning Gold in every tournament he entered in March. Quincy won 3 Gold Medals last month! So this makes him the best student for April’s Student of the Month Award. If you happen to see him in the club please wish him congratulations. His picture will be on the front window of the Martial Arts room at the club.

Testing

In April we will have the following test dates. April 21^st, 1-4pm, April 25^th, 6-9pm.

Tournaments

May 5^th-Calgary, Calgary TKD Academy Open.

Summer Camps

THEY ARE STARTING TO FILL UP! BONUS- We have extended the Early Bird price to April 14^th.Our first Summer Camp in July is practically full and most of the others are half full. So if there are any particular weeks you are interested you really need to book as soon as possible. Every Summer our camps are enjoyed by a large number of children. Last year almost 120 children took part in 6 of our best camps yet! We were able to go Lake Sundance over 25 times! This year we will have 4 regular summer camps open all children ages 5-14, and 2 specialty camps ages 8-15 (Black Belt & Sparring). Our full-day camps are jammed packed with activities for the children. We do Martial Arts in the morning, and play a variety of sports and games in the afternoons. Every nice day we go to Lake Sundance where we have full access to all the facilities and boats. Master Thibault has over 16 years of boating experience (Canoe's, Rowboats, Kayaks & Paddle Boats) and will be in every boat the children will be in. There will be no unsupervised boating of any kind. Master Thibault instructs all the camps, and has the assistance of at least 2 other Senior Black Belt Instructors. Since we actually do 15 martial arts classes in one week the lower belts often have the opportunity to test at the end of the week.

The regular camps will take place on the following dates:

Dates: July 9-13th, 16-20th, 23rd-27th, and August 13-17th
Location: Fishcreek Sports Club
Times: 9 AM-4PM
-Parents wishing an early drop-off time or a later pick-up time please speak with Master Thibault so arrangements can be made.
Costs:
Pricing for members for all camps: $139 before March 31st,$159 after that. Additional family members are $99 before April 14^th, $119 after that. Non-members $179 before April 14^th, 199 after that - this includes free uniform. Additional family members are $129 before April 14^th, $149 after that with a free uniform as well. Ages & Ranks: 6-14 years of age, all belt levels.
Promotion Test Fees: Are not covered by the Summer Camp Fees.

Deposit to secure your spot: 50% deposit is required to hold your spot.

BLACK BELT SUMMER CAMP!

We are creating a summer camp just for Black Belts that will run from July 30th-August 3rd. This camp will focus on advanced techniques for Black Belts; weapons, self-defense, kicking, striking, blocking, patterns and sparring. The cost of the camp will be $139 + GST, and is open to all Junior Black Belts and Black Stripe Students 8-14 years of age. This camp will focus only on higher level techniques designed to learn the elite level martial arts. We will be accepting non-Black Belt students in this camp as well.

SPARRING CAMP!

The Sparring Camp will take place in the last week of August (23^rd – 27^th), and will be open to all Raptors and students thinking of joining the Raptors in the Fall. This camp we focus on sparring and sparring techniques, higher levels of strategies and superior fitness and coordination. We will include in-depth analysis and formulated action plans so students can develop their sparring abilities to National and International skill levels. The cost of this camp will be $139 + GST. We will be accepting non-sparring students in this camp as well.

We have finalized the dates of our summer camps and are taking deposit starting March 2^nd. Our Summer Camps were over Sold-out last year with almost 120 students attending the 6 camps we held. We do martial arts in the mornings and then we go to Lake Sundance in the afternoon.

The days of the camps are as follows;

regular camps July 9-13th, 16-20th, 23rd-27th, and August 13-17th. Black Belt Camp July 30th-August 3rd, Sparring Camp 20th-24th. Both of the specialty camps will have space for regular students. Pricing for members for all camps: $139 before March 31st,$159 after that. Additional family members $99 before March 31st $119 after that. Non-members $179 before March 31st $199 after that includes free uniform. Additional family members $129 before March 31st $149 after that. The big addition to the camps is the inclusion of many more scheduled activities during the afternoon including many more fun activities both for the lake and for the club. 50% deposit is required to hold their spot. The balance of all the camps must be paid by May 31st for July and June 15th for August.

Movie & Pizza night

We have had to post-pone our Movie & Pizza until May 12^thbecause Master Thibault has to be in Edmonton for a WTF Canada Coaching Seminar. Our Movie and Pizza nights have always been our most popular event.  To start the evening will we watch a children’s martial arts movie and then we play a variety of games for prizes. We gave away over $400.00 in prizes last time. We also give away several door prizes. The cost is $15.00 per child and includes 3 slices of pizza and 3 juice boxes. The movie will be shown on a 300 inch HD Projector with surround sound. Prizes will include new Black Collar uniform, Taekwondo gym bags, targets, badges and many more.

It is important, when you reserve your spot(s), to please let us know if your children will be eating either Cheese or Pepperoni Pizza.

Here are the rest of the particulars:

Date- May 12^th

Time- 2:45-6:30

Pick-up Time- No later than 7pm

Place- Fishcreek Sports Club, Court 7 and the Studios Group Martial Arts Studio

Age- 5-12yrs

Taking names from April 10^th

Hi Everyone,

I wanted to quickly fill everyone in on a few things.

1) Testing this week will be on Friday 5pm and Saturday 1pm. Remember you have to book and pay for the testing prior to the test date. Next Dates will be Wednesday, February 23rd at 6pm and Saturday, February 25th at 1pm.

2) We will be attending the D.K. Chun Memorial Tournament on February 18th in Edmonton.

3) We will be closed from February 17th until February 20th for the Family Day Long-weekend.

4)We will have all the Child Sport tax receipts out by the weekend.

5) Class change reminders:
The Tuesday and Thursday Youth and Adult Classes now run from 8-9pm. The warm-up will start in the racquetball court #7.
Raptors classes will now run from 7-8:20pm.

6) Extra Lil' Dragon class: we are still waiting to hear from all of the Lil Dragon families to see if anyone is interested in attending a Thursday 5:15-6pm class.

December Newsletter
Hi everyone, we would like to start by wishing everyone a safe and happy holidays to all our students and families from all the staff at SGMA. We have some important information and dates that we need to pass on to you.     

November Recap
We had a hectic November we attended the Tiger Taekwondo tournament in Edmonton and did very well. Our 6 competitors won a total of 7 medals; 2 Gold, 3 Silver and 2 Bronze. All of our competitors did really well we won 7 matches and lost 4 against very high level competition. We are very proud of the effort they showed. We also did 3 outreach seminars; Bishop Grandin High School, Mother Teresa Elementary School, and a Women’s Self-defense Seminar for the employees of the Hong Kong Bank (HSBC). We also held our own Women’s Self-defense seminar.

Student of the Month
For the month of December we actually have 2 winners for the student of the month award again. This time we are acknowledging to young boys. Ivan Asparuhov and Esteban Gardiner excelled at their last testing. They are both 6 years old and tested better than any other children at their same belt levels. Both scored over 93% on their promotion test! Ivan tested for his Yellow Stripe Belt and Esteban for his Blue Stripe Belt. If you happen to see them in the club please wish them congratulations. 

Movie & Pizza Night
We still have about 4 spots left for our Movie and Pizza night. Our Movie and Pizza Nights have always been our most popular event.  To start the evening will we watch Kung Fu Panda 2 and then we play a variety of games for prizes. We also give away several door prizes. The cost is $15.00 per child and includes 3 slices of pizza and 3 juice boxes. The movie will be shown on a 300 inch HD Projector with surround sound. Prizes will include new Black Collar uniforms, Taekwondo gym bags, targets, badges and many more.
It is important, when you reserve your spot(s), to please let us know if your children will be eating either Cheese or Pepperoni Pizza.
Here are the rest of particulars:
Date- December 17th
Time- 2:45-6:30
Pick-up Time- No later than 7pm
Place- Fishcreek Sports Club, Court 7 and the Studios Group Martial Arts Studio
Age- 5-12yrs
 
Next Testing
Our next scheduled testing will be on December 21st and 22nd from 6-9pm on both days. Remember in order to test you must book and pay for the testing prior to the test date. Also testing students need all their stripes to be eligible for testing (please refer to the handbook for complete details).  Next scheduled testing will be at the end of January 2012.

Year-end Celebration
In the new year, the date and location have yet to be finalized, we will be holding a year-end pot-luck party. At this party we will be giving out many awards and certificates to the students and staff and we will also be celebrating Master Thibault’s 30 years in Martial Arts. We are tentatively planning the event for the first weekend in February at a location close to the school. The awards will be for Student of the Year, Instructor of the Year, Black Belt and Color Belt Competitors of the year, and Lil’ Dragon Student of the year. We will also be giving out numerous certificates for students who demonstrated excellent attitudes and/or showed perseverance.

School Closures
We will be closed from Friday, December 23rd until Sunday, January 8th. We will re-open on Monday, January 9th.

New Lil’ Dragon Instructor:

We’ve added a new Adult Instructor to the Lil’ Dragon program, Karleen Thibault. Karleen has had years of experience teaching young students and special needs. She has already brought a lot more structure and discipline to the classes creating a much better learning environment.

Student of the Month:

We had several students who did very well in testing and at the Sundre tournament. We’ve decided to award 2 students with the Student of the Month awards. Ilya Kostenko and Lawrence Tang both skipped a belt, and as a result they were both awarded the honor. Their picture will be on the front window of the Martial Arts room at the club.

Halloween Party:

We had a pack house for our Halloween Party with almost 50 children in attendance. Every child walked away with a huge bag of candy and we gave away over 16 prizes for the best costumes! Best Overall Girl was Jordan Nolan and Best Overall Boy was Dustin Wright. Thank you to all the Parents that volunteered to make the event a success. Our next Special Event will be a Movie and Pizza night on December 17^th from 5-8:30pm, 8:30-9pm is the pick-up time. We will send out all the information on November 10^th and then we will start accepting registrations on November 21^st.

Women’s Self-Defense Seminar:

This seminar is Free and available to all female students 12 years of age and up. The seminar focuses a providing girls and women basic and strong self-defense techniques. Here’s the date and time: November 30^th 8-10pm. You need to register with M.T. by November 25^th.

Next Testing Dates:

Remember you need to register and pay for testing 2 days in advance, and we have limited amount of space per test day. Our next Black Belt Test will be December 17^th. Here are the upcoming test dates:

November 16^th 8-9 pm, November 17^th 7-8pm. December 2^nd 5-7pm, December 3^rd 1-4pm, December 20^th 6-8pm, December 21^st 6-8pm.

Tournaments:

We did excellent at our first tournament! At Sundre, our 9 competitors in a total of 11 divisions, won 4 Gold, 4 Silver, and 3 Bronze. In 2 of the event we place 1^st and 2^nd so we took home 6 of the highest medals we could. We also we had 5 students who competed at their 1^st tournament. The next Tournaments are in Edmonton on November 5^thand in Whitecourt on November 19^th.

Bullying:

In 3^rd week of November (starting on November 14^th) we will teach the children more anti-bullying self-defense and talk to them on more ways to avoid being the target of bullying. We will

School Closures and Class Changes:

We will be closed on Remembrance Day, November 11^th.

There will be no Raptor classes on the Tournament days.

There will be no 8pm All-Open class on November 30^th in lieu of the Women’s Self-defense Seminar.