Hi Maia,
Here's my recent thoughts on the subject, in chronological order for the first walkthrough:
1. To me, there's nothing really to explain. I find it's too much complication for too little help, and I don't really think roles exist in an integral way as others do. I'm not here to give history lessons, I'm here to get people moving and smiling. I'd rather spend my time thanking people for participating and putting them at ease. You might want to try skipping over the section of your lessons in question and come up with a new way (see below). Different people do different things in the dance, but, in my opinion, it's just easier to teach those things in the moment rather than create an "original" geometry.
2. I do essentially what Louise has mentioned, circle people up first (I always teach La Bastringue for the first dance), then get people to practice the swing with partner and neighbour separately, utilizing the concept of the "pointy hand", a la Louise.
3. Then I encourage that if someone has a preference for side, they should communicate that to their partner. I stress that it doesn't really matter. Most dances I teach are partner-symmetrical. Most noobies just stay where they are.
4. From here I use bi-coloured wrist bands (scrunchies) to identify people. I'm not a positional caller - I think the duality of 1st and 2nd couple is mirrored in the duality of the partners, and not everything is symmetrical. What you really want, what you're really asking for, is an easier way to explain what each person is doing.
I just received feedback last night from a new dancer who's been coming monthly for the last year-or-so, that the bi-coloured wrist bands I initiated in December is making a world of difference for cohesion. Years ago, the local ECD group adopted coloured sashes for the right-hand people (formerly expected to be women), and the local international group adopted formal wear ties for the left hand people (formerly, though rarely, men) when they danced partner dances.
I supercharged the idea by utilizing bi-coloured scrunchies, directing them to be put on specific wrists - this is key. Now everyone wears something, rather than some people essentially being outed for not being in the traditional role (thus requiring additional identifiers). The bands do more though. The colours identify "role": Orange is lead/lark/man, blue is follow/robin/woman. But since the orange bands are on the left wrist and the blue bands are on the right wrist, this gives a secondary word to use to identify who I'm talking to. I'm tending to use right-hand person and left-hand person, rather than my previous lead/follow designations, which is more positional. They're essentially the same thing - roles, but these ones are easier to understand and see under pressure. I also think it's a slight leg up on arm bands because people are looking at others' hands more often, and I can also identify people's pointy hands - they're the ones with the coloured wrist bands!! Swinging is much easier now, and I can use the pointy hand concept to help people end up on the correct side. THANKS LOUISE!!
Greg
Winnipeg
P.S. I tried to buy red and blue, but the colour on the online ad for the wrist bands was off and they came orange. I much preferred the idea of "making purple" as a phrase for swinging but orange is good, too. lol
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On Sunday, March 10th, 2024 at 11:22 AM, Louise Siddons via Contra Callers contracallers@lists.sharedweight.net wrote:
I start intro lessons in a circle, partner people off as soon as it becomes necessary, and teach them both sides of the swing (by asking them to shift their arms while swinging; this is partly about teaching them not to drag on each other). Then I say, your partner might have a preference so you should always ask — and I explain that the preference might be about an injury, about how they were taught to dance, or about balancing out their experience over the course of the evening.
Obviously I can’t listen to every couple on the floor but from the mic it appears to me that new dancers do then ask those they’re dancing with and over the course of the first half the outcome reflects the character of the crowd more than individual new-dancer preferences.
Perhaps also obviously to some people I do all of this without reference to role terms except to alert new dancers that they may hear a variety of role terms from experienced dancers on the floor. If I’m at a L&R dance I say explicitly that they might hear larks and robins, and here’s what that means. (New dancers were not born yesterday and they figure out the gendered role terms quickly if there are dancers using them.)
Incidentally, I find the claim Maia cites about the robin role being easier extremely questionable. Do people truly generally say/believe that?
Louise.
On 10 Mar 2024, at 14:48, Maia McCormick via Contra Callers contracallers@lists.sharedweight.net wrote:
Hey there, hive mind,
When you're calling larks and robins, during the lesson, how do you
a. explain the roles to the new folks, and
b. put the beginners into roles for the duration of the lesson?[the rest snipped for brevity]
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