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View Full Version : Are Teachers standards dropping or rising?



Gus
8th-November-2006, 11:56 AM
This thread was inspired by

IMHO, Ceroc is marketed very well. It gets loads of beginners through the door. And it's a good thing that it does, because, IMHO, it fails to consistently deliver a product that matches up to the promises made in the marketing. ..... but I find that many of the Ceroc classes I visit in the South East are poor in terms of teaching.
I was thinking about some of the recent 'crimes' I've seen (not limited to Ceroc teachers);

not dancing with punters
teaching routines that are waay above the standard of the class because of the teachers ego
not explaining what the women should be doing
not teaching 'basic' intermediate moves
failing to explain moves clearly and correctly
trying to teach dance technique without understanding the technique
preponderance of drops/seducers
dancing 'for themselves rather than the person they are dancing with
The problem is that once a teacher is trained AFAIK none of the association bother to monitor their quality or offer update training. Is there a need or are Andy's comments incorrect?

NZ Monkey
8th-November-2006, 12:15 PM
Some similar things have been discussed http://www.cerocscotland.com/forum/showthread.php?t=9322 before.

On the whole I have to agree with Andy's comments, or at least the essence of it. There are a few notable exceptions of course but in general I think he has a point.

straycat
8th-November-2006, 12:29 PM
Been dancing a longish time now (14 years) - and in that time, I've seen everything from great teachers to ones with some or all of the bad points you describe.

I think the only thing that's really changed is that there's a lot more venues, hence a lot more teachers. I'm not convinced that the proportion of good vs bad teachers had changed - but this does, of course, mean that there are definitely more bad teachers now. Along with all the extra good ones ;)

On the other hand, I feel that at the top end of the teaching spectrum, the standard has risen considerably in the time I've been dancing. If only because some of the teachers who were really good back then are even better now. We had a very welcome reminder of this fact only a couple of weeks ago.

Has the bottom end gotten worse? Hard to say, but I don't think so.

How this all applies to the current Ceroc teaching situation, I wouldn't dream of saying (mainly because my recent Ceroc experience isn't extensive enough to be able to judge)

Shodan
8th-November-2006, 03:13 PM
Yes they are - because I've started teaching. :rofl:

Done a few salsa and jive classes now, but only yesterday I was being a lady demonstrator for my mate (the teacher) at our local jive club.

I tell you now I'm on the scene the standards are shocking!!!! :rofl::rofl::rofl::rofl::rofl::rofl:

filthycute
8th-November-2006, 03:20 PM
From what James mentioned about his teaching days for the-borg, they were supposed to come north and check that his standard of teaching was high enough to warrant teacher status... Not sure if they got round to it though.

And if memory serves, when asked about why the price of a class had gone up, the response was that because the standard of teaching had increased...

So in answer to the question...the standard must be rising with the price? Right?:rolleyes:

David Bailey
8th-November-2006, 03:26 PM
From what James mentioned about his teaching days for the-borg, they were supposed to come north and check that his standard of teaching was high enough to warrant teacher status... Not sure if they got round to it though.
A big scare occasionally goes around my local venue when an audit may be due. I've never seen one yet, however, so I dunno what they're like.


And if memory serves, when asked about why the price of a class had gone up, the response was that because the standard of teaching had increased...
I like that answer :rofl:

David Bailey
8th-November-2006, 03:32 PM
To answer the original question:

I think the standard of CTA training has improved; it would almost have to, over time, as improvements to training practice get made. So the average new CTA-trainee now is presumably better-trained than the average CTA trainee 10 years ago or whatever.

On the other hand, there is AFAIK not much in the way of refresher training - there's a big annual day-long teacher gathering thingy, but that's more like a conference than training I believe.

In addition, there's the question of whether by "teaching" we're describing the class and only the class, or the teacher's involvement in the whole night.

If it's the former, I dunno.

If it's the latter, then I reckon there may well be a case for saing that teachers spend less time doing the after-class work than they did 10-15 years ago. More teachers, it's more like a job now, and there's less personal involvement in a venue than there was then - less teacher-managers, probably.

TheTramp
8th-November-2006, 03:33 PM
On the other hand, there is AFAIK not much in the way of refresher training - there's a big annual day-long teacher gathering thingy, but that's more like a conference than training I believe.

And, of course, there's a fair number of teachers every year who can't get along to this....

David Bailey
8th-November-2006, 03:40 PM
And, of course, there's a fair number of teachers every year who can't get along to this....
Given that Scottish teachers seem to be well-regarded, that may say something :whistle:

Shodan
8th-November-2006, 03:44 PM
Yes they are - because I've started teaching. :rofl:

Dammit, why can't I edit my own posts? I meant to say :

"Yes they are DROPPING - because I've started teaching."

EDIT: Thats interesting.... I can edit this post of mine, but not my previous one. Hmmm...

TheTramp
8th-November-2006, 03:51 PM
There's a time limit after which you can't edit posts anymore....

Shodan
9th-November-2006, 09:00 AM
There's a time limit after which you can't edit posts anymore....
Aha! Gotcha thanks. :nice:

Gus
9th-November-2006, 10:01 AM
There have been two changes to Ceroc Teachers over the last five years AFAIK. Firstly, there was a move to stop franchisees being teachers .. or visa versa. Not sure of the reason but 'the word on the street' was to make it more difficult for teachers to just up and leave with an already prepared club. The second and more important change was the 'dropping of standards' (:rolleyes: ) over the last 3 years, i.e. you don't have to be sub-30, good looking and a size 8 anymore. The effect has to allowed some very good candidates who were previously overlooked to show their potential.

Though the number of days training has changed, I'm not sure if the basic content or methodology of teacher training has changed. I would say that the teacher training is now not the key thing. The biggest threat to teacher competence is the pressure on teachers to display ability against all the new concepts coming through. Previously there was 'just' Ceroc. Now there is WCS, tension/compression, competition style, Tango influences etc. I've seen evidence of Ceroc teachers mistakenly thinking they are dance teachers and trying to stretch the envelope. To be fair, this is a challenge I would level even more at in dependant MJ teachers.

There are some who have an ability on training to make this happen, but many teachers do not have such skills ... they are not taught by the CTA. So IMHO standards may drop by teachers trying to teach more than they were originally trained to do.

As I said, this is a personal observation. It would be good to get a viewpoint of some experienced teachers .... or have all teachers on the Forum now 'left the building'?

David Franklin
9th-November-2006, 10:17 AM
So IMHO standards may drop by teachers trying to teach more than they were originally trained to do.I suppose it's possible, but I remain unconvinced. When I started, I don't think I ever heard the words tension, compression or connection used (though I do remember being told to bounce :tears:). I think if those concepts are introduced, even poorly, it has to be a good thing. I can see there might be the odd teacher who makes a complete hash of them, but I'd be very surprised if the majority of teachers weren't "good enough to be better than nothing". (I think it's helpful for them to lose the Ceroc teacher 'aura of infallibility' if they're teaching concepts they're unsure of though).

Personally, I don't think standards have dropped; I think they've risen. It's just that my expectations have risen a whole lot faster.

[Exception: obviously teachers trying to teach drops and aerials they don't understand is worse than nothing].

Andy McGregor
9th-November-2006, 10:19 AM
It would be good to get a viewpoint of some experienced teachers .... or have all teachers on the Forum now 'left the building'?My guess is that Ceroc trained teachers wouldn't dare comment on their training. It would probably be seen as giving away secrets.

I'm happy to comment on the training we give our teachers. We train them to teach. We do not train them to dance, we expect them to be able to do that before we start teacher's training. We've recently come to the realisation that we will have to copy Ceroc and audition teaching candidates as a few people who've self-selected for teacher training have not been good enough dancers :tears:

One of our local organisers who has recently started up has been trained and examined by the LeRoc Federation. From what I've seen this training results in teachers who would have been good 10 years ago. It's still good teaching, but seems that the LeRoc Federation got stuck in some kind of time-warp around 1995 where the dance became fixed and unchanging. And then there's the going back on the left foot thing to consider...

Lou
9th-November-2006, 10:53 AM
It's still good teaching, but seems that the LeRoc Federation got stuck in some kind of time-warp around 1995 where the dance became fixed and unchanging. And then there's the going back on the left foot thing to consider...
###...Let's do the TimeWarp again... it's just a step on the left.... ### :devil:

I agree with David Franklin. I don't see any evidence of dropping standards in teaching. However, I had the pleasure of attending one of Finchley Carole's classes this week, and was very impressed with her professionalism, and that of the organisation. :clap: I suspect, though, that most of this is due to experience, rather than additional training.

David Bailey
9th-November-2006, 10:57 AM
]However, I had the pleasure of attending one of Finchley Carole's classes this week, and was very impressed with her professionalism, and that of the organisation.
You did? Which one?

purple~emma
9th-November-2006, 11:47 AM
I dance regularly at 2 different venues. I think that our teacher at Brierley Hill as well as others is definately one of the best teachers I've come across. She has time for everyone and seems to know what kind of general standard of dancers we have there, and picks what to teach accordingly.

On the other end of the spectrum, the other place where I dance, not as often as Brierley Hill, I find the teacher to be quite different. I think that she tends to teach moves she likes to do rather than ones that most people there can cope with. I very rarely do a class there as I find her classes too complex and drawn out because people struggle. Plus, as much as I like to learn drops and such, I don't want to be doing that every week.

I think that as well as them being monitored by the people who train them, I think franchise managers should say something if they can clearly see that what they are teaching too hard for the majority of dancers, or if they feel the teachers aren't doing their best for the dancers there, no matter what problem that may be. After all, it is them who are paying the teachers to teach.

detomo
9th-November-2006, 01:33 PM
Down where I dance, all of the teachers seem to be independents and the quality fairly high. Many of the instructors teach at more than one venue
[Exeter & Torquay, Exeter & Exmouth, Dorchester & Axminster etc] and there is little competition between the venues.

But the quality of teachers anywhere is often hard to judge, as some are better at getting across different parts of Modern Jive. Some are better at drilling the basics, some get across the importance of safety in drops and others at explaining the more complex moves.

I've yet to attend a Ceroc franchised class, but would be interested in the differences, if any, between those and the independents.

Gadget
9th-November-2006, 02:02 PM
But the quality of teachers anywhere is often hard to judge, :yeah:
All you can tell is how they taught you - there are wayyyy too many variables that could make the "quality" range from excelent to poo depending on how you look at it.

Gav
9th-November-2006, 02:33 PM
I've only been dancing for 10 months so obviously I can't comment further back than that, but what I have seen in that time is a wide difference in abilities amongst teachers when you travel around.
All of my local teachers are of roughly the same standard (with one notable exception, who was just not born to teach, although she CAN dance!), which is good for consistency.
On my travels I've come across some awesome teachers elsewhere, but naturally they tend to stay on their home turf or travel to the most popular venues.

But to get to the point, recently I've seen some of our local teachers starting to teach some of the more detailed techniques that I've seen taught elsewhere and the franchise owner is introducing concepts seen elsewhere but up until recently ignored in East Anglia.

But are they getting better? just trying to copy teachers from elsewhere? responding to the needs of their audience? not sure, but they are changing.