Rebecca and Master Helsdon’s Community Service Project
Master Helsdon: Um, in case you didn’t know, this is my daughter, Ms. Becca.
Ms. Becca: Hello.
Master Helsdon: Okay. And, um, uh, her and Ms. Maddie, they started around the same time. They’ve been off of college for a bit. Uh, we have here, when you test your black belt, you have to do a public service project. Um, Ms. Becca tested for third degree black belt. I’m in the process of testing for fifth degree black belt. Right? So we have a saying around here for us leaders, you preach what you practice. So adults, if you think about the change of the words there, you never practice what you preach. That implies the opposite direction. You preach what you practice, you should be, that’s why I love parents coming out and joining. You should also be on a journey and you’re teaching others how to do that.
Master Helsdon: So even though I have to write a 20,000-word essay for my rank, um, I, I agreed. I’m gonna go in and we volunteer to do the project together ’cause we’re both testing. Okay. And now we’ll present the public service.
Ms. Becca: Fantastic! So for our project, we decided to go out and volunteer with the DuPage County Park District to cut down some invasive species. So what an invasive species is, essentially a plant or an animal that’s not native to this area. And it kind of comes in and it messes up the ecosystem. So like it’ll come in and it’ll wipe out the whole bottom of the food chain so that the rest of the food chain kind of suffers. Make sense?
Audience: Yes ma’am.
Ms. Becca: Yes ma’am. So the two invasive species that our group was focusing on were honeysuckle and buckthorn. That’s actually honeysuckle right there and buckthorn.
Kiddo 1: It looks terrifying. It’s spiky. It’s very spiky. Yeah. That’s that I never messed with.
Ms. Becca: Mm-Hmm. So Saturday and Sunday this week, me and Master Helsdon went out to the Churchill Woods and we spent a good couple hours each day cutting down the honeysuckle and the buckthorn and it’s everywhere back there. So there’s some pictures of us doing it. The one thing about these two plants, though that they do to the ecosystem is they grow so big that light and nutrients and water can’t reach the soil. So all the other plants on the bottom of the forest can’t grow.
Master Helsdon: Especially baby trees. Eventually, the trees grow big and they get knocked down by wind and lightning or the trees die. Well, new baby trees come up and grow, but this stuff takes over the bottom of the forest so thick that baby trees can’t grow. When the big ones go, you wind up with just the forest of this stuff.
Kiddo 2: Yeah. I think a forest of trees is better than a forest of whatever that is.
Ms. Becca: Yeah. It’s not from here. Honeysuckle even releases some poison into the ground that can kill the native plants.
Kiddo 1: Okay. No, I never want to touch it. Yeah.
Ms. Becca: Yeah. What we did, not that kid of poison. Yeah. Yeah. It’s okay to touch. So after we helped out at the forest preserve, we went back to our own backyard and we walked back there and we went, oh my goodness, there’s a lot of honeysuckle here. So we finished our community service hours by getting rid of the honeysuckle in our own backyard.
Master Helsdon: We haven’t finished yet.
Ms. Becca: Well, we’re starting.
Master Helsdon: We back up to the condos down here. So we got a deep lot and we’ve always left a big bramble of woods there. And now that we’re educated and see kids and you don’t know something, you don’t know it. But when you learn something and all of a sudden you see it everywhere, you realize, we went home and we’re like, I wonder what we got. And we walked back there and went, oh no, it’s all honeysuckle. So we started cutting it down. Now that we know better, I didn’t know what it was. I’m just like, it was growing there forever. Whatever. It was pretty, we didn’t see the neighbors, so we liked it, but now we’re getting rid of it ’cause now we know it’s bad, so we can’t leave it.
Master Helsdon: Question questions. What’s your question?
Kiddo 3: Um, my, there’s some book, my dad has a book in a side, so we cut it down and he let me help him use his, uh, tree cutting shears.
Master Helsdon: Cool. Yeah. Buckthorn’s got little thorns on it. Kind of like a rose.
Kiddo 3: I touched it and it pricked me with my gloves.
Master Helsdon: Yeah. I got one like that too. It happens. What else you got? Any other questions?
Kiddo 4: Yes. Um, sometimes like flowers like die. My flowers like die. He, he died in winter. Okay. And sometimes die in spring.
Master Helsdon: Yeah.
Kiddo 4: And He gets nice and brown.
Master Helsdon: And especially when you don’t water over the summer too.
Kiddo 4: Right. Uh, and he got brown. Okay. And he, and he died. He got brown.
Master Helsdon: Any other questions? On the public service project. Okay. Excellent. Thank you.
Ms. Loula: Yay.
True Balance Karate was founded in 2012 by Master Sue and Paul Helsdon. We offer specialized karate lessons for children and comprehensive fitness programs for adults, tailored to meet the unique needs of each age group.
Kids Karate Lessons
Our kids’ karate lessons are designed for:
- Pre-school children ages 3-6
- Elementary age kids ages 7 and up
These lessons are designed to develop the critical building blocks kids need — specialized for their age group — for school excellence and later success in life.
Adult Martial Arts Training
Our adult martial arts training provides a complete fitness and conditioning program for those who want to:
- Lose weight
- Get and stay in shape
- Learn self-defense in a supportive environment
About Master Sue Helsdon
Master Sue Helsdon is a certified instructor with the World Tang Soo Do Association and a certified judge. Her diverse training includes Tang Soo Do, Shotokan Karate, Kung Fu, and Qi Gong. With a background as a certified special education teacher and two master’s degrees in education, she brings extensive classroom experience to the training floor and our instructor’s education.
Master Sue is also the author of Inspired by a Black Belt; Lessons in Focus, Self-Confidence, Respect, and Self-Control. You can find her book on Amazon and visit her author page. She has written all the supplemental curriculum used in True Balance Karate’s advanced leadership training program and the comprehensive character program, True Character.
Contact Us
Our instructors are available to answer questions 24/7 at 630-912-0592. Visit us at: https://truebalancekarate.com/contact-us/ or stop by in person at 406 Ogden Ave, Downers Grove, IL 60515 (next to CVS)
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True Balance Karate proudly serves the communities of Downers Grove, Westmont, Oakbrook, Woodridge, and Lisle. Join us and experience the benefits of martial arts training in a supportive and empowering environment.
