Call her the natural.

At 8-years-old, Lavina Burman has earned her first black belt as a student at Kung Fu Gymnastics in Wareham.

“Lavina is not only a black belt in her [age] division, she’s a black belt as an adult,” said her "sifu," a sort of coach, John Correia. “She refused to take a black belt in her category."

Lavina is also the first black belt to come out of Kung Fu Gymnastics. Lavina pursued a black belt because “I thought it was really cool when I was little," she explained.

Lavina's mother, Jacqueline Burman, took karate lessons as a kid, but said she never made it to Lavina's level.

“I am extremely proud of Lavina," Jacqueline Burman said. "It took a lot of hard work and determination for her to accomplish this goal.”

Lavina has been doing at it for three years, and is well on her way to achieving her goal of becoming a 7th-degree black belt. The first black belt is just the first step.

“A black belt means you’re generally proficient," Correia explained. "It’s the beginning of a journey."

Lavina says she's worked hard at learning her "forms" -- a series of steps that lay the foundation for more advanced moves.

“I put quite a lot of work into learning my forms,” she noted.

The student must say each step as it’s done, and some of the sequences can last more than ten minutes.

"A lot of kids don’t practice forms, they just want to fight,” said her father, Michael Burman, who teaches Jiu-Jitsu at Kung Fu Gymnastics. "You can’t become a good fighter without knowing the basics.”

As Lavina moved from the basics, to harder moves, to fighting teenagers in tournaments, it became apparent that she wasn’t going to slow down.

“The harder it got the more she liked it,” said Michael Burman.

She had her yellow belt -- the lowest belt on the totem pole -- three weeks after starting classes, and had to earn eight more belts before achieving her black belt.

While rocketing toward the most advanced level of her sport, Lavina, a Wareham resident, earns straight As a third-grade student at St. Margaret’s Regional School in Buzzards Bay.

She even has a very specific career goal nailed down: “I want to be a Porsche engineer in Germany," she said.

Lavina is a student, but she's also a teacher. At age 6, she began teaching classes to younger students, and has since moved on to teaching teen and adult classes.

“It’s kind of hard," she explained, "because the higher belts are with the lower belts."

As Lavina continues to compete in tournaments in the Boston area, her Sifu has the utmost faith in her abilities and raw talent.

Correia said simply: “She’s like a prodigy."