So despite being a little delayed I am back blogging BAPP style. Having already read some of your blogs and questions for your inquiries it is nice to know it is not just me that is not entirely sure of my specific subject for inquiry just yet. After coming up with quite a few ideas in 'Task 2d' I narrowed my interests down and found there are two areas that I am keen to explore therefore have decided to come up with questions for both and see where my thoughts take me.
The first of these areas is the health and fitness side to becoming a professional dancer and factors from personal work ‘outside of the studio’ that go into becoming a professional and maintaining your body and mindset throughout a professional career.
• Is it necessary to do extra personal work eg. Gym?
• What work should you/shouldn’t you do outside of the studio?
• How can you maintain weight during differing workloads?
• Are we educated enough on such aspects?
• Where can we gain specific information for dancers?
• How do we maintain a mental stability in such a high-pressure career?
The second possible line for my inquiry is that of management. As stated in a couple of my blogs from Module 1 I am a good organiser and exploring the management side of both a professional dance company and it's new productions is something that interests me.
• What does putting on a new production involve?
• Is collaboration between departments necessary?
• What are the most effective ways of professionally communicating between colleagues?
• Is promotion for productions important? How can we develop it?
• How can we keep employers & employees happy?
• Should there be more measuring of growth within a company?
• How can we make accurate selling estimates?
These are all just my (very!) initial thoughts and ideas so feel free to comment. I would appreciate your thoughts on them too. Happy blogging again everyone! x
Hi Emma
ReplyDeleteWelcome back!! :)
From task 4B we are to create a SIG (special interests group) And I would like to add you do it, seeing as you have the interest of taking on your own dance company. I too have that in mind, or more a dance school, since I was little actually.
Your first set of questions on Management have captured my attention. I am still unsure of which road to take for my inquiry, it's either Teaching in general or Dance teaching. If I do go along the lines of dance teaching, I know that the inquiry will involve management/business to some extent.
If you were to answer your first and fourth question, what would you say, based on initial opinion?
Thanks
Kim x
Hi Kim,
DeleteNice to hear from you again! Of course, I think it would benefit us both adding each other to our SIGs. I too have played with the idea of my own dance school but as I am currently not undergoing any teaching thought I should apply it to my current work.
In answer to my first question I would say co-operation and good communication between all departments (choreographers, dancers, designers, orchestra/music, promotions team etc) is probably the most important thing. In answer to the second, I would say promotion is vital for a show to sell and numerous different ways such as posters, adverts, word of mouth, video clips, reviews etc would be necessary.
I'm intrigued by your question "What strategies or methods are there to boost a student's confidence?" This question actually links both my idea of company management and that of health (mentally) and wondered what your personal answer would be. Keeping a positive and healthy mindset within a workplace/school is vital.
Emma x
Emma Thanks for this blog - very useful in our conversation last night. Generally people do have several directions that interest them - but on discussion you said that the later - production oriented direction/topic with 'choreographers, dancers, designers, orchestra/music, promotions team' might give you more scope and you could incorporate the health and safety - or in you words 'wellbeing' aspect for dancer into this topic as a part of the inquiry. So now its time to google and look at Summon or on the Libguide for dance etc. - refer to my blog and Module 2 materials about looking for sources of expertise about this area. You also asked about the next task - talking to others at your work does not need the research methods/tools yet (like questionnaires) if you want to plan those into you inquiry that will come later - however it is good to set the groundwork by looking at the expertise of the practitioners who work with you to see how this learning can be incorporated into your inquiry topic and see what permissions you will need in your organisation/company - which sounds lie a very successful one.
ReplyDelete