Every March I have to start pulling together 6 or 7 dances for an end-of-year performance. Every school has its own schedule and rhythm for performance — based on student demographics, the focus of the school, the parent population, logistics, and money — so I operate with some givens:

• Our community — students, parents, staff — prefer one end-of-year performance. During the year, some classes do low-key performances for staff-and-students at Monday morning assemblies, but parents are only invited in June (each of our other community/evening events focuses on a different content area: Curriculum Night, Math Night, Literacy Night, Young Authors Day…). So our end-of-year performance is the one chance to showcase all 380 students as well as what the dance program has to offer — movement skills, cultural dances, curriculum-related choroegraphy, and a lot of creative input, collaboration and ownership from the kids.
• Attendance at evening events is healthy. Healthy means the percentage of kids that attend at night has increased dramatically over the years: at the primary level, it’s gone from 5% to 60%; at the intermediate level, it’s gone from 20% to 90%.
• But it’s also unpredictable: I never know quite which student will or won’t come at night, so I can’t give anyone a starring role. I can’t even do the star-with-understudy thing, cause both star and understudy might both be no-shows!
• The performances need to be no more than 75 minutes long. [We actually have 2 performances -- one in the afternoon, when students perform for each other, so everyone has a chance to perform, and one at night -- when family-and-friends are in the audience.] They need to be short for the sake of the kid-audience in the afternoon, the parents-wh0-want-to-go-home at night, and teachers-who-are-supervising-dancers-back-in-the-classroom while parents fill the audience. So go ahead, do the numbers… each of 14 classes can do a 4-dance, with a 1-minute transition between dances (and I have to come up with structures for 14 different dances!) OR each of 7 grade levels can do an 8 or 10-minute dance. I opt for the latter, so parents can see their own child on stage for more time! But of course, that’s more kids on stage, especially during the afternoon performance: 50-60 at a time, 2 classes per grade level. At night, when some kids don’t come, the numbers onstage are just about right.
• There’s no funding. Our population is low-income, we don’t have parent volunteers, we don’t have a PTA, and our entire school budget goes toward improving academic achievement, because our kids are always just barely making it. That means I use the materials I have. The most I ever do for costumes is to ask the kids to maybe wear a black or colorful t-shirt if they have one.

So in March, I need to think up 7 dance structures for 50 kids each, with each grade-level dance showcasing a different aspect of the dance program and no starring roles. This year, as the task was looming, I got a tip from Krista Carreiro, a hugely ambitious and dedicated performing-arts-specialist colleague who does musicals. I’ve never done a musical.

She suggested the Bad Wolf Press as a great resource.

I was skeptical. “I don’t play piano! How can I accompany them?”

“I don’t either! But with the Bad Wolf Press scripts, you get a CD of the songs — both with and without the voices, so you can practice with the voices & perform the instrumental version.”

Hmmm. I checked out the website. Lots of 30-minute, curriculum-related scripts. Samples of the songs on the website. Affordable!

I chose Character Matters and Pirates from Grammar Island — because we’re always struggling to find more time for social skills instruction, and we have so many English-language-learning kids. And because there’s a discount if you buy two! My principal agreed to the expenditure.

And we launched into a musical adventure… I’ll follow up with more details about how we did it. But for now, suffice it to say, it was a huge success. The kids loved it! The principal & staff were thrilled. Parents were enthusiastic. It lightened my load, and I enjoyed it — and I’ve already got ideas about how to do it better next time!

Check it out — and in the meantime, I’d be happy to hear about the performance paradigm at your school!

Led by Artistic Director Pat Graney & a team of artists & volunteers, the performers worked for 3 months using Michael Jackson & his music as inspiration to dig in the soil of their own lives.  Unearthing the rocks of abuse & abandonment that brought them to incarceration, the program uses hope & the creative process to cultivate confidence, self-acceptance, patience & forgiveness in their place. The culminating performance is a fragile but beautiful blossom, not only for the performers but for the audience fortunate enough to witness the event.

Today is Mother’s Day, and it’s impossible to ignore the fact that most of these women are mothers. Some were abandoned by their own mothers.  All seem acutely aware of their absence from their own children’s lives. As they examine the events in their lives that brought them here, they express the hope that their futures will hold new patterns. As I listened & watched… as the performance plays in my mind today… I can’t help but wonder what we on the outside are doing to help them undo the effects of what was done to them as children & mothers, to help them be the mothers they want to be, to prevent their children from suffering in similar ways.

The voices of these mothers shed new perspective on the lives of one or two of my own students, living with relatives while their own mothers are struggling with addiction or serving time.

On what dance can do for them, if I can do it right…

And on the power of the arts — in both education & transformation.

Thanks to Pat & her team of artists. And to these women, for doing the heavy lifting!

Next week I’ll start my 7^th month of teaching dance to 16 students with autism, without the help of extra time for planning or professional development. Fortunately, we’ve come a long way, with me grateful for every stray scrap of advice and inspiration that’s come my way.  Thanks especially to a small email network of colleagues who are venturing along the same path, as well as a couple good books (by Temple Grandin & Ellen Notbohm).

I work with two classes of 8 students, one with 1^st-3^rd graders and the other with kindergarten-1^st graders. The two classes are so different ~ the older group having developed some skills in verbal & visual communication, while the younger group are just learning to communicate!

So, where have we gone in our explorations…?  The older group can venture in many directions now, each child in his or her own way.  What keeps us going best is the usual delicate balance between familiar routines, new & exciting props, and gradual challenges.

Explorations that have succeeded and continue to grow include:

• The BrainDance: First thing each day we progress through the coordination patterns of the BrainDance, often using the prop of the day (foam bats, stretchy bands, body bags).
• Taking turns: We use short foams bats as clappers and have clapping conversations one-on-one. Depending on the child, I still say “my turn/your turn,” or I ask the child to initiate the conversation, or the child responds to my initiation.  None of the students need an instructional assistant to guide their hands anymore, and one boy is very adept at copying my rhythm. They also take turns on…
• Following a pathway: They’ve progressed from picking up the plastic marker spots and flapping them against the floor to stepping on or over each spot on the way across the floor. I’ve added hula-hoops-in-stands for crawling through along the way, and lately they’ve been practicing jumping over cardboard boxes (instead of stomping on them).
• Beach balls: All but two of the kiddos have learned to blow up and deflate their own beach ball – and are motivated to do it even when it’s hard and takes awhile!  Once the beach balls are inflated, we do the BrainDance, a Freeze Dance, solo toss-and-catch, one-on-one toss-and-catch (with me… not with each other so far), solo dribbling with our feet, and toss-through-a-hoop or into-a-bucket.
• Foam bats: BrainDance, Clapping Conversations (see Taking turns above), rhythmic patterns with music.
• Body sox:  Boy, are these ever a hit! They’ve all learned to lay them out to insert their feet like a sleeping bag. Using the bags, we’ve explored body parts (feeling them push from inside the bag), levels, shapes, smooth&sharp energy, and stationary/(carefully!) traveling moves. At first, I taught them to keep their head out, but as they’ve grown familiar with the body sox, I let them choose — head in or out.  The kids are even getting used to folding them when we’re done.
• Hullabaloo: This is an extension of an electronic game one of their teachers had. Instead of the little spot-markers in the game, we use brightly colored plastic circles, and instead of the electronic directions (that are fast and hard-to-understand), I call & demonstrate different ways to travel from one color-spot to another, using whatever concept I’m emphasizing for the day (body parts, locomotor skills, levels, directions, shapes…).
• Percussion instruments: We practice starting & stopping on cue (stopping is a vague concept for some of them!), beating a match-the-words rhythm (“Pizza, I like pizza, pepperoni pizza, and cheese!” with “shhh” and a “quiet” gesture of a finger to the  lips on pauses between the words), and taking turns playing solos ~~ as well as let-it-rip play-as-you-like intervals.
• Yoga: Using pictures, we have a progression that starts standing and ends with the “Do Nothing Doll” ~~ with each of them lying down while I circulate to gently lift and shake their relaxed arms as a way of saying goodbye each day.

We all still suffer some from Carter’s screaming tantrums whenever things don’t quite follow his expectations (some weeks it happens every day), or Aldrin’s obsession with aggravating Spencer by touching & poking him.  But each week we work together now I’m delighted to see their improvement – with gratitude for the consistent support of their instructional aids (always with us) and the work of their classroom teacher — it’s great to see them dance & grow!

Driving Home

“Yeah, I just about popped that girl that looked down her nose at us. She was lucky she looked away.”

“I bet they never seen anyone so black as us.”

“Oooh, but did you hear the audience clap for us at the end?”

“Yeah, we came on strong for the bow.”

“And when we were doin’ our dance too! They got real noisy when Taneesha and Zenalisa came dancin’ back into the sticks.”

“Oh yeah, we were sharp!”

“Hey, look at that dude on the corner – I think he’s my uncle!  Hey, guy!”

“He’s not your uncle!”

“Yeah, he is! Hey, comb your hair, fella!”

“You know, he can’t hear you with the windows closed!”

“Yeah, well, he’s a mess.”

The banter from the three girls in the backseat was like birds chattering on a wire, shrill chirps overlapping and piled on top of each other, as we drove them home, with my husband Rick in the driver’s seat and me riding shotgun. Of the performers in our group this evening, these were the girls without rides, whose parents worked, didn’t have a car, or couldn’t come. As we turned south onto the highway, the cacophony in the backseat continued. I stared out the window, exhausted from directing their energies through the rehearsal and performance, feeling lucky myself that Zenalisa hadn’t decked anyone, and relieved that a fall chill kept their voices inside the car.

“Hey Ms. R, I don’t want to go home. I want to go to Zena’s house tonight. Take me to Zena’s house.”

This was Taneesha, in the middle seat, in one of her loud, buoyant moods.  A tiny slip of a 10-year-old, she wore carefully polished fingernails, big hoop earrings, and was endearingly cocky. She was fragile, brittle, spunky, steely, all at once or in close succession. The three of them, Taneesha, Zenalisa, and Latreece were like sisters, close, quarreling, and quick to rally as a team if one of them were challenged. When Taneesha had her down times, they’d be all over her with sympathy.

“Hey, Ms. R, are we gonna stop at Dick’s like the other night?”

“No, Taneesha,” I said wearily, “Remember the pizza before the performance?  You three ate a lot!”

“But don’t take me home, Ms. R. I wanna go to Zena’s. We moved, you know. My parents aren’t there anymore, where you took me on Thursday.  They’re at the new house. They want me to stay at Zena’s tonight.”

“They didn’t tell me that, Taneesha.  The permission they signed didn’t say that.”

We’d been there just the other night. Her duplex was upstairs, uncomfortably dark when we entered, but the switch at the bottom of the stairs lit our way to the door at the top, past torn carpet and litter on the steps. Her mom had poked her head out.

“Thanks for taking her!  How was it?”

“They did a great job!” I’d waved cheerily and escaped down the stairs as Taneesha ducked inside.

Tonight her insistences accelerated as we got closer.

“I bet you don’t remember the way, Ms. R! This is the wrong turn. It’s not down here. My mom’s at the other house, they moved all the furniture. They’re not gonna be here.”

Her persistence had my thoughts scrambling for a good option. The signed permission was all I had, and I couldn’t guarantee that a voice in a cell phone would be the right one, so I stared silently out the window. Without comment, Rick guided the car through dark streets, retracing our path from the other night. He was the insured driver, since the district didn’t condone teachers driving students. As we pulled up to the shabby two-story, we all saw the pack of young men standing around on the sidewalk. The girls reacted immediately, with urgent, wary voices, dropped almost to whispers.

“Hey, what are they doin’ on my sidewalk?”

“They’re nothin’ but trouble.  Why are they hangin’ out here?”

“Get away from her house…”

“They shouldn’t be here.  They don’t belong.”

There were three or four of them shuffling around on the sidewalk, dark against the dark night, with big jackets and baggy pants. In their late teens or early twenties, they were spread out along the sidewalk, talking and messing around. I’m thinking, “We’re going to stop here? And I’m going to get out?!”  My instincts screamed, “No!”

Our car pulled up to the curb, and with only a minor hesitation, I stepped out and opened the door for Taneesha. As we walked through the pack, she cussed and yelled at them to get away from her house. Shepherding her along, I didn’t even notice the car pulling away from the curb and easing up the block.

With her shout ringing in my ears, I walked briskly, Taneesha at my side. We climbed the steps, crossed the porch, and entered the dark hallway. The dim light brought the same litter to life as Taneesha clicked it on. She ran up the stairs and knocked. There was a muffled response, and she exclaimed, “They’re trippin’ again!” Another knock. “It’s me, I’m home.” Another muffled response, and she repeated with a disgusted grimace, “Ah, they’re trippin’!” The door opened, and she disappeared inside, leaving me helpless and uncertain on the stairs.

Turning away, I stepped briskly back out on the porch and walked quickly past the group again, with purposeful eyes straight ahead.  Just in time, the car pulled to the curb to rescue me.  I stepped in with relief, and Rick pulled away quickly.

After my shoulders had begun to lose their tension, after we’d gotten back on the highway and driven the other two girls home, and after we were driving home to our quiet, empty street in the north end, Rick told me why he’d pulled the car around the corner while I was walking Taneesha into her house.

“When Taneesha cussed at that crowd, Zenalisa & Latreece hit the floor of the back seat. They were expecting gunfire and stray shots!”

Rick had driven around the corner to calm their fears, and the girls had stayed on the floor of the backseat until the night silence, an absence of explosions, brought them out again.

The next day at school, the girls were their usual ebullient selves, nothing out of the ordinary. They chattered and quarreled, challenged and jumped to protect each other. But for me, what was driven home in that drive home was that home can be very uncertain, and that in their world, you have to be ready for gunfire.

We’re in our sixth week of preparing for the End-of-Year Performance, with two weeks til the final day.  All 325 students will dance to show curricular content, steps, moves, skills, and ensemble work. First through fifth grade classes have had about 8 hours of rehearsal each, including the process of introducing a theme, exploring related dance elements, creating choreography, and beginning to put the whole piece together.  This is the point when every minute is needed in order to make it work, and it’s my work to make the sometimes-tedious job of rehearsal a rich and varied learning experience.

So much depends on the context though… and here’s my context:

• a percentage of my students will miss the final performance because 1. their parents have too many jobs or small kids to get out in the evening, or 2. their parents don’t feel comfortable at an English-speaking event without interpretation (and the task of interpretating 10-12 different languages is daunting), or 3. their religion disapproves of dancing, music, and performing;
• my school has a lot of  families who qualify for free- and reduced-price lunches.

These realities influence our performances some…

• We have two performances, one at 2:00 & one at 6:30. Since the 2:00 show may be the only chance for some dancers, both are full performances [the final rehearsal is the day before]. At the 2:00 version, kids perform for each other, with some extra time for getting on-and-off the stage, in-and-out of the audience.  At the 6:30 show, dancers are in the “green room” [their classrooms], while families and friends fill the audience.
• In order to prevent dances in the evening from being totally decimated by absences, classes pair for performing, with 50 kids onstage in the afternoon and whoever-comes at night.  Before I started this strategy, there was a  dance by 1st & 2nd graders that went from 25-strong in the afternoon to 4 in the evening.  They did a great job, but the fear factor was bigger than the fun factor!
• Parts have to be pretty interchangeable, since we never know who’s going to be missing at night.  When I’m assigning parts, I don’t ask whether they’ll be there in the evening ’cause every one of them deserves to be a full participant at rehearsals.
• We mostly don’t do costumes, which are anxiety-producing for the kids: “Ms. M, I don’t have a white shirt”… “Ms. M, is it OK if my white shirt has green and black stripes?!”… “Ms. M, should I wear my soccer shirt inside out?!”

So here we are, 2 weeks from performance. Each class has developed large chunks of choreography. Tomorrow we start putting it all together — two classes meet, share their choreography, and begin to mold their fragments into one dance.  And then, little by little, I’ll reduce my side-coaching to a minimum, until finally I’ll stand back and watch — and hope — in silence, as they dance their hearts out, with and without mistakes.

Have a different approach to performances? Different parameters? Different concerns? Do share!

Personally, I could wish it was TEDD for Technology, Entertainment, Design, Dance.  Dance is lamentably rare in this fascinating forum. Check out… Kenichi Ebina’s magic moves & Pilobolus performing the duet “Symbiosis.”

And then, after you listen to Bill Gates’ data-based musings on how to clone great teachers, do give yourself a treat by going back to Ken Robinson‘s take on how to focus education!  If they’d really listened to him, perhaps they would have brought more dancers & choreographers to TED.

Right.

Ten students were interested. Several dropped out along the way, faced with the burden of choosing Tinikling rehearsal over tetherball at recess.

Permission slips were needed… Kelly and Danique got their grammas to sign almost immediately. I managed to corral our Spanish language interpreter to communicate with Juan’s mother at our start-of-the-year Open House — she signed, volunteered to drive Juan, and was even willing to pick up Steven.  Steven brought in his.  Shay’s permission came in after I said she couldn’t rehearse anymore without it. Janaea, Dayjanique, and Lanisha required the same threats.

Then I visited the space with the officials who were organizing the Arts Forum and discovered they’d changed the timing, so we were scheduled to perform an hour and a half later.  New permissions slips needed.

Costumes seemed like a good idea…  Dresses for the Thursday performance; dark pants & red shirts for Saturday. No one had a red shirt, so I scrounged.

Rides were needed… Danique’s gramma and Juan’s mom could drive. Shay’s mom could drive her, but no one else. Due to district restrictions, I couldn’t drive, but I could ride with my husband as driver.  What a treasure he is! Danique’s gramma would pick up Kelly; Juan’s mom would take Steven. Shay’s mom would take Shay. My husband and I would pick up Janaea, Dayjanique, and Lanisha at one house and take them home to separate houses.

Did I mention that hardly any of the parents return calls? That someone’s phone was disconnected? That one of the phones had a frequent message saying, “This voice mail is not receiving messages at this time”?  That when I called one home, my student answered, saying no one was home, only to reverse herself and put an adult on the phone when she found out it was me?  That one student had moved since returning her emergency form? That one student’s house didn’t show up on Google maps? That Lanisha came into my classroom the morning after I finally talked with her mother, with an expression that mingled awe, admiration, and sheer pleasure, saying, “You called my mom!”

Steven’s mom wanted to see the performance, so I arranged for Juan’s mom to pick them both up for the Arts Forum event. Our Spanish interpreter explained the timing and locations to Juan’s mom. Then, I learned Steven’s mom didn’t want Steven to go to either performance without her, so rides were needed for both events, along with a younger sister.  More communications in Spanish with Juan’s mom. Then, I heard Steven’s mom didn’t want Steven going in any car without proof of the driver’s safety record. By this time, we were communicating with Steven’s mom through an interpreter in Tagalog. Along the way, it was difficult to determine whether it was Steven or Steven’s mom who was reticent. Then, it turned out Steven might not even be home from day care in time to be picked up. Finally, Steven’s mom nixed the whole thing — on the day of the first performance.  Rushed notes in English and phone calls in Spanish went home to Juan’s mom, to tell her NOT to pick up Steven and his mom.

At the last minute, it became apparent I didn’t just need permission for kids to ride in private cars… I needed copies of driver’s licenses and insurance.  I enlisted another teacher to pick up Kelly. So Danique came with her gramma, Shay came with her mom, Jose’s mom brought him, and my husband and I picked up Janaea, Dayjanique, and Lanisha.  Steven couldn’t come. The performance at the Arts Forum went splendidly, with dancers adjusting to the new space on the spur of the moment and improvising around the hole left by Steven.  The audience warmed to them along the way, and it sounded like thunderous applause to the kids by the time they finished.

Two nights later, my husband and I picked up Janaea, Dayjanique, and Lanisha again (we clocked 80 miles that day), and Danique got there with her gramma. Kelly was gone to California… Shay called and said she couldn’t come… Juan didn’t show up. We rechoreographed to cover the missing: Kelly, Shay, and Juan.  At the last moment, Juan showed up, too late to change anything.  Waiting to perform, my kids were a bundle of nerves, alternately leaping down the hallways and tussling with each other noisily.  In position backstage, they were beside themselves, with Juan doubled up from a mysterious stomach pain (butterflies?) and the girls doing high kicks — but amazingly, quiet.  Onstage, they danced their hearts out — not polished like the other studio groups that were performing, but fresh, excited, and very present.

In their own words:  “It was very fun. This year was our first year that we showed this performance to adults. We was afraid but we did it. We was happy for the dance. It was the best performance. Tinikling was the best time of our life.”

…it wasn’t a piece o’ cake, but their excitement was delicious!

In a workshop with Dr. Martha Bireda on “Student and Family Empowerment,” I was among 50 some teachers. Asked whether we had seen the video “A Class Divided,” maybe six raised their hands. If she’d asked whether we’d heard the story behind the video, I would guess all of us had. Most teachers, most people, have heard of the lessons that took place in a 3^rd grade class in Iowa in the late ‘60s, involving blue eyes & brown eyes. In teaching her all-white youngsters about discrimination & stereotyping, teacher Jane Elliot devised the blue eye/brown eye experience, during which those children with blue eyes were privileged members of the class, while their brown-eyed classmates were branded as slow, mean, and troublesome. Going into the experience with her excited, happy students, she was clear about its purpose: “Let’s try this…” The students debriefed at the end of the day, and the second day, roles were reversed. People who know of the lesson sequence probably also know that within 15 minutes of the beginning of the experiment, students were displaying serious emotional responses, and by the end of the day, both behaviors and cognitive abilities of the children had changed.

Yesterday I saw video footage of the third year of Ms. Elliot’s lesson, which was aired on Frontline as “A Class Divided.” It was stunning. Hearing results of the blue-eye/brown-eye lesson doesn’t measure up to seeing them. Teacher education programs should never settle for informing pre-service teachers about the results; they should show the documentary.

To understand, you must see the children respond emotionally to their experience of being demeaned, faced with limitations and low expectations. These were privileged children who were just “trying on” discrimination, but their faces and bodies spoke anger, humiliation, frustration, powerlessness, resentment, withdrawal, disbelief, and aggression.

And the big fish for me? I’ve seen these faces in my classroom. My students aren’t trying it on. This is their life. They have no relief.

So what do I do? What can dance education do, in response? Dance class, complete with the license it gives students to be creative, improvisational, somewhat rowdy, and highly energetic, is often an opportunity to express or purge negative feelings. But in order to get there, students have to be willing to be vulnerable enough to create and improvise, and to corral their feelings enough to be rowdy and use their energy within safe parameters. So this is my frame as I plan my starting lessons, map my curriculum for the year, and fine-tune classroom management. To plan classes so I can really see my students’ faces… to create activities that bring everyone along… to keep the students that show these faces in class. To try to help. And to help them understand what they’re experiencing.

Another good point of yesterday: meeting & greeting all the folks I spend my year, but not my summer, with – the adults that people my building and whom I depend upon all year for moments of sanity, chances for venting, opportunities to problem-solve. They’re good people, and I depend on them. We share a path.

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