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The following information is published with ROUNDALAB's permission from the ROUNDALAB Reference Manual compiled by Richard & Jo Ann Lawson, 1987.

Getting Your Knowledge Across

by Jim Trulock (Reprint from URDC Newsletter March/April 1979)

One of the most difficult aspects of teaching Round Dancing (or anything else) is getting your knowledge across to your dancers. It is one thing to be a beautiful, graceful dancer and a great cuer, but it is a whole different "ballgame" when it comes to being a really GOOD TEACHER.

How do the really good teachers seem to be able to magically "infect" their students with dancing ability when you and I seem to have so much difficulty in just "pounding a little knowledge" into OUR dancers? Will, perhaps the reason is that they follow, either consciously (or unconsciously) most of the teaching methods listed below.

First of all, A GOOD TEACHER IS PATIENT and realizes that the mind of a dancer is like a narrow-necked bottle. It can take in plenty of learning in small drops, but any large quantity suddenly introduced spills over and is waste! Also, they almost always GIVE THE BIG PICTURE. You can dramatically increase understanding by offering your dancers a "birds-eye" view of the material you will be covering before you actually begin your full treatment. Follow the "big picture" up by BREAKING YOUR MATERIAL DOWN INTO UNDERSTANDABLE UNITS. One vital point: Break your material down in order to make it more easily comprehended. Each part, ALONE, must make sense to your dancers. Keep all of your parts understandable.

Since all learning is based on memory, your skill as well as your success as a teacher depends on your ability to present your material in the most memorable fashion possible. A logical arrangement helps you do just that. Here are three ways to make your material more rememberable.

  1. Start at the beginning.
  2. Move from the simple to the difficult.
  3. Give reasons. Explain why what you are saying is so. Show the connection between the facts (or ideas) you have told him, and your dancer will remember, because he understands it.

The fact is, that the laws of association govern all of our thinking. Whatever appears in the mind must be introduced and when introduced, it must be as the associate of something that is ALREADY stored in our brain. The stronger the association, the more efficient, the longer-lasting the learning. The two most widely employed methods of connecting (or associating) new material with the old is by POINTING OUT THE SIMILARITIES AND DIFFERENCES between what you wish him to learn and what he ALREADY knows.

TRY A LIGHT TOUCH WITH A LITTLE HUMOR. Humor can help you get your knowledge across because it humanizes your subject, keeps your students alive and attentive. Ideally, the light touch should in some way illustrate or illuminate a point you wish to make. Why bother with humor? Because any kind of learning is WORK - and 55 minutes plus five minutes of laughter are worth twice as much as 60 minutes of unrelieved work. Humor puts people at ease. It relieves tension.

Everybody likes a show. We are attracted by and pay more attention to movement, action, things that happen. So DEMONSTRATE AND DRAMATIZE! Do something! But make sure it will help CLARIFY what you have just said, or call attention to what you are about to say.

Roundalab Journal, Summer, 1982