UCanDance

[Sarah]

The new university year is upon us (well, upon the undergraduates anyhow - I've been back here since January) and UCanDance is <almost> ready to spring into action.

UCanDance is the University of Canterbury Dance club - a social dance club run by students for students. I joined a couple of years ago, dragged along by a couple of friends, and this year I find myself in the role of vice-president and will probably end up doing a fair amount of teaching of group classes. When I joined, the club offered weekly classes in salsa, merengue and modern jive, and we have since expanded that to include lindy hop. We've also hosted short courses and workshops in everything from cha-cha to belly-dance, and we may be getting someone keen to teach Bollywood-style dance and hip-hop this year.

Last night we had the first of our training sessions for the people we're going to thrust kicking and screaming into the spotlight and expected to teach our beginners something about dancing. This is a group effort, some might say the blind leading the blind - but what it does is give people a chance to think about what they have to convey and how to get it across. We then all offer positive and constructive feedback.......knowing that our turn is coming up next!

Previous years we've only had other club members who were intending to teach present, but this year we have co-opted various non-dancing friends for free lessons, on the understanding that they will be acting as guinea-pigs for our newbie teachers. This seems to be working pretty well as a reminder of just how much they've learned and forgotten over the past year or so........

Afterwards we went for coffee, and then out dancing - of course ;)

If people are interested in the doings of UCanDance, which seems to me to be somewhat different to most people's experience of studio lessons or college dancesport, I could attempt to wite something about it once a week or so.

-Next week- Clubs day, or how to persuade larval engineers that the best way to meet girls is to learn to salsa.

Cheers
Sarah

[pygmalion]

What does your training involve? I'm thinking about doing something similar for my crazy girlfriends (and their men, of course LOL).

And you never know about those larval engineers. My first dance studio actually had at least a dozen engineers as active students, out of about 80 active students total. (Active meaning addicted LOL)

[Sarah]

What does your training involve? I'm thinking about doing something similar for my crazy girlfriends (and their men, of course LOL).


The dance training, or the teacher training?


And you never know about those larval engineers. My first dance studio actually had at least a dozen engineers as active students, out of about 80 active students total. (Active meaning addicted LOL)

Actually we do end up with a pretty large proportion of engineers - something about partner dancing (and I don't think its just the proximity to females) seems to appeal to them. We also run our own parties, with lots in the way of sound and lighting systems that they get to mess around with.

Cheers
Sarah

[pygmalion]

What does your training involve? I'm thinking about doing something similar for my crazy girlfriends (and their men, of course LOL).


The dance training, or the teacher training?



Yes. And yes. Actually, I was asking about the teacher training, but if you want to give details about the dance training approach, I'll take that too. 8) :D

[Sagitta]

Me too!! I'm completely into all aspects of dance. I was off my dancing for a week or so, for personal reasons, but I'm back, and any shared experiences to help me share the love is very much appreciated!! :D

[Sarah]

I'd probably better start with the dance teaching first. Teaching is primarily done in the form of large group lessons ~ approx 50 ppl.

There is one designated teacher, who does all of the talking and provides the structure of the lesson. They will have a partner with which to demonstrate, but who will do less talking. There will usually be a number of other more experienced people around who can step in and help anyone who is having difficulties.

The classes are structured so new people can join in anytime. They start with an individual warm-up/basic step practice. This is usually merengue, followed by salsa. Depending on the average experience of the class, there may be some explanation, ranging from "left foot goes here, right foot goes there" to where the body and hip movement comes from, to different aspects of the music.

People are then asked to find a partner and introduce themselves. The teaching couple will demonstrate a move or combination of steps several times with appropriate explanations and the various couples will attempt it with greater or lesser degrees of success, while getting individual help from the teaching couple. More experienced club members may help with this, or they may join in and partner with the people taking the lesson (or they may gossip in the corner ;) ) Partners are frequently rotated. Usually two or three moves/combinations are demonstrated. The ideas behind leading and following may be discussed during the lesson, but are more likely to be passed on individually.

So I think that the lesson structure is pretty normal. I'll write about the teacher training tomorrow.

Cheers
Sarah

[pygmalion]

Thanks, Sarah. That sounds like quite an undertaking. Rewarding, but quite an undertaking. Fifty people at a time? Yikes!

[Sarah]

Fifty people at a time? Yikes!

On average!! We can start with ~150 or soon on our initial nights, but this dies away to a managable number once people get into the academic year/decide they don't actually like dance :? or whatever. Out of that number we'll get perhaps 20 or so who will really get hooked and start going to parties and workshops outside our club. They form a sort of self selected core membership from which committee members, helpers and new teachers may spring.

Cheers
Sarah