Tips for Teachers

With only a few weeks left in the year our Faculty are reviewing where we are at and what we are working towards - check out these tips and insights on how we lead our classes.  

1. Celebrate the Small Things

Dance is a relentless artform that take years and years to master and finetune. Feeling short term progress is vital in a student’s success especially during the long winter months. Take time in class to praise the little moments such as knowing what count a jump is on or how to clap the down beat in a 3/4. These small praises or notes of improvement boosts a person’s confidence and create an eagerness to keep working hard, in turn accomplishing their larger goals!

2. Focus and Flow

Upon returning from a period of dancing online, or even a break from dance all together, you may have noticed a shift in attention spans. This is beyond understandable! Be sure to give yourself some grace… and then get creative. Classes do not need to follow one particular order to be successful. Even if your pre-pandemic approach was “foolproof”, it may be time to reinvent the wheel and play with the flow of your class. You can start by noticing where the student’s attention goes. Do they get stir crazy when they are in the centre for too long? Do they get tired after travelling too much? Alternating between sections of class more frequently, like breaking up the class with shorter travelling sections, allows students with shorter attention spans to get the most out of class. It doesn’t need to make a ton of sense to be what works for you and your students. Dancing is dancing! Oh and let your playlist help - various speeds and types of music can naturally liven or quiet a room.

3. Skills A, B, and C … all the way to Z!

As you know, there are so many elements aside from learning choreography and replicating movement with proper technique. Try breaking up the year to include themes or various focuses. This creates well-rounded dancers and lessens the burden of accomplishing everything all at once. While the exercises you execute may not change you can ask the dancers’ focus to shift. Maybe one week it's all about musicality, followed by flexibility or balance, then their speed, strength or coordination. Picture how coaching a battement would sound if the focus was flexibility, and again if the theme were timing, coordination or connection to the floor.

Here are some additional skills you may need a reminder to implement:

• Group Dynamics

• Spatial Patterning

• Role Play/ Character Development

• Class Etiquette

• Level Changes

• Directions - Bonus: changing directions helps with spotting, so face away from the mirror early on in class and create exercises that have multiple fronts!

• Artistry, Artistry, Artistry!

4. Questions for You and Them

Do you ask your students questions? Do they ask you questions in return or when it serves the class? Introducing questions as a method to teaching allows the students to use their knowledge, experience and logic to create new connections. Things seasoned instructors may take for granted may be something that has never occurred to the mind’s of their students.  

What exercise did we do earlier in class that prepared us for this large movement? Why that one? Can you apply the same technical approach now?

What quality or texture is in the exercise? If it’s “resistance,” do they land on that word. Can they be more imaginative as well; it is “dancing on a freshly cooked gooey cheese pizza” or “in a room full of mud”.

Opening up a dialogue where you ask them questions may prompt them to do the same!

5. Favourite Moments are Key

What do the students LOVE to do? If they know, they’ll surely tell you. Ahem, “freeze dance” anyone? Incorporating their favourite activities into class gives them something to look forward to. It’s an opportunity to create a fun weekly routine as well as an added incentive to demonstrate attentive listening and learning throughout class. Adding in their favourite moments also shows the students that they are seen and heard. 

Knowing these activities can also give you insight into better ways to explore new learning materials, class focus, and exercise format as well as give you something to share with their families, showing just how well connected you are to each and every one you teach. Do they like games? Simon Says - Ballet theory edition. Do they enjoy a spotlight, or to make their own choices? End each class with a chance to share their favourite move they did that day, giving options to show it physically, say it verbally or opt out for the week. Do you have shy students who may back away from this? Sometimes they like a couple of options. If they don’t think of something right away maybe offer something you noticed that they liked, agreeing with you is still participation and a point of connection that feels safe. 

6. Retention

Retention is one of the skills developed through dance that is applicable in all aspects of life. Do the students retain material from the beginning of the lesson to the end? AND from class to class? Most importantly, how do you actively measure this with them?

Even if you change up the class content and format often, you can support retention by allowing time for integration before moving on, or by creating a few consistent pillars for class. This can be done by working on the same combo for at least 4 weeks, adding only one new exercise a week, or overhauling the entire class content only a few times per year. Creating a warm-up or cool down that never changes can also create a sense of stability to reinforce the class structure.

You can reinforce retention by ending each class with a recap or “pop-quiz.” Or let the music help by playing a song and asking the students what exercise it’s for.

For little ones you can implement retention into their creative activities. While dancing like a fairy or imagining a flower garden, ask them to think of a colour that corresponds with their task. Inform them that when the music stops after the next few exercises you are going to ask them to name their colours to the group, so don’t forget! Holding onto that colour is retention. And even on those rare occasional when you go in a new direction and forget to ask them - they will remind you!

7. Follow Your Leaders

We’ve all had a dance teacher who made a lasting impression - clearly, since we chose to follow in their footsteps. Think about your favourite teachers or mentors over the years. What made them great? How can you implement these characteristics into your own teaching? Using their approach, the resources available now and your own experiences, you can create a version of those special traits unique to you.

When your students think back to learning with you, what do you hope makes a lasting impression?

8. Reflect and Readjust

Take some time to reflect on the above and how it has presented in the year so far. As we approach winter break, we are in the fantastic position of using this reflection to plan for the second half of the year. What will December’s classes be focusing on? What will you bring to the New Year?

Be proud of where you are and where you are going!