Life as a Modern Dancer

Category: Blog Series: Becoming a Teaching Artist

  • Disrupt/Deepen/Contextualize: A Graphic Organizer for Seasoned Dance Teaching Artists

    ————————————————————————— From Blog Director Jill Randall: As we head into another academic year (the 22nd year for myself!), I have created a simple reflection tool for us all. Please join me! The three key words and actions here are: disrupting, deepening, and contextualizing.  Disrupting – breaking out of our normal patterns for both teaching and…

  • The 2018 Artists’ Gratitude Project: Week 7 (Students)

    The 2018 Artists’ Gratitude Project: A Weekly Practice The potential for positivity, hope, change, and appreciation. Do you feel the dichotomy? Many artists come from an upbringing of extensive support and opportunity – with training, classes, private lessons, workshops, mentors, supplies, and equipment. Many go onto colleges, conservatories, and masters programs. Yet, as artists in…

  • My Dance Week: Teaching Full-Time in a Public Middle School (Makenna Hague)

    My name is Makenna Hague. I am the dance teacher at a public middle school in Utah. I graduated from Brigham Young University in December 2015. I received a BA in Dance Education with a K-12 endorsement. When you become an educator the question of “What teachers inspired and influenced you in middle/high school?” is…

  • The 2018 Artists’ Gratitude Project: Week 5 (Arts Education Towards Social Justice)

    The 2018 Artists’ Gratitude Project: A Weekly Practice The potential for positivity, hope, change, and appreciation. Do you feel the dichotomy? Many artists come from an upbringing of extensive support and opportunity – with training, classes, private lessons, workshops, mentors, supplies, and equipment. Many go onto colleges, conservatories, and masters programs. Yet, as artists in…

  • My Dance Week: Teaching Full-Time in a 6th-12th Grade Public School

      Today we hear from Sarah Billings Wheeler:   I currently teach full-time at a 6-12 public school in NYC; the schedule below is how I live my life once the school year starts. I teach grades 6,7,8,9,11 and 12th, with each grade (except for 9th) seeing me for four classes a week. I also…

  • For Studio Instructors: Weekly Ideas and Reflection Questions for Fall Semester Youth Classes (Week #15)

    From Blog Director Jill Randall: I created this list of 30 questions/ideas for my employees this fall, and I thought that you might enjoy joining us this semester as we reflect each week on our teaching practice. Here is the complete list of ideas, plus week fifteen's two big ideas. Week 15 Reflecting on our…

  • 2017 in Review: From the Blog Series “Becoming a Teaching Artist”

    Teaching artist Pamela Vail; photo by Tori Lawrence Throughout 2017, we shared resources, questions, and personal schedules of teaching artists throughout the United States. The intersection of teaching and artistic inquiry is a beautiful thing – the teaching artist field. On the blog, we wholeheartedly embrace all of the settings, age groups, and formats of teaching for…

  • Teach K-5 Creative Dance Classes? Some Book Suggestions for Exploring the Themes of Winter, Seasons, Wishes and Dreams

    From Blog Director Jill Randall: One of my passions in creative dance classes is the intersection of language and movement. Books can spark ideas; the text can narrate a dance. For teaching artists and students alike, picture books can inspire improvisational activities as well as help shape a group dance. The colors, pictures, imagery, story,…

  • For Studio Instructors: Weekly Ideas and Reflection Questions for Fall Semester Youth Classes (Week #14)

    From Blog Director Jill Randall: I created this list of 30 questions/ideas for my employees this fall, and I thought that you might enjoy joining us this semester as we reflect each week on our teaching practice. Here is the complete list of ideas, plus week fourteen's two big ideas. Week 14 Reflecting on our…

  • Speaking as a Teaching Artist: Becca Levy, Rebecca Stenn, and Joanna Kotze

     Becca Levy. Photo: Seth Langner From Becca Levy: What is the role of teaching within your dance life? What do you love about teaching? What does the phrase “teaching artist” mean to you? Teaching is where I get to dive into investigating what is fascinating about the human mind and body. The most satisfying moments…