(Thanks Kevin Sue for the picture. Note: this picture is not a picture from the lindy hop class).
Tomorrow will be the last class I will be filling in for Bees Knees beginner lindy hop class on Monday nights. Kathleen and I were temporarily filling in for May/June this summer and usually after the class we go through a post-mortem analysis of what happened and what we could do better. One of the key discoveries that we found was that the students who come to these beginner lindy hop classes were already excited about learning the dance. They didn’t need convincing. In fact, most likely they are looking for any reason to continue taking the dance class so that they can tell their friends to join in as well. When we figured this out, it made teaching the class flow more naturally and more importantly, we could just be ourselves. The pressure was off our shoulders to try to continue to get students for future classes and we could instead focus on providing a valuable lesson.
When you love the dance so much that it comes out of your pores, you do not need to convince students this is an awesome dance for x/y/z reasons. They will see it and feel it from you. Then, they will tell their friends ;-).
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The more I teach, the more I recognize that compared to great teachers in Toronto like Mandi and Arthur, I flat out suck at it. I over analyze movement and often go a bit overboard on my explanations. I’m working on it though. :-)
by Randy
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