Guided Practica

[ant]

.... joint learning between lead and follow. It's expected that both would have respect and honest/good feedback for each other... i.e. "Did I do that right?" "How did I feel when I did that?" "Did I knock you off balance?" "That didn't work, let's try this..." etc, etc, etc.

I would have thought that this way of conducting yourself applied whenever there was feedback was given, a class, a practica, an informal practise session in a home or a discussion when not dancing.

Although the closer your dance relationship is to a particular partner (as opposed to life partner) I have found that the feedback becomes a bit more pointed.

For instance I may say "I think you did that incorrectly" to a practise partner of long standing but I would not make such a comment to a less familiar partner. In other words I may start form the point of view that I think a familiar partner was at fault rather than introducing the subject from the point of view that maybe I was at fault. I would also expect a familiar partner to also act in a similar way.

 

[Zoopsia59]

Sorry Zoops I don't altogether agree with you.

The most successful and well attended practicas I know have a big flavour of the following.

The more experienced leaders and followers in the community attend. They spend about half the time practising with their preferred or prearranged partner and the other half with the less experienced members of the community that are present.

These more experienced dancers are not teachers but they attend to give the less experienced dancers the opportunity to dance with experienced partners and to give them advise and feedback in regard to what they have found when dancing with the less experienced dancers.

What you describe is not what I mean by by assuming the role of teacher with someone who doesn't see you that way. It sounds like the lesser skilled dancers acknowledge that the better dancers have valuable feedback for them and seek it out. That's the key... whether or not the feedback is welcomed or considered by the recipient to be valid.

I didn't say that better dancers shouldn't dance with the beginners! In fact, I totally agree that it's a vital part of developing. If the people receiving instruction feel that the person giving it is qualified to give it, then that's great.

IME though, what happens is that the people in the vast "middle ground" (ie: intermediate, NOT advanced) take it upon themselves to "correct" and "instruct" just about anyone they have trouble dancing with. This is especially common when the person being corrected is new to the scene and assumed to therefore be a beginner just starting to come out dancing. ("I've never seen you before, therefore you must not know what I know") I can't tell you how many times I've gotten useless (and often even incorrect) "instruction" from leaders who had no business correcting ANYONE. Like the "you shouldn't sidestep because I didn't move my foot yet" comment which shows a profound lack of understanding of basic lead and follow principles.

Nobody knows a Freshman like a sophomore. In Tango, it seems that Sophomores also seem to think Juniors and other Sophomores are Freshmen. Sometimes they even think Seniors are other Sophmores or even Freshmen!

What you are describing is that there are certain people who attend that are accepted by the community as a whole to be qualified to offer feedback and instruction. That means that those people ARE acknowledged by the others to be "teachers" (or "Upper-Class Mentors to the Underclassmen").

So you aren't really disagreeing with me at all.

And even when someone is in that position, they still can approach the situation initially by saying "Do you want feedback, or have you got all you can think about right now?"

I also hope that those more advanced dancers, when dancing with EACH OTHER do not assume to be the superior one in the position of teaching their partner, but rather approach problems as a partnership with shared issues that need to be addressed... no "blaming".