Allison
Kudos for finding a recipe that works for YOUR dancers.  60-80 is an enviable number of attendees for any group of dancers, barn, contra, english, swing or other genre.

In my opinion, its often difficult to create an "experienced" group of dancers in a monthly dance simply because there are 30 days between one dance and the next.  No one has the mental or physical memory to improve if they practice once a month.  If someone misses a dance they are 2 months absent and need a full refresher.  

My guess is your dancers swap sides of the couple depending on whom they are dancing with?  If so that will make it difficult for them to learn the swing.  It helps to be consistent in a role to learn swing, chain, and R&L.

Many newcomers come to a "regular" contra dance and never return and I believe some of that is the steep learning curve, the intense partner / neighbor interactions, internal pressure to "get it right", and  the physicality of the dance itself.  A well established contra group has expectations of having more challenging figures and I believe that sends some newcomers home in frustration.

I love your goal and encourage you to continue to focus on that. "have fun dancing along the way, and if it turns into something resembling contra eventually, then that's icing on top!"  
 
I know this wasn't your question, but if you're looking for more dances that are accessible to all your dancers you might look here:  https://barndances.org.uk/

Read carefully, some are more difficult than others but there's an index according to difficulty.

You're doing a great job bringing community dance to your community and I believe that's an accomplishment in and of itself.
Best,
Donna
Email: dhuntdancer@aol.com





-----Original Message-----
From: Allison Jonjak via Contra Callers <contracallers@lists.sharedweight.net>
To: Michael Fuerst <sjapartments@gmail.com>
Cc: contracallers@lists.sharedweight.net
Sent: Sun, Jan 22, 2023 7:05 pm
Subject: [Callers] Re: next steps between barn dance & contra, focus on fun figures
Thank you for the list Michael! 

We're beginning year 2 of dances, but we started at very barn dance, 100% newbies, "even long lines forward & back is new" level.  From your list, so far we're only missing chain, R&L across, courtesy turn, and becket. Swings are very new still and part of the work of our practice dance is giving me practice teaching "what are the best ways to help dancers lock on to the muscle memory of 'end on the side you started on." 
If anyone else is in these shoes of "literally zero dancers have ever done a ballroom swing before", so far my best results have been 
1. asking the band to give a B2, pause while we rotate partners, B2, pause while we rotate partners, B2, pause while we rotate partners, et cetera;
2. followed by Anderson Ferry Reel which lets them visually ID "woohoo yes I'm on the side I started" while not crashing the dance if they got it wrong.

Given that I have 60-80 dancers each night, I'm content just adding zero or one "new move" per dance right now and using it in 2 or 3 dances. My crowd is very mixed age and it could be that I'm not teaching new things as fast as humanly feasible... but at the same time my goal is "have fun dancing along the way, and if it turns into something resembling contra eventually, then that's icing on top!" 

On Sun, Jan 22, 2023 at 3:40 AM Michael Fuerst via Contra Callers <contracallers@lists.sharedweight.net> wrote:
For how many months have you been holding these dances?
I am assuming you are the caller.     
If you have  at least 6 or 8 regulars,  I would think, that after 3 or 4 sessions   the core group should be familiar with all of  allemande, chain, R&L across, courtesy turn, swing, balance and swing, circle, F&B, dosido, Star, balance, balance & swing, becket, down the hall and tuning alone or as a couple.   If they don't yet know these, introduce 2 or 3 at your next dance.    Gaps could be filled in for any newbies.   California twirl is easily demonstrated.    Many good contra dances exist that use only these.   Heys are optional.   I have called several evenings of dances without ever using a hey.       Roll-away are not needed.

This  link (a list of easy and intermediate dances I once put together, occasionally augment, but never cleaned up)  has many candidate dances,  especially on the first several pages.     http://aptsg.org/Dance/easy_dances.pdf

I  speculate that  your not having enough experience teaching new dancers may also be relevant.     Maybe you can get Steve Pike or Roger Diggle to call one of your dances,  and you can study what they do and answer some specific questions.
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