An excerpt from the book I borrowed..

My Dance Blog

So prior to blogging here, I had started a while ago on Kandyan blogging on wordpress and recently published an excerpt from this incredible book I've been reading.

Dance and the Nation: Performance, Ritual, and Politics in Sri Lanka by Susan A. Reed and I must say.. there is so much to Kandyan Dance than I once thought I knew!

https://diliniseneviratneblogs.wordpress.com/2018/10/15/women-and-kandyan-dance/

Here's my favourite part:

Miriam Periris and Chandralekha Perera gave Kandyan dancing visibility and legitimacy. The fact that they had learned the dance at all - and from traditional Berava masters at that - is also an indication of the new significance dance had achieved due to the cultural resurgence. However, this should not suggest that female Kandyan dancers suddenly became common or that they became stars. In performances and tours, male dancers continued to dominate, and it was only after the dance was introduced in schools in the 1950s that female dancers began studying Kandyan dance in large numbers.

Chapter 3

Better late than never..

How Dance is Adapted 
Despite the universal language in Kandyan is the same, the adaptation has modified it (to be different)


Kandyan dane is a unique dance form. One of a kind that's predominately practised in it's origin country, Sri Lanka. The basic movements include a series of steps practised just with footwork followed by including arm movements. These are known as the absolute basic steps and there are no modifications to these steps. Various dance choreographies are created using these steps as the fundamentals and the focus on today's post will be how different yet similar in practise they are outside of Sri Lanka. 

The biggest change come with the language barrier - each step has a basic Sinhalese word(s) that go along to it that are also identified by the live drums which altogether becomes the complete step. This is easier to practise in Sri Lanka as all children understand and speak the national language of the country. However, these words and sounds become 'one.. two.. and three' when taught and practised outside of Sri Lanka. 

This is not because the practitioners and teachers don't want to pass on the knowledge as it is - this is because of the understanding of pupil. I know when I teach my students these steps in Sinhalese words, they repeat it a few times but tend to refer to them as 'Step 1 and Step 2 and so on' as time goes on. I've written it down on their weekly handouts, tell them how to pronounce these words but I can see how much ease it gives them when referring to these steps as 'steps' as the direct translation of the Sinhalese word 'Adi'. 

However, the execution of the dance movement still remains the same. There is no modification to the practise of the step itself. It is only when they address the series of steps or practise or discuss these steps, English words are involved. The examinations around the world do not focus too much on the words itself either - not every country anyway and because Kandyan is passed from generation to generation, a qualified dancer is able to teach and practise almost immediately after their Kandyan graduation. 

I personally don't mind my students identifying and connecting with the steps in whichever language they feel comfortable in, at the end of the day they still practise the same movement as every other student around the world. Traditional practitioners though, they may not feel the same way. As a teacher, my knowledge is reflected in my students: how I choose to teach them and how the student's learning process in which how they choose to learn. I can stand in front of the class until I'm blue in the face and say all the Sinhalese terminology, write them in big letter on the white board but if the learning process of this is to remember these information in the language that they understand, that's what they will take home.

Overcoming this is a challenge, weekly reminders and having the words written in English letters for readability definitely helps since Sinhalese writing is a whole different story. It's about catering to your students needs and facilitating them. If they're half Sri Lanka and half i.e. English then the parents may have decided not to practise Sinhalese at home so is it really my place to teach them Sinhalese at dance? 

Until next time.

Dils - The Kandyan Dancer 

Knowing and Learning

Sunday Sept 30th - Notes

Topic: Communication 

-    The PM discussion started off with Hannah's theme 'Trust' where she was facing issues during research and wanted to open up a discussion about how to tackle them, curious to know what everyone thought of as successful feedback from students and how to navigate through in getting them. 

I  I had an input to this where I shared the social media platform I created (@Kandyan Dancers on Facebook / Instagram / Twitter / YouTube) where I wanted to connect all Kandyan Dancers around the world under one platform. By creating this, my aim was to network with a wider dance community and gather information using social media as a tool. I shared that I was able to communicate with dancers, choreographers, practitioners as well as dance teachers through various methods using this social media platform. 

   We then focused on finding information from students being the best method for improvement due to existing professional relationships in place in classroom. Because the student knew the teacher, they will surely give useful feedback, right? Counter point discussed was new students in class, not being able to relate to them or have an existing relationship with them therefore feedback from them not being accurate.

   Time Constraints - Meghna based in Pakistan brought in an interesting point to the discussion where she shared her classes run for 40 minute only and she finds lack of time a problem in gathering useful feedback from her students.

   I was able to suggest something I do in class with my younger students (aged 6 - 15) by using positive reinforcement for feedback i.e. asking for how much they’ve enjoyed the class out of 10 using thumbs up and down, asking for what could be improved for next session, letting them choose pieces of music if they behave well in class .

   Then the discussion focused a little on culture where Meghna talked about the cultural differences between Muslim backgrounds with other parts of the world; where the performance and performing arts have different views by others. To improve this, she constantly takes notes on what works and what can be improved for the future where dance is accepted instead of being a subject of criticism.

-      The focus of the discussion turned to student abilities when Tara, who teaches all age groups from 1 year to 75 years AND all abilities shared that: she feels she constantly learn as a teacher.  So she is both a student herself as well as a teacher. How every day is different with new routines and new students – especially teaching students with disabilities. Changing her teaching techniques in order to fit the group she teaches and so on has shaped her to be a better teacher in class.

-      Another area the discussion focused on was Body Language where Michael shared: that in order to communicate with students through body language as “movement never lies”. Each session is always different because depending on your read of students’ body language, pre-planned classes don’t always work out. This proved to be a great strength for whoever is in charge of the class because they are able to read and assess the mood of the room, therefore create a better suited dance class. 

Topic: Assessment 

-      Julia, a dance teacher with 27 years of teaching experience shared that producing assessment of students with the guidelines of external governing bodies sets the expectation of what is appropriate for a certain group of ages i.e. Pointe work with Year 7s Vs Year 11s. We also discussed how to assess the time frame set to students to predict their progress in order to know whether they meet targets. 

    I was able to share that in Kandyan sessions I have with the younger dancers, I tend to ask them to recap what we've learnt to refresh our memory before learning anything new. As Kandyan dance has 12 basic steps with feet and 12 basic steps with feet and arms, it is important that the dancers know there off the top of their head and playing memory games are always encouraging and gives incentive to students to pay attention during class. In terms of time frames - I was able to share with the group that my younger students class had 1 year to learn the first 12 steps (taking away the school holidays and taking some weeks off from classes). Given that they are aged 6 - 15, this was good progress. They also learnt choreography during sessions so the students were able to use the steps they learnt in short dance pieces created for performances.

    Potential way of measurement: Setting up a syllabus to work on measure how much the students have achieved as well as their theory understanding. 

-      Another classroom based assessment measurement to track progress was -grouping a large number of students in to smaller groups in one session and setting smaller targets for each groups for the end of the session.    

    Another suggestion was - formative assessments in place to give students information on their progress before reaching the final assessment stage, so they are aware of their own progress and able to work on improvements.

-      Conclusion points: Not every student delivers in the same way because everyone’s understanding and interest in dance execution is different. 

   NB: This post is to keep my notes from the discussion in one place. Using the discussion points from everyone into consideration, my post will be about How dance is adapted and how even though the universal language in Kandyan is the same, this adaptation has modified it (to be different).

 From Dils - The Kandyan Dancer