Thread: Becoming a Teacher

Hi Jonathan!

Welcome to our site.

The question you posed is a toughie.

It's difficult to answer your question because I'm not sure what your future goals are. Are you interested in becoming a classroom teacher or do you see yourself teaching dance?

You may want to visit one of the local universities or colleges in New York to talk to a guidance counselor. The counselor would have access to all of the information regarding program requirements and so forth.

If you're simply interested in teaching - New York is reputed to have a teacher shortage ... and if you had a college degree, you could get emergency certification and find yourself in a classroom even if you didn't have an education background. You could then teach and work towards certification.

The advantage to doing this is that you could get into the classroom sooner ... but the disadvantage is that you could conceiveably wind up over burdened - teaching by day and taking classes by night.

If you have the luxury of time and money, I'd go for the education degree ... but that's just me. I prefer taking on challenges one at a time.

If you talk to a school administrator, the principal might be able to put you in touch with one or more teachers on his or her staff who have emergency certification. You could then introduce yourself to these teachers and talk to them about their experiences to get a better idea of what would work out best for you.

Out of curiosity - how do you use dance to help engage students in the learning process without teaching dance technique?

Regards,

David Chin
Moderator for the New Teachers' Place @ Teacher Focus

hmmm. Well it is about what I had figured, but I appreciate the pointers. As to teaching dance, I do that as well.

What I do in the schools is as follows. Every class starts with a 5-8 minute warm-up, comprised of basic stretches and movements that anyone can do.

Then we discuss the task for the day - say Fractions. First I start with the 'Pizza on the blackboard' schtick, talking about how much I love pizza and that when I was younger I used to be able to eat a whole one by myself, but then I started to get older and couldn't eat so much or I got 'a belly' so now I only eat half... and so on.

I explain to them the parallels to music (whole, half, quarter and eighth notes). Often at least a few of the students play an instrument, which makes this easier. Marking out 4 measures on the board, with 'x' marks for the notes, we clap out the rhythm for each measure.

Then we stand up and do the same thing, except I add steps to it, going from side-to-side, jumping on the 1, etc, so that it becomes a fun and simple little dance routine. By the end they are all tired out and need to sit, but they know what I mean when I say whole, half, quarter or eighth :O)

The same goes for another Lesson I have, 'Nouns, Verbs and Adjectives'. The dance element is actually pretty simple; Nouns are positions, frozen like a statue, that the students make up: "Statue of Liberty" or "scooter" or "Dexter from Dexter's Lab" etc. Verbs are transitions, movement words like walk, skip, jump, slide, etc, that I elicit by starting a conversation about 'How do you go to school in the morning?'

Then we arbitrarily assign Verbs from our list to our Noun-statues and we already have a nice little dance sequence. Adjectives come in when we make alterations (High, Low, Fast, Slow, and then emotions - 'Is the Statue of Liberty having a bad hair day? How does she feel? Ok, then let's have her jump up and down 4 times as if she is really cranky!'). And so on.

Personally, I have the most fun when we get into the Social Studies curriculum, when I can bring in music from other countries and we can discuss myths and culture and do simple steps from those cultures... We had a great time with the 3rd grade and the Rainforest once.

Hope that clarifies it a bit.

Your lessons sound very creative! I wish we had someone who could use dance and motion to teach various subjects ... but we don't seem to do a lot of integrated instruction at my school.

I am currently teaching in Texas and everyone seems to be big on teaching to the test and prepping kids for the state examination.

It doesn't help that most of the school is blocked. Some teachers teach language arts and reading. Other teachers teach science, math, and social studies.

I'm a fluke. Because my class was formed six weeks after the school year began, my classroom is self-contained. I get to teach all subject areas - and this gives me a certain degree of flexibility with regards to creating thematic units and integrating instruction.

Unfortunately my dancing ability is very limited. When it comes to the field of dance I am sorry to say that I have all of the grace and stamina of Winnie the Pooh.

(sigh)

I am glad that there are people like you in the world ... so that people like me can point at people like you and say to the children, "Don't do as I do. Do what HE does."

Your program really sounds wonderful.

Regards,

David Chin
Moderator for the New Teachers' Place @ Teacher Focus

4th grade teacher for FBISD
Missouri City, Texas

Johathan. What a wonderful way to teach!!! Surely you could get some credit for what you are doing! I would love to use dance in my class. My dance skills are very limited although I am not a winnine the pooh like our friend David I am more of a tigger. I also teach country line dancing as a hobby and have taught it to my classes amid many groans. My students (grades 6-12) just don't appreciate good country musid! LOL !

I have taught it to the classes of down syndrome childrenand they love it. I never thought of relating it to a REAL lesson, although we did do a "rap" to learn the planets.

You have so much to share with the world. Why don't you try to tape your lessons and market them. You could give inservices etc. Ok, I am going overboard, but if you are ever in Florida and want to demonstrate for a class, I VOLUNTEER .

Good luck in your future!

My goodness, how sweet!

I appreciate the kind words :O)

Well, I am something of a Tigger when I teach, but my soul is Pooh. Also, I can honestly say that if you are able to stand unaided, you can do anything in my class (heck even then you can hold onto the desk...)

The majority of my steps are taken from basic stretches, along with some watered-down African-Caribbean material (I danced with the ALvin Ailey company for many years). Everything is very rhythmic. As to the 'combinations' we do, the material is mostly student-generated (and you know how creative *they* can be)

Line dancing sounds fun, but is a bit demanding for some of the littler kids - unless you don't insist they stay on the beat :O)

I do actually travel about a good bit, being self-employed. In order to keep from getting burnt out with my Teaching Artist work, I take jobs teaching professional dance technique classes from time to time. In fact, I am performing in Maryland and Florida - sometime in March I think - with a small company. If you like I'll find out when and where we are...

If anyone is interested I am more than willing to share Lesson Plans and such-like. I even have my Warm-up and a basic combination typed out in relatively understandable terms.

For that matter, if anyone would like to brainstorm Lesson Plans, or how to apply Dance/Music/Drama/Art etc to a given subject, let me know - I love curriculum development!

Well enough said for now.

Kudos on a truly inspring List, David!

Hi Jonathan,

Thank you for your kind words.

If you're interested in sharing ideas about lesson plans related to dance, you may want to post in the "Other Subjects" forum. You are also welcome to post here. Posting in different locations would help spread your message and would increase the chance that you might get some replies.

I wish I could watch one of your lessons. They sound fun ... and students need some fun in their lives.

Regards,

David

Who knows? Maybe some day I'll be down Texas-way!

Yes - when people ask me what i do, I say "I don't teach dance, that's what dance schools are for. I help students realize that learning (and the Arts) are fun."

If they are not having fun, then there is little point to my being there and I am doing somethig wrong. If they are having fun, then they might learn something before they know it!

Thanks again - I will have to look into that other thread...

Hi Jonathan,

If you're looking for fun, don't come down to Texas. Our schools are preoccupied with prepping children to do well on the state examiniations. Fun is a preciously short commodity here.

Last Friday my students dressed as Conquistadores and we did a short presentation for the other classes. I myself dressed as a Conquistador - from the bottom of my hand tooled thigh length boots to the top of the plume on my combed morion steel helmet.

A parent later told me that the presentation was fun. She said she wished that other teachers could teach "fun" things - but what she may not realize is that our opportunities for creative learning and "fun" are seriously curtailed by state standards, state expectations, and the annual state test.

I myself plan on leaving Texas at year's end. Where I go is anyone's guess. I'd consider moving to New York city if I wanted to live in a city ... but as it is, I'm looking for a job in a rural country school - or perhaps a small town.

Regards,

David

P.S. So what do you think you'll do with regards to pursuing a teaching job? Will you get a degree in dance or bite the bullet and go for an education degree?

yup - Standards and Testing are taking over here as well. The latest is what they call 'Locked-down Reading' - lasts for the first 2 periods of every day in some schools.

It doesn't seem to have much effect upon the abysmal test scores our students are getting, though. I have spoke to teachers that are in despair - they spend so much time teaching how to take the test that they are losing out on valuable teaching time.

Good for you - if the kids cannot have some part of their learning experience that they associate with 'fun', then they aren't going to be nearly as focused (in my humble opinion).


RE: education, I am unsure yet what I am going to do - Time and Money issues seem to dictate that the quicker easier version is the route, especially since there is a shortage of teachers here and they are offering 'deals' like that which Mata spoke of.

For that matter, once i am 'in' school I can take other courses...