Literature Review 6

Dance teaching methods and curriculum design

 By Gayle Kassing, Danielle Mary Jay: Applying Education Theaories in a Dance Class.

I have already read and reviewed another chapter in this book “Dance teaching methods and curriculum design ”, when looking for literature related to my inquiry in module 2. This can be found on an earlier blog: http://cerysdixie.blogspot.com/2011/04/literature-review.html

Going back to this book I found another chapter that would be useful to review as part of my research project now it is underway.

This chapter talks of how educational theories can be bought into the class room. There is a lot of information about the best ways to differentiate when teaching within education and the curriculum but what I found from my initial research was that this wasn’t always transferred into the dance class so this chapter gives a bit of an insight into the possible ways of doing this.

The writer talks about using a ‘student centred learning’ when teaching which links in with the work Sho Botham has promoted using a person centred approach to dance rather than a body centred one which is perhaps how it has been done traditionally.

As with Bothams works this article states that student centred learning “focuses on student’s accomplishments”.  It would make sense to me that if a teacher focuses on a student’s good points and what they have achieved, however small a step it may be, then that student will fell valued, their confidence will grow and they will want to work harder so they can continue to improve.

I don’t believe that when most teachers point out something negative it is done with the intention of making a student feel bad, if you see it from a teachers perspective they are just wanting to help that student to improve by pointing out what they can do better, however if this is done continuously with no positive feedback to go along side it then it could have damaging effects on a student’s emotional state.

This chapter also address’s the fact that when you are teaching a class you are teaching a class of individuals and it must not be forgotten that each person in that class is slightly different and “has individual needs and learns slightly differently to other students” By adopting a “multi focus view” it is possible to provide appropriate learning for all – this can be done through teaching methods, class management and by including educational theories in the dance class.

The chapter talks about the importance of critical learning skills and how these could be applied in a dance class, by sharing work with each other and discussing and evaluating what worked and what could be improved upon these critical learning skills can be used in dance. Mosston’s Reciprocal and Self check learning styles on his spectrum include this critical thinking also, by students watching and analysing both each other’s works as well as checking their own work against a set criteria.

Whilst this chapter is helpful in pointing out some of the teaching theories that can be transferred into a dance class it does not go into detail or give examples of how this can be done. For this reason it feels limited to how much you can gain from this chapter as it just scathes the surface of the problem and doesn’t get stuck in with practical ways of applying these theories.

References

Botham, S. 2000. "A dancer is a person" (online). Available at: 

http://www.ethicsdance.co.uk/downloads_assets/A%20Dancer%20is%20A%20Person.pdf (accessed 14 April 2011)

Mosston, M. & Ashworth, S. (1986) Teaching Physical Education.