Movement Education
Today we are faced with the increased need to be able to adapt and respond to constant change. As an educator, I believe it is my duty to help prepare students in ways that allow them to quickly access all possible solutions to a problem. I view the learning environment as a safe container in which people should feel free to explore, be vulnerable, and take risks. Like uncharted terrain, my classroom cultivates space for deepening somatic awareness, deviation from normalcy, intellectual wandering, and physical curiosity, in hopes of reaching creative discoveries and innovative approaches to being in the world. My philosophy is built around the student; I invite learners to find their autonomy and agency whenever possible.
In this era of individualism I want to encourage movers to find their unique voices, while simultaneously reminding them of the importance to be attentive to, active in, and respectful of their greater community. As a Laban and Bartenieff Practitioner, all my courses emphasize connectivity, aliveness, and relationships and encourage the ability to flow between the different types: self-to-self, self-to-other, self-to-group, and self-to-environment. In addition to the identification of personal preferences, recognition of these relationships sanctions the appreciation and fostering of diversity in experience, preference, and need within a classroom. Through its emphasis on the kinesthetic I believe that dance provides a rich landscape for the integration of various subjects and learning modalities. Ultimately, my goal is to offer a toolbox, or a set of possibilities that students may carry everywhere and use in any situation.
Dance continues to illuminate the importance of knowing our physical bodies, our kinesthetic potential, and our sensory awareness. It contains a telling history of culture, anthropology, politics, and aesthetics. It is essential that students may seek solace and truth in the non-verbal while learning to operate within the context of a growing torrent of image and language-based technology and media. Furthermore, I hope to lead people toward a greater understanding of a healthy integration of the body and technology. The body does not lie, thus I believe we can learn to move our truths as we embark on a healing journey toward wholeness.
As a movement educator I strive to uphold the highest standards, while I concurrently investigate and expand the structure outside traditional learning institutions. From my perspective the classroom is a laboratory, an unexplored forest, a playground, and a constantly transforming ecosystem wherein intellectual, physical, and emotional curiosity, adventure, spiritual development and innovation can harmonically co-exist.