Continuing with Reflective Practices

Upon further reflection, I realise that I start Kolb’s learning cycle at various points of entry depending on what I am working on.  When I’m choreographing for myself and I start with a piece of music that I connect with and resonate with me and enter at Abstract Conceptualisation. This would be at the point of hearing the piece of music for the first time.  

I then realise that I engage in Robert Kottacamp Key Concept of reflection-in-action, this is specific to Middle Eastern Dance for me as generally Middle Eastern Dancers perform an improvisation at a performance and it is imperative that the dance piece is perfectly executed thus engaging in the ‘tacit knowledge’. 

 I have just realised that when I first started studying Middle Eastern Dance our teacher was unable to vocalise at times how to engage within the musicality of the music, or convey the feeling but we could visually see what she was trying to teach us.  I see now that ‘tacit knowledge’ is a very important component of our unconscious mind, I think particularly in improvisation.  I clearly understood this from Twyla Tharp extract explaining muscle memory. (Tharp and Reiter, 2006)..

I hear the words ‘muscle memory’ being mentioned more often at various classes I have attended recently such as 'Pilates' and 'Zumba'.  I am most interested in reading further Twyla Tharp’s ‘The Creative Habit’.  In particular how ‘she has to find ways to walk into a room and come up with the goods and make up a dance when she is hired to do so’ as this may inspire me in my work. 

I have been video recording myself whilst rehearsing, as this aides my learning and critical reflecting and view the performance as others would see it.

I am realising that I engage with multiple theory and use the tools of reflection and critical analysis in my profession.  I have a variety of dance teaching jobs so I shift learning cycles unconsciously to suite and adapt to the situation, event or person. 

Do I change and adapt to suit people’s needs or am I evolving and gaining knowledge and new experiences because I want to? I think I see myself as someone who continually gathers knowledge, learns and deliver and share this knowledge to new audiences.

I would be interested to hear how you see yourselves?

Journal Writing experience Task 2b and Reflective Theory Task 2c

Journal writing experience  Task 2b and  Reflective Theory Task 2c

I have combined Tasks 2b and 2c as I felt they were linked.  I’m not comfortable with writing the Reflective Theory task and post this to a public Wiki.  I’ve learnt that I’m terrified of the thought of academic writing.

For six weeks I have been teaching the ‘Jive’ dance to two year six classes, (ages ten and eleven years) I  have been given ‘carte blanche’ at this school as to what topic or style of dance I choose to teach and have written my own lesson plans for the term.  I generally opt to enhance the children’s topic and work cross curricular. Their topic was World War II and the ‘Jive’ dance was the obvious choice along with recognised music of the Glenn Miller Band.

I introduced the learning objective and success criteria and explained clearly what they are working towards plus I demonstrated the dance. 

My objective was for the children to learn the dance in couples and to experience social dancing in a formal manner.  I was aware that there would be some objection from the boys and girls dancing together but I couldn’t understand why there were so many objections..

I asked the children to partner up in couples and I didn’t expect that only 10% were happy to do this.  Some were repulsed at the thought of holding hands with one another.  I also realised that there could have been cultural reasons for this behaviour.

Their behaviour changed, they were becoming noisy, loud, boisterous and unruly.

I become concerned and unsure of my management behaviour ability as well as feeling anxious at the thought of  loosing control of 30 children in a room the size of a classroom. 

I set myself to find the solutions to resolve these issues.

 At that time I had read about Gibbs model for reflection and also Kolb’s learning cycle and learnt that I had used a mix of both but models instinctively.  I realised I became unaware at what point and what stages they came into play or merged with one another.  This was a complex mix. Is this Multiple Intelligences working?  But through the reflective model and learning cycle I eliminated the fact that the size of the class and the number of students were not a contributing factor of their disruptive behaviour.  Half my dance classes in a week are conducted in the school hall and half are in a Cabin (classroom size) and it is only one class out of the ten that I teach that is so disruptive.  This class happen to be held in the Cabin. So why wasn’t my reflection and learning cycle theory working with this class?  This was baffling me.  With this particular class, the theories alone wasn't working for me. Did it mean that I hadn't grasped the theories therefore unable to correct the practise's?

Further research showed me that according to Piaget’s theory of cognitive maturity,   it was to do with the ability to think, for this particular classes age.  I concluded that this class had a large percentage of socially immature children.  I started talking talk to them about formal dancing and in particular ballroom dancing with children of the same age.  Intuitively I asked for a couple to volunteer to demonstrate the Jive dance with one another.  There were a few giggles and jeers to start with but seeing the demonstration, the children began to accept that it was OK to dance with one another.  This was such a break through! I was feeling elated that by a number of trials around the Gibbs cycle of reflection plus an understanding of Piaget's theory
I recognised what wasn't working and why.

Piaget’s theory states that from age 11 years upwards children become aware that they don’t  just have a sense of self, they have become aware that to move forward and get what they want, they have to accept and recognise other people’s needs.  This is known as ‘formal operations’ stage

The results showed a conclusive break through in the children’s understanding of formality and etiquette of social dance.  I went onto introduce Kolb's learning cycle to the class unbeknown to them.

At the same time, I divide the children into smaller groups to perform their steps, the children watching were asked to, analyse and critique the lesson. I also set a written task for the children not taking part in the class to write down what they observed about the children learning to dance in the class as well as taking notes on the class content and objectives.

I concluded from the written tasks and observations how much the children were enjoying the experience, they were smiling, were happy, they had learnt to communicate with one another about dance steps, they were dancing in time with the music.  I read these observations to the class. This encouraged the children to remain on task, engaged, very enthusiastic and less inhibited, and more dancing in couples.

I also learnt that each and every event and the facts available to you changes your judgement and perspective on how to apply the theories to gain resolve and solutions.

I look forward to your comments

Lesson Plan template and Aide Memoire for a Good Lesson

Teaching Dance in a Primary School

For Michelle Moss and all

See Michelle Moss's Task2b on WALT and WILF aides.  A very well written and analysed post and useful for anyone interested in teaching in Schools.
Here is a template of a lesson plan I currently use in the Primary School I teach in.  I posted this as an aide  to Michelle's Moss's post Task 2b WALT & WILF.  I am also learning to take a 'Games' lesson and I am learning the 'rules and skills' of playing football.!! :-))

Here is a link to a template currently being used in the school I am teaching in for 'Aide Memoire for a Good Lesson' used for Performance Management lesson observations and a reflection on teacher's practices and to set teacher's targets to improve their teaching.  Hope you find this useful..

https://docs.google.com/leaf?id=0B_JmEfUEoU4TNDM3YTE2NzMtYjE4Ny00YzEyLWE5ZmEtZTJhNmZjMGM5ODAw&hl=en_GB

Reflective Practitioner - I think I see the light

Reflective Journal Task 2a

Further thoughts.

I found the reflective journal illuminating after a period of confusion. My learning curve is profoundly steep. I was writing down anything and everything and at times was going off track and had to pull myself back in line. I have discussed reflection with some of the teaching staff at the school to gain insight as to how they would write plus reading fellow learners blogs from previous year and examples of reflective writing from the web. I realised that I have been stuck in a 'culturally conditioned' climate and I require re-calibration. I am a practical person and find theory difficult to absorb but have found analogies very helpful. I require more research and reading of theories before I can discover new theories of my own. I never thought of critically analysing myself or my work.  I am experiencing an 'Evolutionary Awakening'  in more ways than one because I closed the door to my dance teaching  profession years ago.

I found that  Gibbs model of Reflective Cycle a useful and preferred guide. It's a structured template and gives clear cues. 
The Reflective Cycle

The Reflective Cycle

Moon mentions  reflection as a ‘melting pot’ of ideas, feelings, information, etc., this is exactly as I see it.  Easy to put in and off load,  but challenging to analyse, evaluate and conclude.  Moon also mentions ‘cognative housekeeping’.  I understand this as I attended an NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programme) introductory course on becoming a practitioner.  NLP is about re-programming your current cognitive (brain) behaviour. This is similar to muscle programming for dance or physical  moves.  This tool enables you to take new steps to better any bad habit/pattern or behaviour.  A useful tool for teaching Dance as a Therapy. 

What is NLP?

Reflective Practice Task 2

The Reflective Practitioner - the 1st steps

Reader 2

Various types of journals

Professional capacity.  My journal over the years contained short written accounts of my travels to various destinations throughout the world.  Notes on resources, contacts, lots of photographic evidence capturing those moments or reminders of that event.  I would use the journal to seek out new ideas and inspiration for dance projects.  It was a form of database.

Personal life.  I have written about personal events that have caused life changing experiences and about how I was feeling at that time and about the process of resolution.

For this task, I have started a different style of journal as I find myself in a completely different place and time and am confused.  I’ve firstly had to find out if there was a difference between reflection-on-action and introspection as I know that I can be pilosiphical in my writting and yes, there is. Introspection is personal, self analysis and has a philosophical aspect. When reflecting you have facts available to you, within your environment and you are trying to understand why they have turned out a certain way.  I found an analogy that helps clarify; ‘For instance if one of our car tires got punctured, reflection would make us conclude that the puncture probably occurred as a result of driving over a nail. Introspection on the other hand would cause us to believe that the puncture no doubt occurred because of the fact that one drove over a nail, but it was as much a result of not being careful and making no attempt to avoid driving over that nail!’
Thus we see that two seemingly similar terms which are so often used in place of each other, have entirely different connotation both in terms of the actual meanings and connotations. Moreover the close similarity and subtle differences between the two terms occur in the IT domain as well where the two terms denote similar yet differing properties.
Summary:
1.The term reflection denotes the act or state of being reflected while introspection has to do with the observation or examination of one’s own mental and emotional state of mind.
2.Reflection implies a fixing of thoughts on something or a thought while in introspection the whole tendency is to self evaluate and measure.
3.In reflection one looks at the facts while in introspection one looks at the philosophical aspects also.

If the above is correct, I think I will find it difficult not to include an introspection aspect. Would this be the  right thing to do?. I will be looking at other reflective journals for inspiration and ideas and also to see if there is an introspective aspect included. Has anyone else found this a confusing task to start?

Professional Communication Technologies Further thoughts

 I am familiar with some web 2.0 tools but since starting on the BAPP course I have learnt about Google Mail, Google Docs and Blogging. I was about to research ‘Delicious’ further as it’s a good social book marking site and I will eventually book mark the links below into it, but I became side tracked.. Google Docs – Cloud computing/concept. I understand this concept. I worked for Virgin Media and our division (Business) conceived and designed some of the routing for the hardware to be connected within large corporations nationally and internationally to one another for information to be collected/collated/pass through the ‘cloud’ concept. I was on the team of the BT N3 NHS project in the UK, connecting ALL government NHS establishments, hospitals, health care centres, GP centres, Dentists etc., to this cloud that stores all our health notes. Information passed through Ethernet products from speeds around 10Mb to 100Mb
http://www.n3.nhs.uk/HowdoI/N3LondonEthernetNextGenerationServices.cfm
In my current Professional capacity, I first thought ‘who would want to collaborate or edit anything that I've written and that I would want to store this information in Google Docs?’ This line of questioning tells me that I have been teaching ‘autonomously’ far too long and that the technology today has made/forced me to become transparent in all we do. I intend to add my research notes at some point. When I was reading about Ulrich et all (2008) who suggests that ‘these services are constantly evolving and that each platform is progressively developed and replaced (what they refer to as the ‘perpetual beta’), I’d not long read about Quora that was launched out of a ‘private beta’ by two former Face Book employees in 2009 What is Quora? “The website Quora is likely to have answers for you, thanks to submissions from its vast community of users, which the service calls “some of the smartest people in the world.” That's another website for us to ‘manage’! Further proof, in the link below, that Gruber (2007) suggests that there are three components of an on line system that support collective intelligence and the benefits that might be gained from the idea that in a web 2.0 platform like Face Book, the fact that there is over 500 million members makes it the valuable and useful tool for social interaction. The owners of Quora are certainly on their way to benefiting financially.

http://www.maclife.com/article/features/what_quora_and_why_should_you_use_it

Harnessing collective intelligence. How can we trust that the facts are correct? We need to be reminded that photographic and video evidence can be interfered/tampered with. Re mixable data & transformations. Valtyssen 2010 ‘suggests that the blurring of the distinctions between the people who make media and the people who consume it encourages people to engage and participate in the media’ Proof of this is that we have become journalists, reporters and media makers, making our own videos reporting the truth or horrors. One such example of reporting are from young people in war torn countries. This ‘platform’ has given us all a ‘voice’ we are now becoming equal and as important as anyone else with intelligence gathering and reporting it..
I intend to use this media to market my business and add a business page.  I have my own web site but need more hits.. I hope to learn about higher web site profile during this course. I currently us Face Book for socialising and was reading the statistics. A question sprung to mind ‘What would FB be like in five years time’ I was inquisitive so I Google’d the question and found a video interview in 2009 with Eric Scmidt, CEO of Google.  His highlighted comments are shown below;
• Five years from now the Internet will be dominated by Chinese-language content.
• Today's teenagers are the model of how the web will work in five years - they jump from app to app to app seamlessly.
• Five years is a factor of ten in Moore's Law, meaning that computers will be capable of far more by that time than they are today.
• Within five years there will be broadband well above 100MB in performance - and distribution distinctions between TV, radio and the web will go away.
• "We're starting to make significant money off of YouTube", content will move towards more video
• "Real time information is just as valuable as all the other information, we want it included in our search results."
• There are many companies beyond Twitter and Face book doing real time.
• "We can index real-time info now - but how do we rank it?"
• It's because of this fundamental shift towards user-generated information that people will listen more to other people than to traditional sources. Learning how to rank that "is the great challenge of the age." Schmidt believes Google can solve that problem.
• A very compelling interview and worth listening to.
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/google_web_in_five_years.php
I am curious by nature and found the following link about FB. This site mentions Quora and how it would be a good competition for FB. Here is evidence of evolving ideas for improvement. How FB can become bigger in 5yrs than Google is today..
 http://techcrunch.com/2010/10/02/facebook-bigger-google/

In my conclusion I think these new ideas will come to fruition. Having  worked in the Telecoms Industry I was in the midst of the new concepts and designs for evolving and new technologies which are being implemented today.  Live, real time video conferencing for many and varied industries has been in use for quite some time. For example, in education, medical profession, live TV interaction and is happening now in our everyday lives.  Companies will have their day and then go out of existence within a few years. Companies investing in new Technology will be in ‘fashion’ and we all want to at least try out the new technology.  It’s up to us to make an informed choice about the Technologies in our lives. Is it a necessity? We should be responsible enough to allow our young children to dabble with the Internet safely. There is so much going on, I fear we are becoming desensotised.

Re-visiting tasks

I re read the requirements and realised that I hadn't done exactly what was asked.  I have a bad habit of not reading through thoroughly.    I will be posting additional images of my work.. I also need to upload the Audio visual to the BAPP YouTube channel as I have only posted it to my blog. I must take more care in reading the task requirements and take things a little slower.

Task 1c Video Clip

Starting out on BAPP

It's a bit longer than 45 Seconds!!..I think this is funny,  you should see the 'out takes'...

Professional Communication Technology Task 1b

Reader 1

First thoughts about Web 2.0

Does Web 2.0 have a place in my world today? . In deed it is good funnel for research, storage, collaborating, networking, interacting, entertain, be entertained, elaborate, exaggerate, lies, corruption, scheming etc.. One big fusion, one big melting pot..  I will extract what I need when I need it.  We are fortunate to be living in the developing world, we are educated, we socialise, we have freedom of thought or have we after being bombarded with new technology in ways that we can improve our lives, information that we all must have!. We should therefore, be able to evaluate, make good judgements and educated risks within seconds of pressing that ‘send/display/share’ button. Hard to live with it and hard to live without it..

I was reading some of the other student’s blogs and comments and had the same thoughts as Liam about society becoming lazy and becoming less physical.  I see this regularly when taking children’s dance classes how unfit and little stamina they have.  Jessica Hay mentions the difference between seeing a ballet production on TV or video compared to experiencing the real thing and exciting all of our senses. Will we loose some of the use of our senses? Emily Brenchley hit the nail on the head; it is our choice in the end.  Do we sit for hours on end in front of a screen for hours on end, adults at work as well as children at play? Should we? Do we have to?

Since starting BAPP and setting up a Blog, I have never come across the whole concept of Web 2.0.  It is very very clever… A real maze for me though!

New to me is Google Docs or similar and without is it would be difficult to share or publish you work in progress.  Do I want everyone to steal some of my ideas if I’m researching?  Is what I’m researching correct?  Should I trust what I read? Wikipedia is a site I will initiate my research, but I need further proof and justification for cross referencing.

Blogging is new to me too.  I will probably use this more often now.

Flickr or similar sites are great for photo storage and of course ways to make some revenue as a professional.  I enjoyed the outcome of this task but not the process.

Youtube can be fun, entertaining and informative, excellent to broadcast news events but a reminder that horrific scenes can be shared too.

I have looked at other gadget and widgets that can be added to your blogs and web sites and may use them further down the line. For now I still prefer to interact much more with humans face to face, to feel them and so witness their real emotions.  I like the feeling of being alive.

My CV Corinda Hall

Task 1a

https://docs.google.com/document/pub?id=1zTw29vwsdq8KnLLrbZ4Jsa-vhTeFt1-qLROnKuj2z9c

My slide show Task 1d

 I managed it! What a relief! It was bugging me over the weekend, I just couldn't get to grips with the technical side of it. Here are some photo's I managed to upload to Flikr. Mushroom photo's taken by me at night, flowers photo's taken by my husband, I love the bright colours and I love orchids and a couple of modelling assignment photo's taken by my agent. I love hats. It's the first time I've uploaded photo's and turned them into slide show. Is it working? 
I've changed the photos to My Work. 09/10/2011

I've added photo's of my work. Dance in Education in schools, working cross curricular. 1st wedding dance choreographer, Middle Eastern Performer, fun dance workshops for adults.

 

The balance - looking forward to tasks 1c & 1d

Glorious day, just going out for a walk across the fields and woods, need to soak up the sun, filter my cluttered mind and re-charge myself with Negative Ions.  We are all surrounded by electronic equipment, TV, radio, computers, mobile phones, living near high voltage cable lines, walking through shopping malls, etc. and these free radicals need to be eliminated before I attempt the audio-visual and images task. http://www.health-benefit-of-water.com/negative-ions.html  These are exciting tasks for me as I have family members that are knowledgeable in these areas...Did I just say 'exciting tasks' for the audio-visual and images tasks? That means I have to get to grips with more technology...Do we really need all of this technology in our lives? I want a simple life.  If we can get this technology to become even more simplified we can spend less time with our heads in technology and enjoy everything that is free out there in life.  It's a balance..Enjoy your day.

2nd Draft, Task 1a: Professional Profile

I took Liam's advice. I think it looks a little better and not so heavy. Let me know what you think.

 Dance - I want to be like my dance teacher

My first Ballet exam passed was RAD Primary to grade 2. Further ballet exams passed; grades 3 to 6 with the ISTD. Tap Dance exams passed; grades 1 to 3 and Junior Bronze, Silver and Gold and Elementary. I played the Piano Forte, and attained grades 1 to five with Trinity College of Music by the age of 12 years.

After three years on a  Dance Teacher Training Course at ‘The Guildford School of Acting’ I attained Associate and Advanced levels in Greek Dance (Ruby Ginner), and the same for  National Dance. I passed Cecchetti Ballet at Elementary level. Other dance styles covered were; Contemporary and Jazz Dance. I won ‘The best progressive dance teacher’ award in my first year. Other subject studied; Speech and Drama,  exams with LAMDA from grade 5 to silver Medal and Child Psychology

I graduated in 1979 with a ‘Diploma’

 ‘The Corinda Hall School of Dance’, established in 1982 for students to take exams and perform at Arts festivals, events, and competitions. 

I took dance into my community and promoted Dance in local school and colleges. I introduced after school dance clubs.  Welcomed and supported enthusiastically by Head teachers, parents and the local council. 

I was contracted to teach key stages 1 & 2 in at St. Bede’s and St. Anne’s Junior School and key stage 4 at Bishop Challoner School. I devised, delivered and set my own topic projects.

I would collaborate with ‘Arts’ organisations such as ‘Hampshire Dance Trust’, Eastleigh Arts’ and BT Dance’96. An organisation platform for dance groups, clubs and teachers in the community to network and perform their dances

In 1995 I secured a three year contract and given a budget through Hampshire County Council to introduce dance at key stage 3 at ‘The Vyne School’.  End of term performances in collaboration with the Music, Drama and Art departments lead the school to achieve ‘Performing Arts’ status.

In 1997 I secured lottery funding for a community dance project.  I produced, directed and choreographed a musical show with 200 performers.  I managed all the legal administration, theatre design, theatre technicians, licenses, professional guest artistes, marketing and advertising with local and national media was on a bigger scale than I was used to.

In 1999 to retired from teaching dance, I wanted a different challenge. I joined the Telecoms industry. I progressed from Customer Services to Sales & Marketing Manager through to Product Manager.  I was motivated and determined to learn about Systems and Software usage and became a competent user of Microsoft packages up to intermediate level and an understanding of the commercial world of this industry.

At my last company, Virgin Media, I was Support Account Manager.

My duties included; Managing Sales Opportunities (MSO) Management and

Coordination of all provisioning of sales, quotations, orders and billing, presentation

of financial analysis, management of the Business Tracker and a shared target.  

Co-organised and took part in the ‘Three Peaks Challenge’.

My social life included Latin Dancing and started teaching beginners

as a guest teacher.

In June 2010 I became a freelance dance teacher.

My web site is; www.corinda.co.uk  I am currently teaching Dance in Education

in Primary, Junior & Secondary Schools.  My new interest is the

Middle Eastern Dance culture.

I am also a choreographer for First Dance UK. I have some TV and acting experience

on a film set. I have danced in music video’s

I was thrilled to have found BAPP in Arts conversion course.  It will be challenging,

engaging and will give me the opportunity to purse my continuing passion for the Art

of dance. 

I am self motivated, eager, determined, and enthusiastic. 

I value the opportunity to further my education as a mature student and discover

skills needed to become successful in my future career, as Dance Lecturer.