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.
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.
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.
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).
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
Hi Dilini, thank you very much for your PM discussion post, its great to read in such details what was discussed In the evening! Looking forward to reading your other post.
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