Talk notes during the Amsterdam LEAP / local meeting 15.07.2015 related to my TAB teaching.

Participants: Sanna Myllylahti, Roos van Berkel, Michael Jehoda, Toni Bravo, Marieke van Buren, Robin Berkelmans

These notes are based on the talk after Sanna's contemporary technique class for the professionals at HJS, Amsterdam. The talk was moderated by Roos van Berkel.

 Sanna  Myllylahti works as Senior Lecturer in Contemporary Dance at the University of Arts Helsinki, MA and BA in Dance. She got connected to LEAP through Francesco Scavetta.

 Introduction

Sanna:

It seems that there are not many places created to talk/reflect about teaching. Most of the information on teaching comes from talking to colleagues or reading books, watching performances and videos - many teachers have just learned by doing, referring into their own experience and relying on it in their teaching.

Teaching freelance vs institution

Sanna:

Teaching in an institution is very different than working as a freelancer. Often as a freelancer one has a readymade ‘product’,  that is delivered in one place and then the package is delivered again somewhere else. After a while this kind of teaching (alongside with constant traveling around the globe like many freelancers do) can become quite tiresome giving very little time and possibilities for reflection and developing the teaching. When working in an institution, one teaches the same students for long stretches of time, there are longer processes, that require far more time for planning the classes, not to forget the time consumed for all the institutional and organizational tasks, but it provides also more experimenting possibilities and time for developing teaching methods. Depending of the institution and the curriculum, there can be found a lot of freedom how the teaching is conducted.

  Teaching on the freelance scene one does not necessarily get much feedback of what people thought of the teaching. One teaches in a place and then one leaves, maybe coming back after a year. Within an institution a teacher is constantly being evaluated. At least in Finland in the Universities there is a very strong feedback system, where the students can evaluate anonymously the quality of all the teaching. This has both good and bad sides. On one hand a teacher might feel pressured to change their ways of teaching, or in the worst case one might feel wrongly judged, but on the other hand this forces the teachers to evaluate their pedagogical skills in their teaching, a task that often seems to be a huge challenge for dance teachers. 

 Institutional structures /changes

 Sanna:

It is good to get out of the safety of an institution now and then, both for the teachers and the students. Last spring in the University of Arts Helsinki/ Theater Academy(TEAK) a team of a professor and 3 lecturers were writing the new curriculum for the BA in Dance program and one of the big changes was to change the nature of the artistic projects. Until now the projects were mainly directed leading into performances, always led by a choreographer and performed in a theater or a studio.

 For the new curriculum it was felt there was a necessity to respond to the requirements of the (post)contemporary society, where the role of the arts is rapidly changing. It seems that it is more and more important to give the students tools to work together, to collaborate with other disciplines, to create their own work and working opportunities – also out of the ordinary theater context - and to get experience in working in the community, in order to form a more profound relationship with the society and understand the role they can play in it as an artist.

  For this reason, as an example, a project was added in the curriculum for the 2^nd year BA in Dance students (still led by two experienced choreographers working with dance in different social contexts) where the students work within the community with people from various backgrounds who do not necessarily posses any previous connection with dance. This forces them to leave the safety of the school environment and to get encouraged to meet/relate to the “real world” outside the school.

In Finland there are not many dance companies, so most of the students need to create their own working context. A good question to ask is how does one learn to deal with and keep their integrity when going to the ‘ outside’ world. How this can be taught and reinforced?

Also the teachers in the University of Arts are encouraged to continue their artistic work – at least in theory there is time (15% of the working time) reserved for this, but in general it is quite difficult to find this time in practice.

What do you teach? 

Sanna:

Officially, composition,dance technical classes, and I follow/coach projects.

It is important to teach the students how to learn or at least to make them aware how they do learn.This can be done very much by making them aware of their thoughts, patterns and habits through a dialogue. Sometimes it can be done in a private class for example. Or by letting the students watch the class and give feedback to each other. Writing plays an important role in learning to reflect and this is strongly encouraged in the University of Arts.The students keep diary throughout their studies and are asked to evaluate their own study.

 It is, if not to take down the hierarchies and power structures the students do find themselves in, to make them aware about that these structures do exist and only by taking the responsibility of their own study, they can become empowered and strong individuals.

 They need to become their own subjects with their own power and will, in order to grow as artists. It is important for the student to become a subject in learning instead of an object of teaching!

Attached here are some videos and photos of the professional training in HJS Amsterdam!