Nothing as Dear as Life

 Distance learning or no distance learning, I was determined my Dance Production class would create a dance together this fall, as they did last year…

When we came back to school, I first told them their semester would have two main focal points: the first was “screendance,” or dance-for-video (for obvious reasons – there was not a chance that we would be able to perform in person this semester) – I mentioned that dance-for-screen is truly how our art form is evolving these days, all over the world, and our task is to show that we can still do meaningful work even if we can’t get on a stage…

… And the second, of course, was dance responding to meaningful issues – I quoted Nina Simone that “an artist’s duty is to reflect the times” and said that dance can be a part of changing the world, whether we dance for resistance or uplift. I told them that we usually create a dance together on some issue, and that last year we went through a long process of consensus-building to get to an issue everyone agreed on – but that this year, it seemed imperative that we needed to respond to the #BLM movement.... and they all were completely on board with that (not a surprise, actually, knowing these students and how focused they can be on social justice issues).

So from there, my role was mainly to help them organize their ideas – I got them into breakout rooms to talk about ideas for the general shape of the dance, out of which came the general consensus that it should start with solos (some said “like our chain dance from last year) then grow through small groups to end with the whole class dancing together in unity, as well as the idea of using quotes by civil rights activists to lead off each section.

I then took lots of suggestions for music and title ideas, and narrowed them down through multiple polls. We narrowed down the music choices for solos (or duets, for those who wanted to work in a pair) to three, and each dancer or pair of dancers chose their music and which name they would honor. I asked who was up for choreographing the small-group sections, and six dancers stepped up, serendipitously all seniors.

For the ending section with everyone, I asked the four seniors who were veterans of last year's class to choreograph (that was one of my only real inputs in the process). My role from there was setting the small groups (three of them, two choreographers each) and facilitating the rehearsals. The small groups naturally happened in breakout rooms, with many of the choreographers sending their dancers videos to practice with outside of class; for the full-class rehearsals,  facilitating on Zoom meant a lot of watching everyone and checking to see if they all understood which foot and hand the choreographer was using, since some screens come out reversed and things can be really confusing! And of course, once rehearsals were done, I spent a lot of time nagging kids to get their videos to me for editing (they all had three to turn in: one solo or duet, one small-group section, and one for the final, full-class coda), and editing them all together (this was by far the most complex video-editing project I had ever done!).

The piece came out to over ten minutes long, and was beautiful in the variety and passion of their dancing… My one and only choreographic input was the very end – after the choreographer of the very last section ended the whole dance with a long slow movement, reaching toward the camera, I thought it would be nice to bring in the photos of those they honored, one by one… I proposed that to the class, they liked the idea so we went with it – otherwise, as usual, the dance was entirely theirs, I functioned only as facilitator and video editor.

I was incredibly proud of what they did – the dance was powerful, and reminded me more of my class at EOSA, who created their dance on youth killings in Oakland all those years ago, than any other class I have taught since…  and I hope that this experience creating such a serious and socially relevant dance (even virtually) may stand us in good stead for next year’s class and beyond. 

more choreography projects on Zoom

 We only had time for four choreography projects for the Jazz 1 (Beginning dance) class, owing to the 4x3 schedule and having to condense the entire year’s curriculum into one semester. For the third project I wanted to give them a version of the project that is usually our fall semester final – contrasts in tempo, level, and size/range. I usually introduce this one with a quote from Doris Humphrey about staying away from “the deadly middle.” In this situation, I figured that three elements in one project was really too much for Zoom, so I concentrated on the two that we hadn’t already covered (tempo and size/range). Unfortunately, even the two different elements made life too complicated for our distance learning world, as this was our least successful project – only a few groups truly showed what I would consider real contrasts or opposites in both tempo and  size… perhaps showing real size contrasts is just too much for small spaces! So this is the only project I plan to change for my 4th-period Jazz 1 class, which meets during the spring semester – I think I will revert to the simple tempo variations project which is usually the lead-up to the contrasts final when we are in person.

Difficult third project notwithstanding, I was not about to let go of our usual year-end final: narrative form. This one is important to me, as it really helps set the students up for the idea that creating dances is not just about creating interesting steps, but is also a form of communication… I set this one up the usual way, with a video observation of a few short narrative dances or excerpts: a large chunk of Paul Taylor’s Snow White, the final crypt scene from Romeo and Juliet (I have the ABT version, with Natalia Makarova), and the “Rosa Parks” section of Gordon Parks’ Martin. Then I just set them in groups (in this case, in breakout rooms) with the instructions that they are to use movement only to tell a story – whether a famous story that we all know (like Snow White or Romeo and Juliet), something from history (like Rosa Parks), something from their own lives, or something they make up. I remind them that a real story has a beginning, a middle, and an end, and something has to actually happen – but beyond that they are free to create whatever story they would like.

Of course, the added difficulty this year is that it is so much harder to tell a story when none of the dancers are in the same place… But some of the groups came up with very creative solutions to the problem of narrative on Zoom! One duet used a bear costume
and multiple virtual screens to dance Goldilocks and the three bears. Another pair created a story about a girl drowning in the ocean and getting saved, and managed to throw the life-preserver (actually a big round pillow that they both had in their houses) from one screen to the next. And a quartet used extensive (and well-planned) video editing to tell the story of Cinderella – my favorite part was how they took advantage of two of the dancers having similar staircases in their houses, so that Cinderella could lose her shoe in one scene and the prince could find a shoe on (what appeared to be) the same staircase in the next scene! There was much creativity all around, and I was so happy that they finished the semester this way!

distance learning choreography projects (1)

 Okay, about those choreography projects… Last spring, in emergency distance learning mode, I gave in and figured out assignments that each student could create and post individually – for the Jazz 1 students, I reverted to the Cinquain project (which I had originally planned to be the 4th-quarter lead-up project before the narrative final), in which they create their own simple poem in cinquain form, then create a dance to it; for Jazz 2, I made up a dancing with objects assignment, for students to find one thing in their houses to create a dance around (I have Wendy Jones from Lowell High School in SF to thank for the idea for that one).

But when this year started, with no prospects of going back to in-person in the dance room anytime soon, I was determined that this year’s students would not miss out on the concepts and curriculum I have refined over all of these years! So, somehow, we needed to be able to complete our choreography projects remotely. Due to breakout rooms, it mostly worked – the trick was finding the projects that were at least not too confusing to do over Zoom!

Jazz 1 began with our usual axial and locomotor movement / directions and facings project. I explained to the class, as I always do, that beginning choreographers tend to do a lot of movement in one place, facing the audience, so this project is designed to break them of that habit right away. The three main elements of the assignment were: 1. have a good beginning and ending; 2. do at least as much traveling movement as movement in one place; and 3. do at least as much movement facing sideways or backwards as facing your audience/camera. (I usually also require traveling movement in multiple directions, but this time I figured that getting any amount of real locomotor movement would be as much as I could hope for in their small spaces.) I made the assignment sheet that I usually hand out physically to each group into a PDF file, posted on their Google Classroom page so that they could keep referring to it, and I also reminded them of those three main points every time I saw them! They worked on their projects in groups in breakout rooms, and I recorded them in their breakout rooms as well. Instead of watching each others’ projects performed in real time in the dance room, students were asked to choose four of their classmates’ recordings to watch and respond to. All things considered, it worked out as well as I could have hoped for.

The second choreography project was a challenge – again, I did not want to completely give up on my usual Shapes and Levels project! I think it is the one project I have carried through all of my years of teaching, having gotten it from my master teachers during my student teaching year… I love it for the second project because after letting them use whatever music and steps they like for the first project (to get them hooked on the idea of creating together), I then hit them with a project that does not depend on “steps” and uses only amorphous background music – and it often seems to turn their thinking in a new direction and jolt them into new ideas of what choreography can be. The usual form is to create a dance of at least six group still shapes, three symmetrical and three asymmetrical, incorporating low and high levels, and using movements only for transitions.

Of course, the immediate problem here is that we can’t create anything like the group still shapes we would have in the dance room – I had to think differently about shapes myself! So I looked up some dance performances created through Zoom, and took some screen shots of interesting shapes to share with the students. I did still require symmetry and asymmetry for the assignment (I found plenty of examples in the screenshots), and asked for at least some changes in level; but I also asked them to think about using things we couldn’t ordinarily do in person – such as proximity to the camera, or reaching body parts across screens – to make their shapes interesting.  Some of the groups did some excellent work for their second-ever choreography project!

“Othering” — beginning to form the dance

For our collaborative dance, we had managed to come to a consensus on a theme — “othering.” So, now to begin the dance! Again, I started by having the dancers write: since art is most powerful when it has an element of the personal, write about how othering affects your life or those around you, or what aspect holds the most meaning for you… (Of course, with the caveat to share only as much as they felt absolutely comfortable sharing.) I am always astounded at how my students can open up their hearts on the page — and this group showed me again how thoughtful they can be.  I read stories of racism and stereotyping of Blacks, Asians, Latinos, and Muslims, of sexism and homophobia… But beyond the personal stories, students grew analytical:some mused on othering as the root of all bullying, or on how oppressed peoples internalize their oppression; one wrote that othering connects all violence, and about how it “has become normalized; it’s become natural to see the white man degrading the black man… to hear about the raping of women… to push around the kid who doesn’t have enough money… then say ‘it’s human nature.’”

I also asked for ideas of how they would portray this issue in dance, and for their opinion of my role as teacher (i.e., should I choreograph a section, or just help to organize their ideas?). There emerged a general consensus on the basic shape of the dance — nearly everyone mentioned beginning in small  “us vs. them” groups, then ending hopefully, in unity and empowerment. One dancer proposed that to show empowerment, all would freeze and “one person could be dancing to show how a movement only needs one person to start,” then the others join — a powerful image!

As to my role as their teacher, it seemed at first that these budding choreographers didn’t fully trust their own skills, as nearly everyone said they would like me to choreograph at least part of the dance, and they could “add our own touches.” But then…

I came to them with a general shape of the dance, based on all they had written and discussed: beginning with one group representing he “majority” culture, then various smaller groups entering and being somehow dominated or swallowed up by the majority, and finally the lone dancer stepping forward to rebel and start the unity phrase for others to join… And that is when these lovely students took the dance and ran with it, as one dancer spoke up: “I think we should start with the smaller “othered” groups before the dominant group comes in to take them all over…” There was general consensus on that being the better idea, and just like that the class took ownership of their dance!

Next we got into small groups for the first section. I divided them mostly by movement style, making sure that the “dominant” group (I resisted the term “majority,” since straight white males are in no way an actual majority) was made up of dancers who had said they would be okay with that. Their first prompt for group work was simply to come up with some distinctive movement for their own small group phrase — and this is where the dancers began to truly make it their own. Although I hadn’t specified any focus for the various small groups, each group came up with its own population to focus on, and with it an idea for their group’s denouement… One group focused on homophobia and gay rights, and decided that they would fight back when the dominant group tried to swallow them up. Another group chose racism, specifically directed at Blacks and Asians, and determined to create their movement with ribbons which the dominant group would snatch away as if to erase their cultures. And the last group chose to portray immigrants, and imagined that the dominant group would scatter them to the corners of the stage, symbolizing family separation — and that separation would be the “last straw” which would inspire one dancer to step forward in solidarity. They got to work in their groups, and fairly quickly created some movement for the first section — the collaboration was on its way!

Full-class collaboration – finding a theme and a consensus

Now that I have a real Dance Production class again, I decided that instead of teaching them a dance for their one full-class performance piece, I would set them on a collaborative project…  and one connected to something meaningful. The last time I tried something like this was with my last few DP classes at EOSA (including the class who created a powerful piece about youth killings in Oakland). After taking a workshop on theme-based projects at last year’s NDEO conference, and reading a couple of new articles about social justice projects, I was anxious to revive the idea – and I knew that this group of dancers, who are relatively inexperienced in dance but amazingly focused and serious about their choreography, would be ready to take it on.

So, as I have done in the past, I started with student writing. This time, we began very simply, with the dancers just listing some social justice issues they might be interested in creating dances about (some chose to write in more depth about actual choreography ideas, but most did just list some issues, as that was all I had asked). The issues they raised ran the gamut, from environmental destruction to domestic violence to racism and police brutality to xenophobia… So then came the hard job of deciding what issue we could all focus on. I told them I wasn’t going to just have them vote, that I didn’t want to go with majority rule because majority rule often leaves a minority unsatisfied (and after all, majority rule was just fine with chattel slavery in this country for two-and-a-half centuries) – instead, we needed to somehow come to consensus.

I started by having them get into small groups to talk about what commonalities they could find among all those social issues. The small groups then shared out to the whole class — some of what they talked about included “nearly everything connects with violence”… “many of these issues involve a hierarchy”… “absolute power connects a lot”… I posted their thoughts that I had written down onto Google Classroom (I hate how Google is taking over the world, but I have to admit GC has become a convenient tool), and asked them to think overnight about how we might tie all their issues together. The next day, after another brief discussion of what I had heard them say the day before, I mentioned the concept of “othering” — “us vs. them” — and asked if they thought it might actually be the common denominator to all their issues (I didn’t want to impose any ideas on them too quickly, but on the other hand we did have to find consensus at some point!). All agreed… We had found our idea!

Motif and development

Although none of my students have fully experienced all the elements of dance yet — last year we primarily focused on Space, with one Time unit (tempos) — I still wanted to jump my Dance Production class ahead into some work with forming before they take on creating full dance for the fall showcase. So for their first composition project, I tried them on motif and development. I had thought of giving them a strict theme-and-variations form, but decided against it because this is a pretty creative group and I wanted to give them the freedom to mix up their movements a bit (I do plan to give the Dance 2 class the strict theme-and-variations project later in the year, to set them up for further work if they continue on to Dance Production next year). They completed their projects with somewhat mixed results, but for the most part at least successfully enough to know that they did grasp the concept.

For lead up lessons, we began with each dancer creating a personal phrase using an accumulation process of seven elements, then editing them down to five (the seven elements were: 1. make a fabulous twisted shape; 2. look somewhere in the room and travel to it; 3. reach out, fold in; 4. your "signature movement"; 5. a turn; 6. a jump or spring; and 7. a variation on your fabulous twisted shape). The next day in the week was a short day, so we used it to play the Adverb game with an already-learned phrase from their lyrical dance. The next day we reviewed the personal phrases created the first day, then manipulated them with various choreographic devices (tempo, size, level, repetition, range, embellishments, retrograde...).

The project was: create a dance motif of eight distinct movements, then expand it into a dance three times as long using any of the devices we worked on — and you must show your motif in its original form, in unison, somewhere in the dance. I also required instrumental music, so as not to distract them from the movement variations and development. As mentioned, the projects were somewhat mixed, but overall pretty well – some came out beautifully, while even those that were a bit less successful in the extent of their motif development at least showed enough movement variation that I believe they did at least understand the concept well enough to use it in the future.

One trio began with quick, intricate arm gestures on a standing level, then ended on a seated level with their arm gestures huge and in super slow-motion. They chose to perform in silence rather than spend time choosing music (I loved that, it is so rare!) – if that happens again, I hope to have time in the showings to try the dance with a selection of different musical choices. Another trio essentially performed a strict theme and variations: they began with their motif phrase in unison, then each dancer performed it in turn with each solo growing progressively slower and bringing in each dancer’s personal movement style. One duet used repetition and canon form to develop their motif; a quartet began with their motif in call-and-response form, then ended the dance by repeating it in unison; and another quartet began with a walking pattern moving from a line into a diagonal, then ended by retrograding the walking pattern from the diagonal back to the line.

In general, I might have liked to see a bit more development of each motif, but for the first project of the year they did fairly well. I will be interested to see how this class progresses!

first choreography projects — energy qualities for Dance 2

After a couple of weeks of technique (basic jazz for Dance 1, more complex jazz for Dance 2, lyrical for Dance Production), we moved into our first creative work / choreography unit. The Dance 1 classes started with Directions and Facings — simple and accessible for new dance students who have never created before, and which I wrote about at about this time last year...

While the Dance 1 classes are focusing primarily on the element of Space, I plan to emphasize the element of Force/Energy in the Dance 2 class. To that end, we began with a lesson on smooth and sharp — beginning with concrete images ( float down a smooth-flowing river, slash through a jungle, hiccups...), then using action words to find movements that can be done both smoothly and sharply — then moved on to further qualities of movement. I know that (at least according to Blom and Chaplin) there are as many movement qualities as there are adjectives in the dictionary, but for the purposes of this unit I focused on six: sustained/smooth, percussive/sharp, swinging, suspended, collapsing, and vibrating (which are the same qualities I learned from my master teacher, Marcia Singman, at Berkeley High school when I was student teaching, long before I learned much about creative dance teaching). The group project was simple: create a dance showing clearly at least three of these movement qualities, but making one the most important.

The Dance 2 class is small, so they worked in groups of 2 - 4, and I was intrigued by the variety of movement choices in their projects. One quartet created a dance in the form of a traditional Tahitian ‘aparima, with mostly sustained movements punctuated with some percussive arms and vibrating hips. Another group created a narrative about one person controlling a group, using percussive movement to carry the dramatic elements.

A third group began as a trio, with a lovely abstract dance of sustained in contemporary style punctuated with collapsing and percussive accents. Partway through the creating and rehearsal process, one dancer rejoined the class and this group after being sick at home for most of the week. The original trio was about to try to teach her all their movement in one day... but I told them my story about Balanchine’s Serenade — how one dancer was late to rehearsal, ran in midway through the dance and took her place, and how Balanchine kept the dancer arriving late as a central image and perhaps the most iconic element in a very famous dance. I always appreciate an opportunity to tell this story, because it is such a perfect example of how you can turn rehearsal difficulties to your advantage to make your dance more interesting and creative. So after hearing this little pep-talk, the group created a coda to their dance in which the original trio froze while the fourth dancer entered, weaving around and through them, and releasing them to exit as she circled each one in turn; the dance ended with this last dancer sinking to the floor in a low shape. It was lovely, seeming to imply a subtly mysterious narrative — and perhaps the group learned something lasting about working with what comes...

Dance Production class — creative work and meaning...

I’m afraid I’ve fallen behind in writing again — my classes are already starting their second creative work unit, and I haven’t written about the first one yet! More on that later, but first...

This past Friday we started some explorations and improvisations. Since we never got to non-unison forms with last year’s classes (except for choreographing a bit of canon and antiphonal into their ballet performance piece, just so they’d know what they are), I planned to have both the Dance 2 and Dance Production classes take them up this year... but in slightly different ways: while I plan to give the Dance 2 classes a fairly straightforward composition project (create a short dance that includes unison, canon, and antiphonal forms), I wanted to add a bit of an element of meaning to the Dance Production project. My goal is always to move student choreographers beyond just making cute or flashy steps to their favorite songs, and into thinking about what they are expressing; so for the class that will be working intensively on their own choreography to put on stage later in the semester, I hope to at least move them somewhat in that direction in every short project — although I am still a bit unsettled as to exactly how to word it in this one (something like “find a reason for your movement to be in call-and-response form,” perhaps? or just “make your dance about something”?)

On Friday both the Dance 2 and Dance Production classes warmed up with “one moves, the other doesn’t” — improvising in pairs, with one partner moving while the other freezes, and either partner can control the action by freezing or beginning to move at any time — essentially an exercise in being sensitive to and keeping careful track of your partner. We then played a little shape tag and practiced movement conversations before composing a brief duet with only one requirement: all movement must be in antiphonal form, with only one dancer moving at a time.

The compositions were very quick — with our short classes, we ended up with only 2 - 3 minutes for actual creating time. The Dance 2 class treated it as a pure movement exercise, with an interesting variety of movement. But what fascinated me was how the Dance Production class turned their brief compositions into miniature dramatic studies: while one pair skipped, leaped and beckoned each other across the room like two children playing leapfrog, another pair alternated one partner’s harsh, angular movement with the other’s limping, melting retreats — both implying, if not a storyline, at least a definite emotional character to their dances. Even in these very short studies, perhaps this bodes well for the kind of work this group might be inclined to do later in the year!

new school year

Well, the new school year is well under way already (school starts so much earlier than it did in my day!). My dance program is growing — I now have two beginning dance classes (Dance 1), one intermediate (Dance 2), and one Dance Production class.

A big difference this year, besides the newly differentiated courses, is that I started my classes on the first day (last year there was a substitute for the first two weeks while the district decided on whether to actually hire a dance specialist). Whether because of that, or because we have now established a bit of a culture of dance in the school and students have a better idea what to expect, my new beginning students seem to be, as a whole, more focused and serious about the class than even last year’s group… Pretty much every day , everyone or nearly everyone in class is dressed and participating, following directions, and taking technique corrections and choreography advice in stride (which in theory is supposed to be routine, but doesn’t always happen in real life). I am already thinking about how to further differentiate my daily dance practice grades, since full credit for being on time, dressed, and participating to personal best has mostly everyone earning an A+ every day. Of course things aren’t perfect – it’s always hard getting beginning students not to think of creative explorations as social occasions – but for the most part, the beginners are doing quite well, three weeks into our dancing year.

The intermediate / Jazz 2 class is small (17) – unfortunately a natural consequence when the bulk of beginning students take the class to fulfill their second of two years of required PE credit, and then move on (this because the 9th graders are not allowed to take Dance for their first year of PE credit)… But those 17 seem to be quite serious about what we are doing. We have begun their first creative work unit, focusing on energy qualities (last year in Beginning was mostly about the element of Space), and it has been a pleasure to watch them tackling the subtleties around sustained, percussive, swinging, suspended, and collapsing movement and how to show them clearly in their bodies.

And Dance Production – I can only say at this point that it is going to be a lot of fun teaching this class. These are the students who earned their spots in the class by doing excellent work in their semester performance finals and by being extremely enthusiastic choreographers and performers all year long – and their enthusiasm shows every day in class. After a couple of weeks of lyrical jazz / ballet technique, I started this class’ creative work on forming with motif development. Last week they created individual phrases which they then developed with various choreographic devices, and it was wonderful to watch the wide range of movement that poured out of them – not to mention their delight at playing the “adverb game” with one of their technique combinations!

About that adverb game – it involves one group picking an adverb from my stack, doing a unison phrase in the style of that adverb (crazily, loudly, obnoxiously, whatever), and having the rest of the class try to guess the adverb. We used the first unison phrase from their class lyrical jazz / ballet dance. Since it’s a small class we just broke the class in half for groups. The first group picked “sexily” (they’re teenagers, so of course), and it took a few tries for the watching half of the class to guess the right adverb (even though a couple of students turned our lyrical phrase into something rather more Bob Fosse-ish). But the second group picked “dramatically,” and it took exactly one movement – as they all turned from facing upstage into effacé with great dramatic flair, chins raised and heads tossed – for one of the watchers to yell “dramatic!” It was a priceless moment, and it made my week!

reflections on the tempos project

I got behind on my writing as I spent a good chunk of last weekend and quite a few evenings ensconsed with my video camera and choreography rubrics, grading the tempo variations projects... But after viewing twenty-one projects (many times each), I think I can at least say I am encouraged with the results of some adjustments in the way I've been teaching it over the years.

When I first started assigning this project, way back in my student-teaching days, it was very cut-and-dried: create a 16-count movement phrase and perform the same phrase in three tempos: medium, half-time, and double-time. From this, I think students learned what half-time and double-time were — but not really very much about varying tempo for choreographic effect. In the intervening years, I had tried broadening the project by simply requiring three distinct tempos, but students often wound up with movements only marginally slower or faster (sometimes they would even ask if they could mix three songs, in slightly different tempos, so that they could stay "on the beat"). This time I did allow them to use three tempos any way they liked, but stressed very strongly how extremely different they should be ("think s-u-p-e-r slow-mo"... "think hyperspeed!").

I also expanded just a bit on the lead-up creative work this year — for many years in the past, I would give one creative-work lesson on tempo/speed, then follow up the next day by trying already-learned dance phrases in double-time and half-time; but this time I used two days for creative work on speed. And, of course, the third major change was restricting them to instrumental music.

It's hard to say which of these adjustments made the difference (probably a combination of all three), but this was the first time that I saw almost all groups using tempo variations, clearly and purposefully, the way they should be used: to make choreography more interesting and engaging. Nearly all groups clearly showed three very distinct tempos, and nearly all mixed them in some unique ways. Even groups who haven't yet gained the skill or confidence for full-out, polished performances created some lovely little studies... One group juxtaposed a slow body roll with a fast, accented arm movement in a repeated pattern; another repeated their opening movements at the end of their dance in slow-motion, creating unity and variety long before I taught the concepts; still another began their dance with slow, curling hand movements, reflected those movements with undulating torsos, then kept repeating hand and torso movements in increasingly fast tempos until they ended with fast shoulder isolations.

So... while it would be tempting to think that I simply taught the project so well this year that my students really got it for the first time, my suspicion is that what actually made the most difference was the instrumental music. I'm remembering back to when we first did the ancestors project at EOSA, and how being required to work in a new style jolted those dancers out of their hip-hop-and-Cumbia comfort zones and into an entirely new level of choreography — and I think perhaps in much the same way, having that crutch of their favorite songs taken away gave these students the freedom to think about their movement in a new way. In that case, I may have just found a good progression of projects to start my Beginning Dance classes: starting off with directions and facings, an easily accessible project danced to their requested songs, letting them begin the year in their comfort zone so as not to scare them off; then the Symmetrical and Asymmetrical Shapes project, danced to amorphous music to break them out of their comfort zones; then the tempos project, requiring instrumentals to help them continue growing and risking new ideas... We'll see how it goes from here!

tempo variations

The dance classes opened spring semester with a short creative work unit on tempo variations. I wanted to work fairly quickly on this one because we only had 3-½ weeks between the beginning of the semester and our February break (officially called "Presidents' week," unofficially "ski week"), in which to cover one creative-work unit and one world dance unit — so I asked the students to make slightly smaller groups for their choreography project in order to get it done more quickly (big groups do tend to get a bit unwieldy).

We began, of course, with a couple of lessons on tempo. The first day, I gave them a fairly extended exploration, trying various actions (tiptoe, glide, slither, twist, skip, gallop, swing, sway...) in different tempos (slower... slower... s-u-p-e-r slow-mo... faster... faster... hyperspeed!) as well as acceleration and deceleration. We tried a single movement in one count and stretched it out to 2, 4, and 8 counts; then reversed the process by making a short phrase in 8 counts then speeding it up to fit into 4 and 2 counts. We danced across the room in 8 counts, then 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2... (both of these are venerable exercises from Anne Green Gilbert's Creative Dance for All Ages, if I'm not mistaken). We had to leave out the composition piece that day because it was a very short school day.

The second day we warmed up with the "whimsical minute" — a wonderful little exercise from Blom and Chaplin's The Intimate Act of Choreography in how we perceive time: the dancers free dance very slowly, to slow music, until they think one minute has passed, then freeze; they then do the same but dancing quickly to fast music. It is always interesting to see the range of perceived minutes — there is always close to a half-minute difference between the first dancer to freeze and the last, and the times are always much shorter the second time around, with the fast movement. We then explored variations of traveling, turning, jumping, sliding, swinging, and shaking; after plenty of exploration for lots of ideas, dancers were asked to create a short phrase with just four of those actions. After they created their phrases, we tried them with the same tempo variations we had explored the previous day, then the final composition piece was to revise the phrase using one or more of the tempo variations.

The group choreography project was very simple: create a short dance (30 seconds to a minute) that uses three very distinct tempos. I specified that their medium tempo should be what they think of as "on the beat," their fast should be at least doubletime ("think hyperspeed") and their slow should be at least halftime ("think super slow-mo"). They could mix their tempos however they wished, as long as there was enough of each to register for the viewer. My last big requirement was that we would work to instrumental music — I would play them songs from my pop beats playlist, so they could use tunes they were familiar with (in the karaoke versions), but I stressed that I didn't want the words to distract them from their movement.

We are only halfway done with the showings (about half showed Thursday and Friday,  the rest will show tomorrow). So far they are mostly doing well — I'm seeing some lovely solutions to mixing tempos, turning into interesting accents. One pair that stood out for me began a fast connected turn, suddenly slowed down to complete the turn in slow motion, then sped up to repeat it quickly while letting go of the connection — very effective. My one slight disappointment so far was with one group of excellent performers who begged and pleaded to be able to perform their dance to their actual song with words (which they of course had on their phones), so I caved in and let them... The dance was obviously well-rehearsed and performed with great energy, using a variety of tempos — but it was an object lesson in song lyrics distracting from movement creativity, as so many of the movements were just mimicking the lyrics (if not taken straight from the music video) — what I would call "Mickey Mouse-ing" the movement. If nothing else, it gives me a chance to remind students in the future exactly why I will keep them working to instrumentals for a while!

pre-winter break creative work

This past week we worked on a few different (though related) concepts. We started out on Monday with the map activity — a tried-and-true lesson I learned at a workshop many years ago and have been using successfully ever since. This time we began the same as usual — draw a beginning and ending point; connect them with a pathway including straight lines, curved lines, and a zig zag; try various locomotor movements on your pathway — but when we came to adding the stopping places for still shapes and axial movements, I introduced the LOD (Language of Dance) symbols for turn, spring, and still shape. It worked well, and we had just enough time to show the resulting solos in three groups each class.

On Tuesday, we focused more on the LOD notation. I started them off with a freeze dance emphasizing traveling, turning, and a lot of variations on opening / closing, expanding / contracting, folding in / reaching out, etc. to give them a handle on what is meant by extension and flexion. I then explained to them about various forms of notation and LOD in particular, gave them the symbols for traveling, flexion, and extension to add to the three we had learned the day before (I had all 6 symbols taped to the mirror), and showed on the whiteboard how to arrange the symbols into a timeline. On backs of the maps from the day before (to save paper), students created a timeline using at least one of each of the six symbols, then took a few minutes to turn their notation into movement. They showed their solos to one partner, who followed along with the notation, and then discussed what they noticed.

Wednesday and Thursday, because of exit exam diagnostic testing (always with the testing!), we were missing all of the sophomores — about half the population of all of my dance classes — so I wanted to do a two-day project just for the juniors and seniors (and the few freshmen I have this year). I wanted to try something that we might get to next year in higher-level classes (which the seniors would miss out on), and I also wanted to do something with pairs; so I looked through my notes and found an accumulate-a-duet lesson, which I was able to adapt for my beginners... Here's how it went:

On Wednesday, we warmed up with a brief freeze dance, again using reaching, folding, turning, traveling, jumping, and still shapes. We then began a sequence of seven elements — we tried each element in multiple ways before adding it to the sequence, repeating the entire sequence with each addition. The seven elements were:
1. make a fabulous shape
2. look somewhere in the room and travel to it
3. reach out, then fold in
4. do a signature movement (your favorite move, the one you would do forever if you could only do one!)
5. a turn
6. a spring or jump (any air movement)
7. a variation of your fabulous shape
After practicing the sequence until it was settled, we then did some editing: remove any two of your seven elements, but keep the other five in the same order ("when you write an essay, you do a rough draft first then edit out all the fluff — dances need to be edited, too!"). This being  a short Wednesday, we didn't have much time for showing — the homework was to remember the edited five-element phrase for the next day.

On Thursday, we started with a very brief recap, for students to remember their phrases (and for any who were absent to catch up). Then they got into pairs, and the assignment was to combine their two five-element phrases  into one duet phrase no longer than the originals (or not much longer — I did give them the leeway to have from five to seven elements). I asked them to practice their phrases until they were really "in their bodies," because we would be fooling around with them further. We showed the duets two or three at a time, then I asked the pairs to separate (go across the room from your partner so you're not tempted to worry about shat s/he's doing").

With the partners on their own, I gave them a few choreographic devices to manipulate the phrases: size ("do it tiny... do it humongous"); tempo ("do it as fast as you can safely... start slow-motion and speed up to hyperspeed"); level ("as best you can, do it sitting down... on your tiptoes or jumping"); with different energies ("do it as if you've gone to the moon and you only weigh 20 pounds... now as if you weigh 600 pounds"); retrograde ("do it in reverse order"); and embellishment ("do it with fancy arms..."). I gave them a couple of minutes to revise their phrase using the devices they had just tried, then they showed them to their partners and discussed what surprised them in their different choices.

In general, the students did pretty well with all of the lessons. My fifth-period class in particular did some beautifully uninhibited work on Wednesday (when there were just the few juniors and seniors in class) — when we tried on a few fabulous shapes, many of them did low-level shapes without being asked (something I don't see much with beginning classes), and then continued the pattern with the traveling, crawling, rolling and spiderwalking across the floor. All in all, it felt good to be able to get a few days of creative work into them before winter break, and I hope we will be able to continue some of these concepts as we go along.

End-of-semester dilemma

Planning the end of this semester turned out to be a bit of a dilemma for me. Coming from Oakland, I was used to having two weeks after winter break before finals — ample time for a few improv lessons and a final choreography project. Most of my years at EOSA, my fall semester final was a dance mapping and notation project: after leading in with the map activity then practice describing steps and movements, groups would notate their own choreography using dance vocabulary, musical beats, and pattern maps.

After attending a wonderful workshop on the Language of Dance (LOD) this fall, I got excited about trying the project in a whole new way. In the workshop, we learned a few basic LOD symbols (shape, travel, turn, spring, flexion, extension, stillness) and how to use them in a timeline; we then created solos by arranging the symbols as a starting point. It was an engaging new way of working for me, so I planned to try turning that notation part of my usual assignment upside-down — instead of first choreographing steps and then notating them with descriptions, my students would arrange the LOD symbols to build their dances, and only then fill out the movement physically. I was anxious to try out the project in a whole new way...

Unfortunately, my new district starts and finishes the school year (and fall semester) one week earlier, leaving only one week after winter break to prepare for finals. It just felt too weird to me to have a two-week vacation in the middle of a creative work / choreography project; to top it off, I would also be missing all of my sophomores (about half the students in all my dance classes) for testing during two days of this week, making it even harder to feel that we had time to do a notation and mapping project justice. So I somewhat reluctantly decided to switch gears entirely and have a performance final instead, letting students choose one or two of the dance styles we have studied this semester (basic jazz, the Thriller jazz dance, and Lindy hop / Big Apple) to perform in class — which they could easily review in the one week after break. In the meantime, we could still work on some of the mapping and LOD concepts this week.

What feels uncomfortable for me in this is that I’ve only gotten my classes through two choreography projects this semester. There are a number of reasons for that — for one, we started the school year two weeks late, then took an extra two weeks out of the curriculum to work on the Thriller dance (which was entirely worth it, both for making the program visible and for student buy-in); we also took longer on both creative work units than I have in the past, for the sake of allowing enough time to not rush the choreography — but in that “technique vs. creative work” dichotomy, the creative work seemed to be falling behind.

On the other hand, what came out of the dilemma was perhaps a new way of thinking about teaching creative dance and improvisation for me. In the past, the bulk of my creative dance lessons have been connected to a few elements, as lead-ins to group choreography projects; but this week, we were able to do four days of creative work for its own sake, not tied to a project, and that actually felt very freeing. We did dance mapping and a brief introduction to the LOD symbols and timeline (which I hope to return to in small ways throughout the year), as well as a two-day duets project for the small classes while the sophomores were out testing (more about all those lessons in the next post). I now think that this is a direction that I can and should explore further — while I surely will continue to  teach creative work units, with specific lessons leading into choreography projects, I am intrigued by the possibility of introducing more elements and more creative dance work into the “in-between” times. Perhaps this will turn out to be a new way of finding opportunities to infuse creative work into the curriculum!

Reflections on the Shapes project — open minds...

We finished the Shapes project last week — using symmetrical and asymmetrical group shapes, transitions, and various levels, danced to amorphous background music. The last journal entry before Thanksgiving break asked students to reflect on their experience creating a dance starting from still shapes rather than steps to music, and whether it helped them to discover anything new about dance. This is often a difficult project for high school dancers — so many students think of dance as what they see on music videos, and the idea of creating a dance that is not responding to a particular song is completely foreign to them. Even so, I found almost universally positive responses in the journal entries — here is a small sample:

"I did discover new ways of dance forms. Dance really just expands further and further..."

"This project was interesting for me because I never really had to create shapes in a choreography before... [it] helped me learn that there is more to dance than just steps."

"I'm used to fluid, constant movements to the beat of a song — it was almost eye-opening trying to come up with this choreography. It made me realize that dance isn't all about the leaps and turns. I always forget that dance is a form of creativity and not always a competitive sport."

"Every dance that I saw was beautiful. The dances reminded me of nature... Like the wind, trees, and so on. Every dance was unique and original. I discovered that there can be a dance to anything, whether it's the wind blowing in the trees or a song."

Hooray for minds opened to new ways of making dance!

technique vs. improvisation / composition

Saturday morning I attended a collegial brunch for east bay dance teachers, organized by the California Dance Education Organization. There were four of us from public schools scattered around the east bay from Richmond to Antioch, along with two graduate students studying dance pedagogy at Mills College and a handful of undergrads from UC Berkeley who teach in various elementary schools and private programs in Berkeley.

It is always gratifying to be able to connect with other dance teachers, since — unlike math or English teachers — we are usually the only ones on our campuses. There were of course some lively conversations about our programs, upcoming events, and the like... But the most interesting discussion for me was the perpetual dilemma of how much technique instruction and improvisation/composition work we include in our classes.

I come to the subject from a long-time focus on moving student choreographers beyond the "cute steps to cool music" stage. At the high school where I did my student teaching years ago, the program had been focused almost entirely on improvisation and the principles of composition — and I could certainly see the difference in the sophistication of the student choreography. When I observed the performances at other high schools, I saw that the dancers were technically proficient, but their dances were essentially collections of their favorite steps and flashy tricks, usually performed in unison; whereas the students at my student-teaching school were using canon and antiphonal forms, varied groupings, and a wide range of moods and qualities... and more than that, their dances often had personal meaning (beyond "these are my favorite moves"). So from the very beginning of my public school career, I knew which direction I wanted to go.

But it is that mix — how much technique work? How much improvisation? — that is difficult to get just right. One of my colleagues, who originally came from a contact improvisation background, said that she has gravitated more and more towards technique over the years (even though she finds it much more difficult to teach), because her students so much want to learn steps and phrases and dances... and she wants her classes to be joyful. I certainly can't disagree — in my experience, students who begin dance as teenagers expect to be taught steps and movements, and are uncomfortable with improvisation until they have a fair amount of experience under their belts. (Although, in my work in East Oakland, I had more of a dichotomy between the boys and the girls: the boys loved improvisation, since many of them already practiced improvisational street dance forms such as TURF dance; while the girls tended to look at me as if I'd lost my mind when I asked them to improvise).

And yet and yet... as a choreographer, I can't forget the difference in the dances of students trained in the craft of choreography and the elements of dance — and helping students to create meaning will always be a priority for me. My compromise is that I work in units and I try to do about half-and-half: every technique unit is followed by a few directed improvisation lessons, leading into a choreography project. It worked for me at EOSA (although I did always get those girls complaining about explorations when "you haven't taught me how to dance yet," eventually they got the creation bug)... and so far at DeAnza, my beginners have been remarkably open to exploring the elements and working on choreography (maybe because more of them have some studio experience already?). I will be interested to see how my thinking evolves as I work in my new program...

Shapes and levels

Now that Hallowe'en and Thriller are over, we're back to creative work and choreography. This time we're taking up shapes and levels, which is a project that I've been using since I first started teaching, which I actually got from Susan Brown, one of my master teachers when I was student teaching. I'm not sure how it gels with creative dance teaching theory, since it focuses on two different dance elements — but I do like the way it gets beginning choreographers out of the "cute steps to favorite songs" rut right off the bat.

Over the years, I have done some refining of my creative work lessons leading up to the project. We began the week with a lesson on Level, starting with a basic freeze dance, focusing on shapes in various levels and shape copying ("make a high twisted shape… change it by changing one arm… one knee… look at E___'s shape and copy it… make your shape turn, make your shape jump, make your shape travel… Drop your shape and make a low, wide shape…"). We then took up the Erosion Game partner activity — one partner takes a high shape, the other partner molds him/her into a lower shape then copies it to be molded in turn… After four or five changes from high level to low level, the composition is all the shapes performed in unison, eroding to the ground. Simple but effective (and students always enjoy working with partners).

The second day, we worked on shapes and shape transitions. After a very brief recap freeze dance, we built on the previous day's work with shape copying for some Shape Tag — half the class freezes in a still shape while the other half dances around and through them, "tagging" a still dancer by copying her shape — with lots of giggles from the dancers as they found shapes to copy; then we worked on transitioning into and out of shapes. This is important to get dancers out of just dropping a shape and taking up the next one — so we did a lot of explorations with specific transitions: "melt out of your shape, glide to a new spot, and wiggle back into it… explode out of shape #1, gallop to a new spot and then stretch into shape #2…"

The third day we worked specifically with symmetry (and asymmetry) — we started by looking at some photos of symmetrical shapes in dance, then tried some of the "Man-on-a-stick" improv from Blom and Chaplin's book The Intimate Act of Choreography (what would we ever do without Blom and Chaplin?). Then we worked in pairs with some mirroring and trying a few symmetrical and asymmetrical shapes; and then each pair joined with one or two others to try a few group shapes.

After the three days of exploration, the group project began on Thursday: Create a dance that includes at least six group still shapes (at least three symmetrical and three asymmetrical) plus transitions between shapes, using a variety of levels. I always caution the students that we will be practicing these to amorphous instrumentals without a strong beat, as the starting point for the dance should be the shapes and not steps to music. I usually get a fair amount of whining about that part, but this time only a couple of groups asked about being able to use particular music (I just told them "let's get your dance set first, then think about it"), and for the most part all groups have dived in and gotten off to a good start. We hope to be finished the end of this coming week (though not sure, since it's only a three-day week) — I'm anxious to see how their dances come out!

first creative work unit: directions and facings

For years, I have asked my Beginning Dance students to use various devices (repetition, changing the order of steps, adding embellishments with arms, etc.) to expand on our class jazz phrase for their first choreography project. I always did it this way to make it easier for students who had never danced before and who may not feel confident about creating their own movements. I also liked to get across the concept that a dance can be created out of just a few steps, repeated and rearranged in different ways, to get away from the tendency of beginning choreographers to just keep making up more and more steps with no sense of unity — my first assignment sheet always said "the purpose of this assignment is to discover how much dance material you can make from only a few steps: building a dance out of a few movements, repeated in different ways, allows the end to relate back to the beginning, and helps the dance make sense as a whole."

But this year, starting the year in a new school, I decided to start with basic dance elements instead and see how it goes (definitely saving that part about discovering how much dance you can make from a few steps for a later project, because it is very important). We focused on locomotor and axial movements, using various facings and traveling directions — beginning with a few days of exploration and improvisation, of course! The first day we worked on locomotor versus axial movement: creep around the room... melt and rise in place... melt and rise while traveling… do a turn that travels… a turn in place… find another turn in place… Then adding sequences (glide backwards, twist in place, hop sideways...) and a very short solo composition, shown to one partner. The next day we worked on traveling directions, starting with the "walk in straight lines" exploration from Blom & Chaplin's Moment of Movement ("walk simply in straight lines… vary the speed…"), adding backwards, sideways, and diagonal directions as well as various actions and variations. The third day we explored facings of the room with partners and ended with a short pair composition before breaking into groups to begin their choreography project.

The project was pretty simple: create a short dance that uses locomotor movement in at least three directions and that uses movement in at least four facings. They worked on it for about a week and a half — ordinarily, I try to get projects done in about a week, but since they were consistently working hard on their compositions and felt they needed more time to perfect them, I let them have it (it would have been different if they had been wasting time, but almost all groups had started working right away and kept on planning and practicing through all the time I gave them.

In the end, I was very pleased with the variety of their work... Even though most of my students are beginners, especially with composition, many groups were spontaneously using variations in level and tempo and lots of interesting pattern changes… And because of the facings requirement, many groups began their dances facing upstage, which is a somewhat unusual choice for beginning choreographers. I will be interested to see how their work progresses!

end-of-season at the studio: creative dance!

Last weekend finished the season at the dance studio. Since the spring recital was in the beginning of June, I had the rest of the month (three Saturdays) to do nothing but creative dance lessons (this is a neighborhood dance studio where parents send their kids to learn ballet, jazz, and tap — so all through the year I use as much creative work as I can, but the focus is on technique). I considered devising some work that would build and deepen over three weeks; but then I remembered how spotty attendance can be in June, as families take off on vacations, and thought better of it… So I took it as an opportunity to pick some of my favorite lessons that could work as "one-offs" to see how they would work with the studio kids. It turned out to be a joy to watch these dancers, immersed in technique throughout the year, throw themselves open to creative work.

Because of the low attendance after the show we combine classes, which means a pretty wide range of ages working together — so I kept all the lessons pretty general in terms of level. The first week I brought along my bag of scarves for the "magician and scarf" lesson — beginning with a brief Brain Dance in a circle, then an exploration with partners, one partner manipulating the scarf while the other imitated the scarf's movements in her own body (I guided them with wiggle, float, stretch-squash, fold-unfold, and spiral/circle); we also practiced trading the scarves, and still shapes with both partners attached or touching the scarf, using different levels and sizes. The composition was short and simple: begin with a scarf-attached shape, then each partner choose one movement from the exploration as leader ("magician") for the other partner to follow (be sure to trade the scarf in an interesting way), and finish with another scarf-attached shape.

The next week the youngest classes worked on size/range contrasts, while all the other classes tried the "map dance": draw a beginning and ending point; then a pathway from beginning to ending including some curved lines, some straight lines, and at least one zigzag; then add stopping places for still shapes, axial movements, and jumps (we did three for the younger classes, five for the older kids) — then practice the dance you drew! Since we hadn't done much creative work for a while, we warmed up with a freeze dance incorporating lots of elements to pull them out of their ordinary technique habits… In our short (half-hour) classes, when it came time to show, almost everyone danced with their maps still in hand — but all were engaged and there was some lovely and surprising work (one student chose to make her beginning point in the bathroom so that she could enter from offstage…).

Last week, we worked on shapes and levels with the "erosion game," again in pairs… We began as usual with a general freeze dance to warm up, this time focused on shape copying; then partners took turns molding each other from a high-level shape to a somewhat lower-level shape, copying the shape, and being molded in turn, until they reached the floor. The composition was the five or six shapes it took to go from high to low, performed in unison. Although the class was too short to go deeply into the exploration, still there were some unusual shapes and movements in the compositions… and because of the combined classes, we had some interesting pairings as well (it was very sweet to see one 7-year-old little girl working with her 12-year-old brother).

It was also nice to see the creative work spilling into other parts of the class… At the end of the younger classes, Angela (my former studio partner and now studio owner, since I "retired" from the studio five years ago) was finishing class with an obstacle course on the mats. Ordinarily, she would set up a dot to balance on, a circle or two to jump or hop into, a cone to run around, a tube to crawl through, and/or the "mud puddle" to leap over… but this time, she simply set up a dot, a cone, a couple of circles, and the mud puddle, and said "you know what we usually do — now take these obstacles and do whatever you want!" The first couple of kids did pretty much the usual with some minor variations — maybe balancing on the dot with one leg out to the side instead of in passé or arabesque; but the third dancer up, instead of hopping or jumping in the circle, plopped into sitting criss-cross in the middle of the circle and then crawled out on all fours. After that, the kids let loose with their ideas on manipulating a dot, a cone, a circle, and a mud puddle: running through or stomping on the mud puddle, juggling the cone, picking it up and using it as a pointy hat… So nice to see the kids letting themselves go wild!

an impromptu lesson

I haven't posted much recently — in a challenging year, it has been difficult to find things to write about that don't sound like complaining… But I did have a great little impromptu lesson with kids at the studio last weekend.

I have been back teaching at the studio on Saturday mornings this year – teaching some ballet (since that is what moms bring their little girls to learn) and as much creative work as I can fit in. I also occasionally sub for another teacher in the afternoons, which this close to the spring performance usually just entails cleaning up the parts of the dances kids have already learned… So I was doing just that with the advanced teens jazz class in the afternoon, when 15 minutes from the end of class, one of them mentioned “I think maybe Nicole wanted you to help us get ideas for our solos for this dance.” “Oh... you mean some improvisation to help get you started?” “Yes!” “Cool! I wish we had started a little earlier, but let’s see what we can do…”

So I quickly ran to my dance bag, took out my little pack of action-word cards, and picked out a few that I thought would fit well with mood of their dance. They were working to “Feeling Good” by Nina Simone (yay! some classic music for these teens!)… I pulled out push, pull, slither, glide, sway, and swing, along with leap, slash, explode, and stomp for punctuation. We explored those movements as much as we had time for, pairing up some actions: show me lots of ways to slither (high, low, curved paths, zigzag paths, with your heads, knees, arms...), punctuate your slithering with exploding (tiny, huge, arms only, legs only, explode inward...); and the same with push/pull and leaping, gliding and stomping, etc. We didn’t have time for a real improvisation, so I just gave them a couple of minutes to review all of the actions they had explored to see what felt good to put together; then they showed whatever very short movement phrase they had come up with, to be the basis for their solos. Some of them came up with some movements that were way out of what I would consider their comfort zones (those standard pique turns and leaps that good technical teen dancers like to fall back on) — it was such a pleasure to see them diving into their explorations with wild abandon… It was also a good teaching moment for me — I’ve long said that I could practically teach technique in my sleep, but I have to obsessively plan creative work lessons –  so it was nice to know I could pull out a successful lesson (however short) at the drop of a hat!

Directions & facings project

The composition project I gave just before winter break was pretty simple: create a dance using any steps, movements, and dance styles you like (school-appropriate, of course!), a long as you include movement that travels in at least three different directions and that faces at least three different walls or corners. We started out with a couple of days of explorations — first just reviewing axial and locomotor movement, then working with various traveling directions and axial facings. I included a lot of actions they could play with in various ways, and by the end of the second day many students were getting into the spirit pretty well.

Then they began working in groups on the composition, and I ran into a new problem: most of the 7th graders (those that were participating and working on the project, at any rate) wanted to dance to a song called "Payaso de Rodeo," which I soon discovered is the music for a simple line dance well-known in the local Mexican-American community, much the way the electric slide was well-known to mostly everyone a couple of decades ago. The dance itself does nominally fulfill the basic requirements of the project, as it travels (minimally) in four directions and faces four walls — the complete dance is: slide/chassé to the right, then left, then back, then front, then one-quarter turn to the next wall and repeat... over and over and over...

I had a very hard time getting across to them just why this wasn't okay for their project, especially since some students who hadn't been participating before actually started to join in ("but we're dancing, what do you want?"). I had to sit them down and explain that this was a creative work / composition project, that I was expecting them to create something, and that just getting up and running through a dance that I could see random people doing in innumerable YouTube videos was not creating! I used the analogy that if their English teacher asked them to create a short story based on their own experiences, using certain elements, it would not fulfill the assignment to just write down a story that everyone already knows, like Snow White or the Three Little Pigs. A few of them tried to tell me that their English teacher would be okay with that (I told them I was pretty skeptical, and that I would certainly check with their English teacher!)… They did finally get the point, chose new music, and created a dance of their own (pretty basic, but their using their own ideas at least).

This did, of course, give me an idea that what these kids really want to do in my class is something they already know how to do — which is a little weird to think about in a learning situation, but could be related to making them feel successful, or at least in their comfort zone… something to ponder for the future, at any rate.