Developing dance in schools
25 February 2019Throughout March, we’re dedicating studio time to the development of three new dance packages for schools. Launching in September 2019, the packages will strengthen our education offer, using dance to explore socially relevant issues, offering further breadth and depth to curriculum understanding.
Sam Broadbent, our Learning & Participation Officer tells us more and says, “At Company Chameleon, we’re passionate about providing high quality dance education in schools and in order for us to push forward our practice and develop our pedagogy, it’s essential that we revisit and refresh our approach, so our education offer is kept exciting, fresh and relevant.”
“Additionally, it’s an exciting time for the education strand at Chameleon. Thanks to support from Manchester City Council, the last twelve months has seen us take dance into more schools than ever before. We’re keen to use this momentum, learning and experience to build on what we do and ensure our offer is of the utmost value to both Primary and Secondary schools and which also reflects the curriculum in the most purposeful way.”
Over four weeks, our Co-Artistic Directors, Kevin and Anthony, will lead sessions in the studio with Company Dancers, Juliana Javier and Theo Fapohunda, along with NSCD apprentices, Rachel Sullivan and Dan Lukehurst.
Together the group will immerse themselves in a creative lab, focused on testing and developing new approaches, innovative ideas, teaching tools and creative tasks and this activity will culminate in the creation of three individual education packages.
Whilst one of the packages will focus on exploring the Company’s unique movement style and creative approach, the other two packages will relate to productions, Witness This and Of Man And Beast, drawing on issues including mental health and wellbeing, group relationships, bullying, inclusion and building resilience in young people.
“Through dance, our issue-based workshops allow young people to explore complex ideas, feelings and emotions, without using words, but through expression of movement,” explains Sam. “Dance provides such a fantastic platform to discuss challenging topics, as it breaks down barriers to issues which can be difficult to approach, talk about and understand.”
Over the course of the Company’s history, Chameleon has always shone a light on and explored socially relevant issues through its productions. One of the challenges of our education work, is to translate this trait of our performance work, to an educational setting in the most constructive and creative way.
“The next month of development is about questioning our thinking and challenging current approaches,” says Sam. “The vision is to create a dance offer that connects with young people in a fun, unique and accessible way, whilst at the same time, encouraging creative and critical thinking and offering a deeper and broader understanding of key concepts that feature within the curriculum.”
————————————————————————————————
Over the month of March, look out for coverage on social media of our studio time developing our dance education offer. Are you a teacher? We’d love to know your views on issues and themes that can be explored through dance in our workshops. Share your thoughts with Sam at sam@companychameleon.com.