As a crowd of young onlookers watched, Noah Benevides and Ryan Dupuis traded blows to show off their passion for karate.

The UMass Dartmouth students, already well versed in martial arts, are members of the university’s Shotokan karaoke club, and were on hand to teach students the art of karate at the Fall Family Festival on September 16.

Hosted by UMass Dartmouth and Bristol County District Attorney Thomas M. Quinn III, the event is all about getting kids and families exposed to sports and physical activity.

“Field day, that was my fun thing growing up in school, so we just came up with this, well let’s have a field day,” said UMass Dartmouth Fitness Center Director Greg Homol.

He worked with former District Attorney Sam Sutter to get the event off the ground in 2009. Originally held indoors, it has since grown to take over the athletic fields on campus, with dozens of stations featuring various sports staffed by more than 100 college athletes.

“The community members seeing them and the kids hanging out with college athletes, that’s kind of exciting for them,” Homol said.

At the karate booth, Benevides, Dupuis, and other students taught passers-by a basic self-defense skill: escaping from the grab to the wrist by exploiting a weakness between one's thumb and fingers.

Elsewhere, teammates from the university’s volleyball team had games going, and teammates from other teams ran stations covering baseball, hockey, football, and other sports. Sack races and corn tosses, and sports like ultimate frisbee were also on display.

The university’s athletics department works with the Charlton College of Business to host the event.

“It’s about providing that opportunity to businesses in the region to showcase what they have to offer,” said Melissa Pacheco from the Charlton College of Business.