Welcome!

 Week 1

    What a better way to start a new year and semester with something different and unfamiliar to my portfolio. Today, I was able to gain some understanding of dance as a subject taught in Ontario elementary schools. Given our global pandemic, the class had to follow our provincial health guidelines and accompany the same online format as last semester. Even though this course will be fully online, I have great colleagues and an awesome instructor to gain the most from the classes. 

    In our first class, our instructor began by welcoming each of us to the course, and she was able to note that some of her students have had her before in the drama course - me being one of these students. I've never felt so comfortable to be part of a class. It helps when you have a general understanding of the instructor's expectations from the previous semester. As the course continued throughout the day, I was challenged with the idea of practicing some of the movements on camera, but as the class went on, I found myself adjusting to the new way of learning. Our instructor reassured us that we weren't going to be learning a new routine or anything out of the ordinary, but the main idea behind teaching dance is creating a movement based on our choices. 

    As the course progressed, we were instructed to meet with our groups to complete an activity of assigning movements to the syllables of our group members' names. My name is short and only had two syllables, but I have a group member with four, which was very interesting to see her come up with her movements to represent her name. When we were called to rejoin in the general meeting, it was fascinating to see everyone's movements. Some were similar, and others really took the creative process to the next level. With it being our first class, some of us need to grow our comfort level before using the space that our cameras can capture to incorporate movement into our activities. 

    Overall, our first class was enjoyable and engaging for all of us, especially myself as a new dance curriculum learner. As a future educator, I must learn through my experience to teach my future students and connect to how they feel and think. My instructor exemplified this with her care and understanding by debriefing with use once our assigned activities were complete. It was a valuable experience to witness and learn from that to apply it in my future classroom. My upcoming classes' goal is to bring my whole body into movement activities and learn to build cross-curricular connections between other subjects and dance. I am looking forward to the upcoming classes and the experiences to follow.