ONE MILLION YEARS AGO [yes, I prehistorically uploaded pictures to a technological platform], I posted this series of pictures to ye olde Instagram:
Using the classic teaching tropes, I told one of my kids to "stand up tall".
Then, I said, "Use forward poise."
Next, I told her to "bend her knees".
And finally, "Chin up!"
And the final result, even though I gave her excellent directions, is ... not excellent.
Well, she IS a child, one might say. She doesn't understand what you're saying.
...
OR, maybe my excellent directions weren't that excellent.
The phrases
- stand up tall
- use forward poise
- bend your knees
- chin up
are all TRUE.
BUT, if they're offered with little explanation or awareness of how they tie together, you get poor Georgia up there (and quite a few beginners as well).
To complain without a solution is THE WORST, so let me offer some advice:
Stand up tall
This one is probably the hardest one to screw up, but finding vertical is admirable yet tricky for many people.
Saying the words "stand up tall" usually makes people pull their head and shoulders back and level their jawline out. Sometimes, you even get some correction of "duck butt" (lordosis) or "hunchback" (kyphosis).
Mostly, the work is getting everyone's heads back far enough (#desklife). So, standing against a wall is an easy "exercise" and of course, I already wrote a posture post.
But then...
Forward poise
The words "use forward poise" mean VERY LITTLE to anyone at first. IT IS JARGON. VOCABULARY. Do not use it without defining and explaining it well.
Forward poise SHOULD BE an active and engaged way to hold your body to make movement in any direction easy.
The weight of your body should mostly be over the balls of your feet.
I always think of tennis players (hello, Roland Garros!) who are waiting to return a serve. Like, THEY ARE READY. They're ready to move any which way (forward, back, right, or left) at a second's notice.
Now, that's an extremely sporty example, but forward poise is NOT leaning on your partner (because then the impetus to move would be on your partner and not yourself), nor should your toes be curled up to keep you from falling forward. IN both examples, you have gone too far.
I have two methods to help people find forward poise while stationary:
- Have people bounce lightly a couple times and then stop and notice how they're standing. It's impossible to bounce without using the balls of your feet, so VOILA.
- "Stand up tall" comfortably, which usually means people will stand with weight equally distributed over the front and back of their feet, if not further to their heels, then have them shift forward. It helps to do this in a mirror, or at least show them a side view of how it affects posture.
Keeping forward poise in practice, and not just standing around, is a huge part of the learning-to-dance process, but having a starting point is #1.
Bend your knees
I love yelling this from across the floor at my couples when they're in the middle of a round, BUT they already have a ton of context for what I mean.
Similar to the first two directions, bending your knees is an integral part of ballroom dancing.
YET, bending your knees also should involve bending your ankles and *GASP* at your hips.
Do you remember poor Georgia up there? See how she's pitched forward and has a downward angle to head because she followed my excellent directions? Poor Georgia.
If I explained "bend your knees" better, she might look, and move, better.
Metaphors are great teaching tricks, so I like to tell people to bend their knees "like they're about to sit down" but just at the very beginning of that motion (they just hitched up their pants like Grandpa does before he sits). Or they're perched on a barstool (for my 21+ crowd post-COVID).
In any case, USE MORE JOINTS.
Chin up
Oy. I hate this one. On the continuum of "you can't really screw this up" to "just stop saying this because it's not the correct* words", this is the latter.
Because of the excellent directions I gave poor Georgia and the order I gave them in, Poor Georgia is seemingly looking down.
Well, of course, we can't have that.
So I tell her to put her chin up and now I've made a mess.
There's not really a way to come back from this one, so read below.
SUMMARY
All of those phrases I told Poor Georgia were “correct” but when instructors throw them at students with no context/corrections/specificity, students just DO all of them... and then look a bit goofy. And it messes up their learning for the future.
Everyone needs to use forward poise, but it’s not just leaning forward, as it’s often quickly explained. And if you’re trying to “lean forward” and then someone tells you to bend your knees, your butt sticks out. And then someone tells you to look up, then you’re one big goofy-looking zigzag and it’s not your fault!
Trying to sum up something that involves a lot of subtleties and technique in 2 or 3 instructions results in bad learned habits. - the brilliant KIAH (whose name shall always be all caps in my book)
It seems to happens most often in group classes, or when teachers want to teach more (note: more ideas, which feels more productive to many instructors than spending 45 minutes to several weeks showing a student how to stand up properly [in fun and sneaky and a million variety of ways], EVEN IF IT'S BETTER FOR EVERYONE IN THE END).
If you feel like you're teaching more, DO MORE LEARNING. There's 50 ways to leave your love of dancing with your student : through words, movement, examples, exercises, metaphors, repetition, graphs, drawings, videos, homework...
FIND MORE WAYS to communicate all the things. Talk to fellow teachers, go to classes yourself (OMG PLEASE DO THIS ALWAYS), take lessons, read books, practice, notice, reflect.
GO FORTH AND TEACH GOOD.
Thanks to Diane, for years of sending me pictures like this.
*annoying teaching things : I try not to say "right" when I mean "correct". While "right" is correct, it's confusing because DANCING (#right and #left).
