Marya
Member
Hi everybody,
Last night was the first night of my once a year dance class that I teach.
I had a bigger group than usual. I worked hard to personally invite some people and had a press release in the newspaper. I have some dancers with real potential.
However, I had two ladies in their 50's (my age) who just wanted to try the class so paid the drop-in fee. If they come back I will have a lot of work to do with them.
I have seen this issue come up before and have always struggled to find the best way to help students who are so disconnected with their bodies that they cannot move their hips without moving their shoulders and rib cage. it is like their hips are frozen with no ability to have independent movement.
It is hard to put into words, but for example, one lady raised her whole right side, leaning to the left and flailing her arms around to keep her balance in order to accomplish a basic down hip movement. I see this a lot especially in older beginners and am stumped as to how to help. I was wondering if anyone has any tips.
I do the usual, try to explain in words, then stand next to them to demonstrate, have them put their hands on my body to feel what I am doing, try different stances etc, but I think she was really frustrated and not really understanding what I was saying.
Interestingly at the end of class we did a few isolations and she could do hip slides ok, but the posture for the way I do hip slides requires very straight legs with the knees and thighs very engaged (like mountain pose in yoga).
This is just one example to illustrate. We mostly focused on walking and basic Egyptian (hip drops) in class but I can predict she will not be able to shimmy either without her whole body involved. This is not the ordinary beginner issues where there is unfamiliarity with movements but an ability to understand and progress.
So what would you do in this case?
Marya
Last night was the first night of my once a year dance class that I teach.
I had a bigger group than usual. I worked hard to personally invite some people and had a press release in the newspaper. I have some dancers with real potential.
However, I had two ladies in their 50's (my age) who just wanted to try the class so paid the drop-in fee. If they come back I will have a lot of work to do with them.
I have seen this issue come up before and have always struggled to find the best way to help students who are so disconnected with their bodies that they cannot move their hips without moving their shoulders and rib cage. it is like their hips are frozen with no ability to have independent movement.
It is hard to put into words, but for example, one lady raised her whole right side, leaning to the left and flailing her arms around to keep her balance in order to accomplish a basic down hip movement. I see this a lot especially in older beginners and am stumped as to how to help. I was wondering if anyone has any tips.
I do the usual, try to explain in words, then stand next to them to demonstrate, have them put their hands on my body to feel what I am doing, try different stances etc, but I think she was really frustrated and not really understanding what I was saying.
Interestingly at the end of class we did a few isolations and she could do hip slides ok, but the posture for the way I do hip slides requires very straight legs with the knees and thighs very engaged (like mountain pose in yoga).
This is just one example to illustrate. We mostly focused on walking and basic Egyptian (hip drops) in class but I can predict she will not be able to shimmy either without her whole body involved. This is not the ordinary beginner issues where there is unfamiliarity with movements but an ability to understand and progress.
So what would you do in this case?
Marya