balancing studies

[Ahava_Melantha]

I am having a HARD time with my belly dance studies.

everyday I mostly just wanna play with my favorite songs.

not a lot of drillz or learning choreoraphy goin on right now.

how do you balance it all out.

I am debating between limiting myself to 20 min free time (dancing) and the rest of it - drilling/choreography learning depending on what I got.

and my other option, one day free dance, the other day drillz.

i would love some ideas here.

 

[Darshiva]

Why not .... drill to your favourite songs?

 

[Farasha Hanem]

I'm just trying to find some free time in my crazy schedule TO practice, without being passed out in bed or trying to catch up on household responsibilities. ???

 

[Amanda (was Aziyade)]

It all REALLY depends on your learning style, but there's a lot to be said for just "playing" with your music.

Now that said, your practice session can easily devolve into "I'm just playing dance" and you don't actually accomplish much that's all that productive.

This is just how I do it. It may or may not work for you, depending upon how goal-oriented your personality is:

I dedicate a certain amount of practice time per day. Of that time, I try to allow for "free time" to just dance, AT LEAST 3 times a week, for 15-20 minutes each session. (But I'm super structured and anal that way.)

IF, after a really intense series of days or weeks of practice or rehearsal, sometimes I take a week off of "serious" study, and just spend all my practice time "playing." That helps me keep it fun and light.

Only you know how you best learn, but if you respond well to structure, why not try some structure? Allocate 20% of your practice time to play, and 80% to drills, choreography, technique practice, etc.

I mean, depending upon HOW structured you want to get, you can create an entire month's lesson/practice plan for yourself. If you want help with this, PM and I'll help as best I can. I structure EVERYTHING -- but I have to. I teach a lot and have a toddler, so I literally have to schedule into my day each minute of practice time I can hope for - lol.


Also -- if it's just recently that you've been playing around, it may just be a part of your learning process. You may need time off from structure, and just need to play, or to explore what you've already learned. Or it could be laziness -- as it usually is on my part - LOL! Usually you will sort of know.

 

[Ahava_Melantha]

well part of it is laziness, part of it is like intense therapy hehe.

but also, I have found that after watching some dvds and youtube clips, I've been able to add stuff I've learned to dances at home. so it IS part of how I learn or actually practice what I see.

but I really do need to spend a lil time on drillz. trust me drillz MAKE me better. practicing new choreography, which I'll probably never perform cuz its JUST not my style, but doing it several times a day for several months helps me with Muscle memory of what I've learned. and it imprints on to the muscle memory in the creative part of my brain.

its just figuring out what to get next hehe. as far as dvds anyways.

 

[teela]

I often time put on a DVD to work on a specific skill for 10 min or so and then put on music to dance to for 20 min while I practice a specific skill as I dance to the music in an improvisational manner. You can practice a choreography.

 

[Darshiva]

I've found it helps me to have a set selection of music to drill to. But I must confess that most of my drilling is practicing teaching different coursework at different levels, because for me explaining how to do something activates the part of my brain that learns how to do it so breaking it down into simpler components makes me learn faster & better.

But yes, I do tend to drill to my favourite music. Often my favourite music really isn't appropriate for dancing to in public but great for drilling.

 

[nitewindz]

What works for me is to start by running thru chores I already know, drilling or working, then just dancing for fun.

If I have just 15 minutes, I might run thru a choreo, practice some moves with zills, then just dance. Maybe with music I'm trying to work with, like Egyptian, or maybe just my favorite tunes from any genre