For Michelle

The book I mentioned in the campus session today, that may be relevant to your topic is:

'Child Development from Birth to Eight: A Practical Focus' by Jennie Lindon and published by the National Children's Bureau.

I think I got it off Amazon but it might also be available on Dance books. When completing my FDI we had to complete a unit on Child Lifespan and development which looked into the cognitive, social and emotional development of children.The ISTD put together a textbook for this, so it may be worthwhile contacting the I.S.T.D. to see where they got and how they got their info for the book. There website is www.istd.org

I hope this helps

Useful Activity

At the Campus session I approached Paula having thought I'd completed activity 7 and she asked me to bog what I had done as a useful exercise for every body.

The exercise:

Take an existing data collection tool and critique it, use the questions in activity 7 to analyse what you have found is effective and any faults that you have found in the tool.

I took interview questions designed and used by Julia Buckroyd when writing her book 'The Student Dancer' and here is what I concluded:

Critique of Interview questions used by Julia Buckroyd when looking into ‘The Experience of Professional Dance Training for Male Trainees’ Buckroyd, J, 2000, The Student Dancer – Emotional Aspects of Learning Dance (p218), London, Dance Books Ltd.

The interview questions proposed by Julia Buckroyd in order to indentify “distinctive issues for boys in professional dance training with the idea of clarifying how dance training could ensure those needs are met” (Buckroyd, J, 2000, The Student Dancer – Emotional Aspects of Learning Dance (p128), London, Dance Books Ltd) are well structured, thorough and are appropriate to the purpose of the investigation. Buckroyd has explored all imaginable areas of the emotional/ psychological aspects of a boy undertaking full time dance training however there are questions that may lead the interviewee to form a certain way of thinking, questions that could possibly lead to the identification of the participant and there are also a number of questions that may alienate the male student dancer.
The interview is well structured with all relatable questions grouped together for example all questions relating to weight and food issues follow one another. There are a few exceptions to this where a question does not precisely fit into the running them for example the question “Do you watch dance performance?” is situated among questions about the male dancer’s hobbies other than dance however these questions can still be encompassed in the general area that the surrounding questions and are simple, short answered questions and therefore they do not disrupt the flow of the interview. The questions are not only in logical groups but they also follow a structure taking the interviewee on a progressive journey through their training; starting with their experiences before their professional training/ information on when they started and concluding with life after their training and life after dance thus making a well structured interview. The questions are very thorough and appropriate to the purpose of the research, exploring all areas of the emotional aspect of a male dancers training however it is possible that there are too many and some unnecessary questions especially considering that Buckroyd allocated a time period of one hour for the interview. Some of the questions could be simple yes or no answers however many of the questions are written to prompt more in depth answers and therefore could take the length of the interview far beyond the allocated timescale, this combined with the volume of questions could make the interview more time consuming than anticipated.

Buckroyd has asked a number of difficult questions in her interview which although may be considered necessary to understand the emotional aspects of a male dancer undergoing training, they may also alienate the participant for example the question “What kind of social life do you have in comparison with your non-dancer friends?” may embarrass the participant as the question is making two assumptions; one, that the participant has an active social life and two, that the participant has friends outside of the dance community. These sorts of probing questions may cause the participant to feel uncomfortable and could affect the information that they divulge throughout the rest of the interview. The questions that Buckroyd has posed also stipulate a certain intellectual level with her questions assuming that the participant has a certain level of understanding about the ‘normal’ development of the adolescent male, which again could possibly alienate the subject due to feeling of in-adequacy. Buckroyd has been careful with most of her questions not to lead the participant into a specific way of thinking/ point of view however there are a few questions which could possibly do this for example the question “Do teachers treat you differently from girls” could lead the participant to over analyse something that otherwise may not have occurred to them. Buckroyd has appeared to have made the assumption that a boys experience will differ from that of a female student by the question that she has asked regarding the treatment of the participant compared to the girls in the class however, although these questions insinuate certain assumptions they are necessary to all possible emotional aspects of a professional dance education for boys. The opening question regarding age of entering the school, current age and previous experience when combined with school records may allow the participant to de identified however this is only when combined with the schools information and therefore does not present an ethical issue. Buckroyd also provided an example of her consent forms which clearly expressed her intentions of recording and ways of publishing the participants involved and thereby preventing ethical issues

Buckroyd has formulated a probing in-depth interview that will thoroughly investigate the experience of the male dancer. The interview is well structure with the interview following a logical progression of topics and all questions put into topic related groups however Buckroyd in her endeavour for thoroughness may have; asked too many questions, alienated the participant and led the participant into a certain way of thinking however the negative aspect to Buckroyd’s interview questions are only possibilities and are completely dependent on the views and experiences of the participant. Buckroyd has created an effective instrument for research which providing the researcher has an extensive timescale could prove extremely useful however if a researcher has a restricted timescale like that of our project Buckroyd’s in-depth style of interview may not be an effective and time efficient way of gathering data.

You don't need to right it all out in an essay like I did (this is what I thought Activity 7 was) just annotate a photocopy or printout of the questionnaire/ interview questions and see what you come up with and what you can learn from this.

Learning Diary: Blog 3 19/03/10

At the Campus session this week, we discussed a number of issues regarding data collection methods specifically observations, interview and questionnaires. We were asked to observe a pre-recorded segment of a dance class to look for phenomena in the class, following Paula’s comments it was obvious that as a teacher I automatically analyse any observation that I make and in the process of this project I must ensure that I only record my observations and not my analysis of those observations. If I record my immediate analysis of those observations rather than the observations themselves I am not accurately recording my primary data which could jeopardise the validity of my conclusions.

The campus sessions also resonated the importance of a pilot study, which is effectively a trial run of your observation/interview/questionnaire. The purpose of a pilot study is to ensure that your data collection technique achieves what you want it to achieve and that it does this in a effective way. After you conduct a pilot study it is imperative that you receive feedback from your pilot study test subjects in order to ascertain if any improvements could be made. By having a pilot study I can ensure that my data collection methods are effective, understandable and fit for purpose before I begin my final research project thereby minimising the chance of having to completely change my research tools halfway through the final project or finding out at the end that the data collected does not answer my research questions.

The campus session extended my knowledge of data collection method and educated me in the more precise and well research my project proposal is the more successful that my final research project will be.

Project idea

This week the concepts I had come up with have taken a complete U-turn, I have to apologize to Peter who went through the long list of project ideas that I had and have now just completely disregarded. Following what I’m calling my crisis moment I had a bit of an epiphany looking at why I entered into this course in the first place, my previous ideas were all about looking into improve my teaching practice and teaching methods which although would aid me and my students, in Peter’s words ‘Who cares’ (apart from me that is). So now I’ve gone a bit bigger that just my classroom.

The idea:

The benefits of integrating creative dance into technical syllabus work in a dance education/ preparation for a professional career in dance?

There has been a lot of research into the benefits of a creative dance education in the public sector (secondary and primary education) but what I would like to know are what would be the benefits of integrating creative dance into the private sector? What would the impact of adding a creative dance exercise into Modern/ Jazz/ Ballet syllabus work? I know from experience that many students struggle with the idea of freestyle when introduced to the concept dance college and this can often be the make of brake point of getting that all important job. Would having to create your own choreography from an earlier age/ improvisation have helped with this?

The areas I would look at:
What is a dance education?
What is creative dance?
What skills are required for a successful career in dance?
How is creative dance taught in the public sector?

What does literature say about the benefits of creative dance?

My primary research:
· An experiment of adding a creative dance section to my syllabus classes- Would it improve, technique, confidence, enhance enjoyment, improve performance etc?
· Conduct a survey of what the child thought of these additions to the classes.
· Survey professional dancers on what they think are the integral skills that they need?
· Observe other teachers conducting my experiment and the effect it has on their students.

I hope that this study would not only interest myself but my employer, other teachers and ultimately the IST D whose syllabus I teach.

What do you think?

Learning Blog 3 05/05/10

When trying to whittle down my ideas for my research project I was trying to answer the question of feasibility on one of ideas ‘the effect that choice of music has on the technique/ performance of dance’ an idea that had come about from a ballet lesson where I found that my students were not exhibiting their previous technique/ performance of their port de bras and footwork. When I asked why they said it was because of the music therefore I thought that it may be a worthwhile investigation looking into the effect that music has on dancers. From my many spider diagrams and reading of research methods I thought the best way to collect my primary data would be to conduct an experiment where I would chose a selection of set exercises in my ballet class and get the students to perform these two contrasting pieces of music and then observe the effect of this. However when looking into the feasibility of conducting this experiment I came across a problem; the most effective way to conduct this experiment would be with a pianist who could easily perform contrasting pieces of music to the specifications that would suit my experiment, but I do not have a pianist (as my classes are all done with the aid of my iPod) and the likelihood of finding appropriate pre-recorded music in the correct time signatures and style of music was un-likely due to the time constraints of balancing this project and my other life commitments. Therefore I have concluded that although this project would have an insightful benefit that would impact my work in a positive way, collecting primary data would not be feasible.

This revelation made me evaluate the priorities of what I need to consider before choosing my project idea in order to complete my project proposal. Primary data collection is an important aspect of our final project and therefore I must ensure that the research that I wish to conduct is feasible which means answering the questions:

1) Do I have persons to conduct the research on (my sample group)?
2) Will my sample group be representative (think validity of research)?
3) Do I have the equipment (if any) to conduct the research.
4) Is the research possible in the time period for the project when considering balance with my other commitments?
5) Are there any problems that I could encounter when conducting this research
6) Are there any ways in which I could overcome these problems and are they feasible.

All these need to be considered in order for me to choose a topic for a realistic project proposal; therefore I am now looking at answering these questions on my other project ideas.

Activity 2

A new influence that perhaps could be classed as an advantage or a disadvantage depending on your point of view is the insider knowledge of the subjects that you are conducting your primary data research on or thinking of conducting your primary data research on. I believe that this is a distinct advantage as it enables you to make more informed choices/ informed conclusions when either planning or analysing your research, for example when trying to put together a group of subjects/ participants that are truly representative of the type of persons/ group of persons that your research is about (your ‘sample’), your insider knowledge will help choose the subjects/ participants in order to make sure that they are truly representative group in order to help ensure the validity or your results.

Activity 1

Social Constructivism: The construction of the social setting in which learning occurs and the effect of learning the construction of the social setting.

Reflexivity: Work with which the researcher tries to be as objective as possible but with which the work takes into account bias and subjective views of the researcher for example, any research that I conduct will be from the perspective of a teacher, a third party academic may draw different conclusions/ have a different opinion on my findings.

Athens!

Can anybody log into Athens? (the portal to let Middlesex uni students look at online books/ journals) I've done what the book tells me to do and what Paula said on the last campus day but its still not letting me in. Can anybody help?