Student Objectives:
Teaching Cues:
Lesson: Americana (Key Lock)
The assisting student will lay on the ground with their legs gently bent and their hands in the Home Alone Position. The practicing student will get in the mount position, with good posture.
The practicing student will place one hand on their partner’s same side elbow and the other hand on the cross side wrist (this puts both of the practicing student’s hands on the same arm of the assisting student). The practicing student will push the assisting students arm to the floor. Encourage the practicing student to keep straight arms and use their body weight to push it to the floor. Remind the assisting student that a good training partner will allow their arm to go to the floor in practice, but they should resist this during sparring.
Once the Arm is pressed to the floor, the practicing student will place their elbow on the floor (of the arm that is controlling the wrist). This will create a frame against the neck and further isolate the assisting students arm. Remind the student not to drop their elbow on the face while making this transition.
Once the elbow has framed the neck, the hand that is on the elbow will slide under the assisting partner’s elbow and take a shell grip on their own wrist. The practicing student will then place their forehead on their own wrist and slowly, in a controlled manner, pull the non-framing elbow back to their own knee. Once they have made contact with their own knee they will slowly, with good control, drag their elbow up their own thigh towards the hip. The assisting student’s knuckles should not come off the floor, and special care should be given to this detail.
Remind students to tap when they feel pressure, and do NOT wait until they feel pain. Children often have hyper flexible joints and may not feel any pressure. It is important to supervise the movement to stop the child before an injury.
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