I don't think we do disagree.Originally Posted by Gerry
Sorry Ant I disagree
Why you had to seek this clarification is open to debate and my point 3 above refers. However by going to a lesson finding out what further information you required was my point 4 above.If I didn't ask a question within the advanced lesson we would never have been given the small pointer to help make the lead of the move work
Agreed as per my point 2 above.If you are going to teach advance moves, you need to be able to break it down and highlight the significant parts of the lead that make it work.
I think you are now alluding to the qualtiy of the teachers concerned. This is a point FF has subsequently been making. It was not a point that I commented on in my post but for what it is worth I agree with you both that the quality of the teaching is key.I have been in a number of lessons and spoken to the teacher afterwards concerning parts of the lesson and the had no inclination in putting over the information needed in fact they thought we should already know it.
This is an interesting area, again which I had not commented on in my post above.As far as I am concerned this is still a lead and follow dance and if the men are not taught how to lead properly you can never progress that far
This is my take on it.
I have oscillated over MJ teaching, its pitfalls and its advantages and I feel the following points are relevant.
1 MJ teaching per se does not concentrate on technique both from the individual and the dance partner perspective. However it does try to incorporate some of these areas in context in its lessons.
2 I feel the result of this way of teaching produces two things. Generally speaking bold and daring leaders and followers that may not be as technically as proficient as people taught in other partner dances.
3 However, much of the technique learned in the other partner dances that I am aware of comes more from its culture of private lessons that is far less common in MJ. Rather than from its group classes.
4 Whether this is because the teachers in these other disciplines are better qualified to give these technique based privates compared to MJ teachers, who knows. However to train a Ballroom teacher is counted in years rather than in months so I suspect that they are better trained in this regard and so better placed.
5 I wonder how much of the MJ training we have been given that we do not realise we have taken in then benefits us if we cross over into other dances. We are then critising MJ teaching once we see some benefits of the training in these other dances without giving the credit to our MJ training.
At the end of the day if each dance is taken in isolation, in other words training for one dance only, and each student has the same level of ability, is given the same level of resourses in terms of time and money, what training will produce the better leaders and followers?
I have a feeling that compared to the other forms of dancing I have come across the MJ model will. Because I think at the end of the day the dancers coming this way have far less restrictions in regard to the way they dance planted in their minds.
Where I think MJ lets itself down is the strand of technique that needs to follow through its training. It seems to me that the new approach is an attempt to remedy this.
Whether it is produces the desired results will depend on the teachers and only time will tell.
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