Help with Karate?

[Monk]

Hi. I'm Courtney. I'm American and almost 18.
I have recently enrolled in a martial arts class, and I really want to do well and master what my Sensei(s) are trying to teach me.
I go two days a week, and since I'm one of the newest students and at the lowest rank (white belt), one of the senseis is assigned to teach me the basics. After I have mastered these basics, I can join the rest of the class and begin pairing off with other students to apply fighting techniques.
I want SO MUCH to make my parents and my teacher proud by doing well in this class, but I find it really difficult to memorize the steps to the movements we need to know. Usually, my sensei will give me 8-10 steps to learn. He goes over the movements many times with me, but sometimes I can only remember two or three out of eight or ten, and I sometimes make mistakes on the ones I already know. He will tell me "Do this block with your left fist, and keep your right fist touching your body". And I will do it correctly, but I can't switch to the opposite side and do the same thing. Either that, or I forget the move all together and freeze up while I rack my brain trying to remember. I understand that I'm new and I make more mistakes than people who have gone up a belt or more, but I still feel that students that are just as new as I am catch on more quickly than I do.
I also have difficulty remembering things such as "Point your fist to the center","Relax your shoulders", or "Keep your arm above your head."I forget them as soon as I am told a lot of the time, and I don't know how to train myself to remember. My mind just seems to go blank, even though I've been trying to pay attention.
Another thing is, he will tell me "Class is over. Now you can practice these skills at home," but if I can't memorize a lot of them (and they have to be in order), how am I supposed to practice?
How should I begin to conquer this?

[MontyDyspraxia]

I did kickboxing for about a year and I wasn't bad at it but I wasn't good either. My dyspraxia didn't bother me, except for once when I went to do a kick but slipped and fell hard on my bum! I mainly did it to get confidence (when you threaten to beat up your bullies with what you've learn and they run away screaming, I think you've got confidence! ) Anyway, my advice to you is to just enjoy what you're doing and don't give a darn about whether or not you can do it. Eventually, you'll learn the steps.





OK, I just realised that's really bad advice. Oh, well

[Steph]

I gave up karate as the messages always got confused halfway between my brain and my limbs and my hands would end up tangled round each other or I'd be doing actions with the wrong hand. Then again, when it comes to physical pursuits, I fail at willpower, so I would say to you to keep going-when you do eventually pick it up, it will feel so good.

[Dizzy D]

I used to do Karate but I quit because I found it to hard, but you should keep it up, I think the reason I quit is because I was doing it with my sister and although we were the same belt to start she was much better then me and I found it annoying when she kept beating me (painfully, she's not genital)

[Dyspraxic bear]

Me and my friend did karate and we are both dyspraxic we had pretty much the same problems mixing up right and left and when we made a mistake we couldn't fix it we had to have 20 tries to get it right or give up. Also memorising sequences were hard, we have a new seqence every belt and three sets of basics so one for beginners middle and advanced. But we stuck at it " we began when we were 4" and now have done well we just quit because we moved to secondary school and we don't have enough time with. Being unorganised it is opposite my school now but not my friends we got to black belt sorry if ranting or boasting I remember I hated physical contact as I hate hurting people and they were vicious and strong. Try and get it in your long term memory and don't think about power think about the movements if you know it somewhere if you let your mind wonder you amazingly will do it !!!!! practice at home