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Thread: How do Teachers improve?

  1. #1
    Commercial Operator Gus's Avatar
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    How do Teachers improve?

    Face it, teachers have got a tough task. They are expected to be the gods of the dancefloor, come up with new moves/routines every week and they have to communicate all this to punters in a 30 minutes lesson. This against a backdrop of raised expectations from the teachers and dancers seen at weekenders and on YouTube.

    So .. how does you local instructor keep up? I think its clear that to 'stay still is to go backwards'. The problem is severe for indepenent instructors, and yes I'm talking form bitter experience.

    First of all, where do you get all the new moves from. Many instructors have to resort to buying the DVDs of the wekeenders just for this ... but then again so have many of your class so thats not helping you stay ahead.

    Next, how do you improve your teaching style? I'm not aware of anyone running courses for qualified teachers so how do you learn about what principle you should be teaching and what teaching models to use?

    I think that there is a lot to be learnt from watching our US counterparts in Swing and WCS. I probably picked up more about teaching technique than personal dance technique from the time spent in J&T and Lucky & Ruby's workshops. Not everyone though has the luxury of seeing these guys in person ... so, any thoughts?

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    Re: How do Teachers improve?

    Do teachers really need to be the best?
    Do teachers need to constantly improve?

    IMHO teachers are there for teaching the basics and improving intermediates.

    A teacher has placed him/herself in a position of trust, to help others improve their dance.

    Frankly I think thats enough and applaud each and every one of them.

    XX XXX DTS Dave

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    Commercial Operator Gus's Avatar
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    Re: How do Teachers improve?

    Quote Originally Posted by dave the scaffolder View Post
    Do teachers really need to be the best?
    Do teachers need to constantly improve?

    IMHO teachers are there for teaching the basics and improving intermediates.
    Good points. Must admit I hadn't thought a bout that angle. I suppose, ignoring my personal situation, is that there must be various levels of teachers, as with any profession.

    Thinking of it like a triangle;

    At the base you have your everyday average instructors who teach at the local club week in and week out.

    In the middle, the more experienced instructors who focus on teaching technique. They probably run the non-standard workshops, like style, blues, drops etc.

    At the top, the very few who are the Teacher Gods. these are the guys who have a national standing. They are the ones who push the barriers of dance and are responsible for the innovation.

    ....anyway, thats one way of looking at it. I suppose the guys at the base just need to plod along and ,maintain standards. It the guys in the middle who really need the continuous professional development ... maybe.

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    Registered User David Franklin's Avatar
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    Re: How do Teachers improve?

    Quote Originally Posted by Gus View Post
    Good points. Must admit I hadn't thought a bout that angle. I suppose, ignoring my personal situation, is that there must be various levels of teachers, as with any profession.

    Thinking of it like a triangle;

    At the base you have your everyday average instructors who teach at the local club week in and week out.

    In the middle, the more experienced instructors who focus on teaching technique. They probably run the non-standard workshops, like style, blues, drops etc.

    At the top, the very few who are the Teacher Gods. these are the guys who have a national standing. They are the ones who push the barriers of dance and are responsible for the innovation.

    ....anyway, thats one way of looking at it. I suppose the guys at the base just need to plod along and ,maintain standards. It the guys in the middle who really need the continuous professional development ... maybe.
    Don't forget that "level of ability" is orthogonal to "level of teaching".

    A story I've recounted before is how a certain lecturer was described to me:

    <redacted> is quite possibly the best algebraist in Cambridge. On the other hand, he is most definitely the worst lecturer in Cambridge, so bear that in mind before you choose to do his course.
    <redacted> is probably the most talented mathematician I've ever been taught by (arguably one of the top 2 in his subject in the world at the time). But the comment about his teaching was bang on, and his lectures were a complete waste of time (though worth it for the sheer experience of watching a man so out of touch with his audience).

    So I think working on your teaching skill is important too. For all that people gripe about Ceroc, this is definitely something they did (and still do) far better than anyone else I've seen in MJ.

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    Commercial Operator Gus's Avatar
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    Re: How do Teachers improve?

    Quote Originally Posted by David Franklin View Post
    So I think working on your teaching skill is important too. For all that people gripe about Ceroc, this is definitely something they did (and still do) far better than anyone else I've seen in MJ.
    Ugg .. looks like I need to work on my communications skills as well.

    What you've said is bang on and what I was trying to say in my comments referring to J&T. Aside from their obvious dancing skill, it was the way they managed to convey their expertise to the `class that impressed me. Its an area that I'm not aware is covered by any teaching course but its so important. I spend most classes, when its politically acceptable, just watching teachers with a note pad, trying to identify things to do and things to avoid.

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    Registered User spindr's Avatar
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    Re: How do Teachers improve?

    Specially selected "secret shoppers" in the class providing feedback.

    Constantly taking (new) courses yourself -- for several reasons:
    • To remind yourself about the nature of class dynamics and remembering the impact of the whole learning experience.
    • To learn new dance techniques and moves
    • To learn new teaching ideas


    SpinDr

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    Commercial Operator Gus's Avatar
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    Re: How do Teachers improve?

    Quote Originally Posted by spindr View Post
    Constantly taking (new) courses yourself -- for several reasons:
    • To remind yourself about the nature of class dynamics and remembering the impact of the whole learning experience.
    • To learn new dance techniques and moves
    • To learn new teaching ideas
    Simple question ... WHERE????

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    Re: How do Teachers improve?

    Great subject/thread - and relevant, as noted, of course to teachers in other areas of life.

    With regards to Ceroc, from what I can see it seems to be fairly self-directed after you're up and running.

    I've never seen any feedback forms or anything like that.

    'Mystery shopper; approach is interesting.

    I guess at the end of the day, I would not want to become heavily policed/inspected - life's too short and teachers might get 'on edge'.

    Anyway - this is slightly off-thread because it is about the teaching itself, not about how teachers improve - but maybe (for me) this would improve things (from an already high base).

    This was from the mildly entertaining blog in April:

    Manifesto (2) - Teaching


    This is the second in an occasional series on how things could be improved.

    Firstly, let me say that in most cases, the teaching of Ceroc/MJ is of a very high standard: well trained teachers, who know their subject, have great enthusiasm and are able to organise their dance students and get the most out of them.

    So..............having said that, there may be one or two things which could be made more consistent - and this is really to do with 'best practices' that I have seen - and which I feel should be used by more classes/teachers. Bear in mind that I have only been to maybe 12-15 different venues - and experienced may be 20 or so different teachers/styles.

    1. Intermediate moves
    Teach just 2 (two) intermediate moves in a lesson. Anything more just gets forgotten. For me, it would be better to do a few more repeats of the moves in the times thus saved (usually 3 - sometimes more are done).

    2. Lessons on the internet
    Here, the clear best practice is that done by DanceYourselfDizzy (Basingstoke, Winchester). The lesson appears in video form a few days after - what agreat way to able to remind yourself on the moves!! No excuses. (Incidentally it has a full database of moves - you can download the videos for £8.50 for 6 months). No Ceroc facility like this exists to my knowledge - what a shame!

    3. Organising women (usually) on
    The best practice here is surely that when there are more than 4 or 5 women over, to 'scatter' them across the rows and do 'one woman on'. This saves time. As someone on the forum pointed out, you need one woman at the top who is over, so that the woman at the far bottom corner doesn't hold things up by having to run all the way to the top (as happened at Luton........and I happened to be the guy waiting).

    4. Naming the moves
    Sometime the moves are given only vague names or not at all. This usuaully doesn't make a jot of difference to the women - but it does to the guys (at least me). One reason is for me then to associate/catalog it in my head - and another is to reference it on the web (eg. a video as above) or description - or when talking about a move in a forum. Of course, for more advanced moves, this can be a bit tricky - especially when they merge a number of components - still it is not insurmountable. I imagine that the Ceroc 'Bible' has full names in it(?).

    5. Recap next week
    One Ceroc teacher looked at how we were doing a move in Intermediate and said something like 'we'll do that again next week - because no-one is really getting it completely right'. Great! (I never went the following week - so I don't know if they did repeat it, but I suspect they did). DYD (as above) do a short recap of last weeks move (good idea).

    6. Building on the beginners lesson
    One of the lessons I most enjoyed was one where the Intermediate moves were built on variations of the moves in the beginner lesson we had just done. That made it just a little bit easier (and I suspect for newbies to Intermediates it was just smoother). This is logical - although I have only seen it done once or twice - and I guess in some cases it is just not feasible.

    7. Handouts with descriptions/diagrams
    (This is an idea - never seen it done). Hand out an A4 with the moves described in full. Hmmmm - cost involved of course. The other option is back to DYD - where the full description (in text form) of the lesson is available on the web. Eg:
    Move 3 = Basket Bottle Opener = Beats 1, 2, 3 & 4 as per a normal Basket. Men step directly behind your lady with your hands on her hips. Men raise both the lady's hands above her head. Ladies stay where you are as the men turn half a turn to their right - so you end up back to back with your hands raised above your heads. Keeping your arms straight, lower your arms down to your sides over 2 beats. Let go with your hands as the men nudge the ladies away with the bum. Turn to face and catch right to right. Return. Step back.

    That's it really...........as I said most teachers and teaching is really very good - and the teachers always are approachable if you have any questions afterwards.

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    Omnipresent Administrator Franck's Avatar
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    Re: How do Teachers improve?

    Quote Originally Posted by Gus View Post
    Simple question ... WHERE????
    Simple answer really, the Beach Ballroom in Aberdeen where for the last 5 years I have invited teachers I wanted to learn from (and whom I wanted to teach Scottish dancers) and asked them to teach specific topics that I wanted to develop, more recently Blaze where I have tried to do the same, and being a smaller week-ender we are really able to learn at the classes, like you were in May, taking note at the back of the workshops, no doubt in preparation for your upcoming technical classes or by taking private lessons with other teachers you respect...

    I realise I'm in a fortunate position as a reasonable size franchisee to create custom courses for myself, but all the classes were open to everyone, so any teacher could have booked (and all teachers from Scotland got the opportunity for free).

    Besides learning from other great and innovative teachers in many dances (MJ, AT, WCS, Jango, Ballroom, etc.) improving for me has been a matter of creating courses that focused on stuff not covered in regular classes. By forcing myself to prepare workshops on specific topics, I improved and learnt a lot.
    Franck.

    There's an A.P.P. for that!

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    Registered User spindr's Avatar
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    Re: How do Teachers improve?

    Quote Originally Posted by Gus View Post
    Simple question ... WHERE????
    Lookup list of nearby classes
    1). Go to class
    2). Was it good?
    Yes: Did you learn anything useful? Then borrow ideas, techniques, etc.
    No: Then analyze why, and avoid those reasons yourself.
    3). Pick next nearest class and repeat as from 1.

    SpinDr

    P.S. A more concrete suggestion
    Last edited by spindr; 31st-October-2007 at 10:26 PM.

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    Commercial Operator Gus's Avatar
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    Re: How do Teachers improve?

    Quote Originally Posted by Franck View Post
    Simple answer really, the Beach Ballroom in Aberdeen where for the last 5 years I have invited teachers I wanted to learn from (and whom I wanted to teach Scottish dancers) and asked them to teach specific topics that I wanted to develop
    Thats how I developed in the early years. I was lucky enough to bring up teachers like Viktor, N&N, Roger C, James & Bridget to run workshops for GGus Dance from 99 to 03. That where I started to see the gap between basic teacher training and what could be achieved.

    Quote Originally Posted by Franck View Post
    being a smaller week-ender we are really able to learn at the classes, like you were in May, taking note at the back of the workshops, no doubt in preparation for your upcoming technical classes
    Oh that I could ... I'm afraid my 'upcoming' workshops are actually repeats of what I taught in NZ in 2005. The more technical aspects are based on what I've been taught by DavidB, Amir and Kate during my exile in London ... so I guess we've learnt from the same source Having said that I have picked up more areas to think about from Blaze 1 and Lucky & Ruby ... so the weekenders have been useful ... but its not enough. Oh that I could just go off on a dance sabbatical ... but the day job beckons.

  12. #12
    Commercial Operator Gus's Avatar
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    Re: How do Teachers improve?

    Quote Originally Posted by spindr View Post
    Lookup list of nearby classes
    1). Go to class
    2). Was it good?
    Yes: Did you learn anything useful? Then borrow ideas, techniques, etc.
    No: Then analyze why, and avoid those reasons yourself.
    3). Pick next nearest class and repeat as from 1.
    Urrrr been there, done that, learnt little. There are very few 'trained' instructors in our area and only one of them (IMHO) has enough technical knowledge and teaching expertise (she's an HR professional) to learn from

    Any more suggestions?

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    Re: How do Teachers improve?

    how about :

    - learn new partner dances such as AT, WCS, ballroom to develop your lead and technique + it will give you ideas for new 'fusion' moves
    - learn solo dances, ballet, jazz, contemporary, hip hop, to develop your own quality of movement and control

    by learn I mean take enough classes to become a competent dancer in that new style, not just stratch the surface...

  14. #14
    Registered User spindr's Avatar
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    Re: How do Teachers improve?

    Ask your teachers which classes they are taking
    SpinDr

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    Registered User Lynn's Avatar
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    Re: How do Teachers improve?

    There isn't exactly a CPD plan in MJ teaching.

    There are two aspects

    Improving your own dance knowledge, experience and expertise
    - Learn new dance styles.
    - Private lessons with 'top' teachers.
    - DVDs, internet, travelling where possible to see a wide range of professionals.


    Improving your teaching technique
    - Gain a wide range of experience - different class sizes, workshops, privates
    - Feedback from students - informal and formal
    - Peer assessment - get other teachers to watch you and give feedback
    - Learn from observing other teachers, what works for them and why (and what doesn't work!)
    - At large weekenders, possibly get together with other teachers and arrange a private small group teaching masterclass from one of the 'big names'.

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    Re: How do Teachers improve?

    I'm constantly looking for ways to improve my MJ and my teaching of it. I attend as many lessons as I can. I constantly review what and how I teach and I have long discussions about it with other teachers who I network with - and I read a lot on this forum, which is quite helpful too.

    I think that Gus is looking for something that's mostly not needed. What we need are more beginners and basic intermediate teachers to get more people into MJ. And to do that we need to be better teachers, not better dancers or more advanced. If anything, we need to be more simple. The more I teach the more I realise you need to be entertaining and give people a good night out. That doesn't require anything clever, it requires an entertainer who can dance and teach MJ.

    My advice to Gus is to go to more MJ lessons and listen to the teachers.

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    Re: How do Teachers improve?

    Quote Originally Posted by Gus View Post
    Face it, teachers have got a tough task. They are expected ...to come up with new moves/routines every week..
    I agree with the comment elsewhere - in a weekly class you do a beg and int class. You only need about one years worth of routines. Most people stop doing int level classes after a year. The few that carry on can't remember what you did a year ago anyway. The small percent who keep coming after a year and can remember what you did a year ago probably don't need int level classes. If they can dance one year's worth of moves than its time they learn that its about more than moves. Maybe then they will start to listen to how you do them.

    But if you really think you need new moves do a 'swap' with a different teacher who is far enough away from you that you don't feel your students overlap.


    Quote Originally Posted by Gus View Post
    So .. how does you local instructor keep up?
    Local instructors improve their dancing same way as everyone else who has outgrown group classes:

    - Take private lessons
    - Arrange practice times outside of freestyle
    - Take classes in another, probably more disciplined style
    - Join a performance team or choreograph your own cabaret

    These are all expensive and time consuming, and although you may become 10 times a better Modern Jive dancer, you won’t get paid very much more. So you do it for love, or to get laid, or both. Either is probably a more noble pursuit than doing it for money.

    Anyway, those above notes are not really for Gus, since he does most of those things. Its just that the better you get, the slower you get better. So I think Gus you are just feeling frustrated with how little you notice the improvement in yourself, although over a period of many months I am sure others will tell you it is there. (Watch an old video of you dancing or teaching to make a comparison.)

    Quote Originally Posted by Gus View Post
    Next, how do you improve your teaching style? ...

    I think that there is a lot to be learnt from watching our US counterparts in Swing and WCS. ...

    Not everyone though has the luxury of seeing these guys in person ... so, any thoughts?
    One great way is to get another teacher you respect to demo for you. Then after the class you can analyze what worked and what didn't. I have been lucky enough to have many great demos that provide this feedback for me. Not always solicited, but always appreciated. (Well.. eventually.)

    The other great way to improve you already mentioned. What I don't get is 'not everyone has the luxury'...

    Why not? If you consider yourself a professional teacher and your goal is to improve, it is not a 'luxury' to go and watch great teachers - it is your job. There are so many weekenders now that fly over these brilliant instructors, that if someone is not motivated enough to turn up to one I would question how badly they wanted to improve.

    Remember, even if there was a course for independent teachers you would almost certainly have to travel, and it would be expensive. Maybe one day we'll put one on, but in the meantime just watching great teachers is relatively cheap, fun, and available method for self improvement.

    I have never been asked to teach a private lesson on 'how to teach better' which makes me think there is no demand for a course, atleast not from me. If you think there is, get a group of independent teachers together, decide what you want to learn, what you are willing to spend in time and money, and contact the teacher who you think can do the job. The reason there are no courses is because there is no obvious demand.
    Last edited by Amir; 1st-November-2007 at 02:47 AM. Reason: I always lost paper rock scissors by choosing rock so now I always click on scissors

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    Re: How do Teachers improve?

    Quote Originally Posted by Amir View Post
    I have never been asked to teach a private lesson on 'how to teach better' which makes me think there is no demand for a course, atleast not from me. If you think there is, get a group of independent teachers together, decide what you want to learn, what you are willing to spend in time and money, and contact the teacher who you think can do the job. The reason there are no courses is because there is no obvious demand.
    I run regular teacher's training courses. They are well attended. Our next one is in a month, we publicised it for the first time yesterday - it's half full.

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    Formerly known as DavidJames David Bailey's Avatar
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    Re: How do Teachers improve?

    Quote Originally Posted by Andy McGregor View Post
    I run regular teacher's training courses. They are well attended. Our next one is in a month, we publicised it for the first time yesterday - it's half full.
    Yeah, but are they "how to teach" courses, or "how to teach better" courses? In other words, are they aimed at people who want to be teachers, or existing teachers who want to move on to the next level?

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    Senior Member Minnie M's Avatar
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    Re: How do Teachers improve?

    I was surprised when I went on a WCS cruise to find that a good percentage of the 'students' where actually teachers. The actual teachers for the cruise where top US Pros. What a way to catch up with the latest techniques and get some dancing practice with fellow teachers as well as the pros


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