Below is a list of tasks I’m determiend to accomplish before the end of the semester. Most of this probably won’t make sense to someone who hasn’t climbed before but I will do my best to explain each task as I describe the steps I’m taking to meet them.
The first task on the list is the one I’m most excited about so it will be the central focus of this post. All boulders are given a grade by person who establishes them. The grades start as low as VB (B for beginner) which is followed by V0. After V0 each climb is given a higher number to reflect its difficulty. The highest grade ever assigned to a boulder is V17 and only two people in the world have ever finished it. Also, depending on where you are from grades are presented differently but I’ll be sticking to V scores as it is the most popular grading style in North America. Along with a grade all established routes are given a name in order to give them more character. This is great as it gives your climb a sense of personality just like how all of our past teachers have had names relating to their cultural background. As great as this is, some climbers take this opprotunity and run with it. There is nothing more embarrising than telling someone your current project is foot fetish 1.0 and you are hoping to get started on fart blaster 200 by the end of the year.
The problem with grades however is that they are subjective levels of difficulty and one V3 can feel like a V0 to some climbers but like a V6 to others. Climbing gyms have worked around this issue by starting to adopt colour grading systems specific to the gym’s setting team. I’ll explain this more when I get down to the third task on the list. Since, gyms don’t typically have V graded boulders it’s hard to compare indoor progress to climbers who climb at different gyms. That is where the kilter board comes in. The kilter board is a universally set board with an adjustable wall angle. This means that if you’re gym has a kilter board it will have the exact same layout as a kilter board at another gym. On top of this any climber can set problems on the kilter board as it utilizes blue tooth on your phone to project climbs using leds on specific holds. Green holds are start holds, blue holds can be used in any way the climber wants, yellow holds are for feet only, and purple holds are the finish holds and typically require two hands on them in order to consider the climb complete. If a hold doesn’t have a colour than it can’t be used. This is definitly easier to show in video so I’ve attached a video of my most recent Kilter board climb called Hard Hard which is a V3 climb. If you go to any gym with a kilter board you can use the app to connect and put on that exact climb to also give it a try. VOLUME WARNING!!!
For reference this is the second hardest climb I’ve ever done on the kilter board and the hardest I’ve ever done has also been a V3. I have the board set to a 20 degree angle which is fairly easy as it is not too much of an overhang. I just want to be able to climb a V6 so any angle will do for me.
Grades are a great way of giving a student the feeling of progression and make it very easy to track improvement. As a teacher I’d like to implement something similar into my class where I provide a difficulty level with specific questions so as students further develop their understanding they can see that they are able to tackle more challenging problems. The system would have to be fairly easy to understand while also applicable to any topic. I think the grading would be dependent on the level of application as well as effort required. Climbing is kind of funny for that because a climb can have a difficult rating but it isn’t necessarily hard it will just be longer than typical requiring a greater level of focus and endurance. This is somewhat similar to classroom problems because not all assignments are that difficult but just require an extensive amount of work in order to meet expectations. Providing grading for specific questions in order for students to visualize the difficulty of a question could also be great for encouraging goal setting where students aim to accomplish a specific level similar to how I’m striving to climb higher difficulty climbs. I will mull over the idea more as I climb on the kilter board and reflect on it more as time passes. Anyways, next post I aim to provide an update on my kilter board progress and tackle explaining how sports route grading works and differs from bouldering.
Thanks, cya in the next one 🙂
oh they do be climbin tho