In this course, students will engage in research and reflection on the following questions: As a teacher, what long term dance learning or enduring understanding do you wish to pass on to your students regarding modern dance? As a choreographer, do you know the lineage, from where your personal expressive style is rooted and developed, of your modern dance style? As a performer, how can an understanding of modern dance styles aid in clarity of execution in repertory pieces? From where do we develop our personal movement preferences and expressive capabilities? What or who has influenced these preferences and capabilities? Even if you are a “rebel”, as opposed to one devoted to passing on a legacy, you need to know from what or whom you are rebelling. By applying a known family genealogy, one is given a deeper sense of identity and so knowing the modern dance historical genealogy gives a deeper sense of one’s place in the modern dance world and thereby improve one’s dance products and students’ training experience.

Required Book: Legg, Joshua. (2011). Introduction to Modern Dance Techniques. Hightstown, NJ: Princeton Book Company Publishers.

How do OPDI Online Courses for dance teachers work?

Our “online” courses are guided by a professor and include a co-hort of students (other dance teachers) with whom you will collaborate. They also include graded assignments, feedback, final grades, and Professional Development Credits (PDCs). Our OPDI online courses require on average between 6 to 8 hours of work each week, but it all depends on your learning style. It could be less or could be more. You can also register as an Audit student and do as much or as little work as you want and will not receive a grade.

We utilize the Sakai online learning platform to deliver the course materials and instruction. Our courses are asynchronous, so there are no required meeting dates or times but we do have a Course Start and Course End date; however, our courses offer at least 2 optional live Q&A-Feedback zoom sessions during the course to enhance opportunities for connection with other students and the professor. Every week of the course there are assignments that you will need to complete with due dates listed in the course outline / syllabus.

Assignments can be done at any time during the week prior to the due date and may include reading, watching videos, posting answers to prompts on a discussion board, writing an essay, reading and responding to other students' posts on the discussion board, taking a cell phone video of yourself completing a particular movement, taking a quiz, or completing a final project. The professor provides written feedback and grades and you get to connect with other students (who are actually dance teachers) via our discussion board and the optional live Q&A feedback sessions.