Highly Effective Instructors Series, Habit 3: Dance Skill & Style
For the true lover of dance, exploring all aspects of their art form brings great joy and exhilaration. For the true lover of teaching, the same satisfaction is found in bringing their passion for dance into the lives of others. It is often the case that dancers who reach a certain level in their dancing move on to teaching. However, teaching is not a higher level of the art of dance, but its own art altogether. Dance instructors must therefore find themselves navigating and uniting two unique sets of skills. This can be both challenging and rewarding to the instructor who is willing to spend the same time and energy on the art of teaching as they do on the art of dancing.
The seven habits of dance instructors who are highly effective at making a meaningful and lasting impact on their students’ dancing, as outlined in Seven Habits of Highly Effective Dance Instructors, are…
1) Professionalism and Respect
2) From Stepping Stones to Beyond
3) Dance Skill and Style
4) The Art of Adjustment
5) Real Community
6) A Student of Teaching
7) Pure Motivation
Read on to learn more about dance skill and style. Please also check out the other six habits on the Joy in Motion website.
Habit #3: Dance Skill and Style
Skill: First Things First
The most obvious requirement of the effective dance instructor is dance skill. What is readily apparent to students, especially beginners, is that the instructor has mastered a set of skills that they want to master as well. Mastery implies that the skills and techniques have become automatic, that they do not require conscious thought or deliberation to execute but rather have become second nature. This level comes only through dynamic practice and repetition, which means that the instructor has spent a significant amount of time dancing with different partners to different types of music in venues appropriate to the style they teach (social, competitive, etc.)
Emphasizing skill can be a dangerous game because its meaning is often misunderstood and then overemphasized in the dance world. It is important to understand that, at least for the purposes of this article, skills are not synonymous with moves. Building one’s skill level does not mean learning as many moves as possible. Rather, it refers to developing an understanding of body movement and mechanics, leading and following dynamics, musical interpretation, etc. This of course includes specific moves and patterns, but empty execution of these moves is not the goal. Instead, moves provide an avenue for exploring and expressing one’s understanding of the concepts listed above; moves executed without respect for these concepts are not truly skill and therefore do not reflect mastery.
The effective instructor has not only mastered the skills and techniques at the level he or she teaches, but has mastered more advanced skills and techniques at least one level above that level. For the majority of students, good instructors do not have to be among the best in the country, or even the best in their state or city, as long as they have mastered one level above their level of teaching and have continued progressing beyond that. For example, on an imaginary scale of 1 to 10, an instructor teaching at level 3 should be dancing at least at level 5, meaning that levels 1 through 4 have been mastered. This is necessary to ensure that the instructor understands first-hand how to build a proper foundation and prepare students for the next level should they desire to progress.
It is important to pause here a moment and emphasize that there is a degree of subjectivity when it comes to rating the level of an instructor’s dance skill. Our imaginary scale of 10 is variable rather than absolute, as the reference point is the individual student’s goals. For example, while an instructor might be a level 3 in the eyes of one student, he or she may be a level 9 in the eyes of another. Is either student wrong in their assessment? It is possible that a lack of knowledge and training accounts for a student’s inability to distinguish a very skilled instructor from a marginally skilled one. But it is equally possible that one student is interested in learning to dance socially while the other is interested in competition, or that each want to learn different styles that fall under the same category of dance. In that case, one instructor may be “rated” differently by various students according to their values and goals. It is important to keep this in mind, as the misunderstanding of what is objective versus what is subjective in the dance can often cause confusion and even contention among dancers.
So while the idea of an effective instructor possessing solid dance skills seems obvious and straightforward, we find that this is often not the case. However, at the very least an instructor should be teaching skills which they themselves have mastered, meaning that executing these skills should be automatic and second nature. It is important to remember that execution is not only about being able to get through a particular move but about displaying quality body movement and mechanics, using good leading and following dynamics, and fitting the move or pattern itself into the music. In addition, an effective instructor has progressed to a higher level than that which they are teaching, which indicates that they should have an idea of how to prepare students for the next level should they desire to continue learning.
Please note that Habit #3 is about dance skill. The ability to break apart and teach these skills to students is equally important in being an effective instructor; however, it is not within the scope of this article. Please see Habits 2, 4, and 6 for more on teaching skill.
Style: Breathing Life Into Movement
The process of discovering and developing one’s own unique dance style can be thrilling and exciting and/or confusing and even frustrating. An effective instructor does not necessarily have to possess style – if a skeleton of skills is all the student is interested in learning. But most students who understand and appreciate the difference between a competent dancer with style and a competent dancer without would agree that it makes all the difference. And an instructor who possesses that intangible quality of style is likely to pass on this desire and quality to his or her students, or at least contribute to an already established path. To accomplish this, the effective instructor must understand and communicate two concepts fundamental to the development of style: 1) Style is built on a foundation of skill and technique, and 2) Style is never an imitation, but rather an individual’s unique response to the dance.
That the importance of dance skill has already been discussed is not an accident; skill is indeed a prerequisite to style. Only once a set of skills and techniques have become automatic can the dancer truly transcend them to dance creatively and expressively, which is the essence of style. Until mastery is attained, style will not reach its fullest expression because the dancer must still consciously control his or her movement and responses. Once the dancer reaches the level at which the skills and techniques are second nature, he or she is free to relax and focus on pure enjoyment and expressivity. However, this freedom can be more difficult for some learners than it sounds. Since much of the student’s time is spent imitating an instructor’s movements to improve their skills and technique, it is often erroneously believed that imitation is the key to dancing with style as well. An effective instructor can and should correct this misconception, and he or she can only do this through a deep understanding of the second fundamental concept.
The effective instructor understands that the goal of developing style is not to imitate an instructor – or anyone else. Imitation and style are diametrically opposed. Dance style is unique to the individual and should result from the way the dancer naturally moves in his or her body, connects with his or her dance partners, and feels about the music and the dance. In other words, style should be a response, not a creation. A style that is imitated or created to impress or obtain superficial results will appear artificial and fake, even if subconsciously, to dance partners and spectators. True style that naturally evolves as result of the dancer’s genuine response to the dance will feel and look good because it comes from the inside out. And, it is one of a kind.
So if style isn’t an imitation, what about the instructor? From the student’s perspective, it is important to choose an instructor whose style resonates with their own, someone who makes them feel the music and the dance more completely for themselves. Instructors are not responsible for developing students’ style for them; however, they can show their students options and give them stylistic and improvisational choices to try out, build on, and alter based on their own unique preferences and personality. The choices dancers make and the small details that manifest themselves in their dancing – which is what style is made up of – will be shaped by their personality, temperament, character, quality of movement, thoughts, emotions, musical interpretation, and creativity. So while they may be influenced by their instructor(s) when it comes to style, the result is completely their own.
If style belongs to the individual dancer, where does that leave instructors who want to boast about their knowledge and influence by emphasizing the responsibility they carry for their students’ learning? Appropriately, the fundamental concepts of style outlined above place the ultimate value on each student’s individuality, not on the instructor as an object of emulation. Instructors who either ignorantly or egotistically encourage student dependence and imitation are usually betrayed as such by the way their students dance, in copycat fashion with artificial rather than individual creativity and no genuine, informed responses of their own. The effective instructor, on the other hand, is recognized by students who explore their own response to the dance within the framework of technique and skill. Greg Downey, in his book on the culture of teaching and learning capoeira (a Brazilian fusion of dance and martial arts), was insightful in his comment that “variety in students’ styles was the very hallmark of a great mestre’s [master/instructor’s] inspiration.” So students who dance with great style – their own – are the best compliments of the effective instructor.
