On The Flip Side:
Perspectives on Teaching, Learning and Choreographic Thought
National Dance Education Organization Conference, November 2014
Recognizing that the nature of the work of the discipline may at times be at odds with the systems and structures in which we teach, learn, and practice choreography, this panel offers experiential insights about those processes in the context of higher education. It looks at the relationships between pre-college and collegiate dance education and between the academic experience and the field. It examines multiple sides of the same experience: a professor discusses her pedagogical approach; an undergraduate student explains her current interest in collaborative authorship and the historical research that interest has inspired; and a graduate student reflects critically on her undergraduate experience. The two students unpack their own trajectories and transformations as college dancers, explaining how they came to embrace seeing, making, and researching dance in dramatically different ways from their pre-college trainings. Their professor puts forward a pedagogical value system that privileges choreographic thought, includes a heavy emphasis on collaboration, and proposes an important relationship between success and risk-taking. The panel will include time for lively discussion.
Recognizing that the nature of the work of the discipline may at times be at odds with the systems and structures in which we teach, learn, and practice choreography, this panel offers experiential insights about those processes in the context of higher education. It looks at the relationships between pre-college and collegiate dance education and between the academic experience and the field. It examines multiple sides of the same experience: a professor discusses her pedagogical approach; an undergraduate student explains her current interest in collaborative authorship and the historical research that interest has inspired; and a graduate student reflects critically on her undergraduate experience. The two students unpack their own trajectories and transformations as college dancers, explaining how they came to embrace seeing, making, and researching dance in dramatically different ways from their pre-college trainings. Their professor puts forward a pedagogical value system that privileges choreographic thought, includes a heavy emphasis on collaboration, and proposes an important relationship between success and risk-taking. The panel will include time for lively discussion.