--- Victor Bennetts <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Teach always in couples? That is partly true in my view. > If I ever go to a class and it starts with the teacher > telling all the women to go to one side of the room and > all the men on the other (sound familiar?), my heart > sinks. At that point I am getting ready to walk out. If > they start counting out from one to eight then I am > changing my shoes and heading for the door :-). But there > is a place for individual work. If a class starts with > the teacher leading everyone in a walking exercise then I > start grinning.
The method of having men & ladies separate to learn a choreography can work with really good instructors. One couple that uses that approach very successfully is Colette Hebert & Richard Council. It always surprises me how well people are dancing a complex choreography by the end of their class without much anticipation. Part of their success, I believe, is that they repeat the sequence over and over and over again so that they separate out the learning process. First the choreography and then the technique. When they put people together, they work on the communication skills. But by keeping people apart for as long as they do, they actually force people to do the drills that they should be doing on their own anyway. It makes people be aware of their own bodies. When people have their bodies primed, then the communication in both ways becomes a lot easier. I believe the flaw committed by other teachers who may use that method is that they only concentrate on the choreography part. They don't give people enough time to work on the technique. Do they retain the sequence after the workshop? Perhaps not, but that's not the point. The point is for students to work on their technique. And the milongas after the workshops are fine. No one going wild with a sequence they've just learned, though I do see bits of the sequence appear. But they are done okay. Trini de Pittsburgh PATangoS - Pittsburgh Argentine Tango Society Our Mission: To make Argentine Tango Pittsburghs most popular social dance! http://patangos.home.comcast.net/ ____________________________________________________________________________________ Be a better friend, newshound, and know-it-all with Yahoo! Mobile. Try it now. http://mobile.yahoo.com/;_ylt=Ahu06i62sR8HDtDypao8Wcj9tAcJ _______________________________________________ Tango-L mailing list [email protected] http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/tango-l
