Bringing out their Best: for Dance, Drama & Music Teachers

Today's article follows the journey of six drama teachers from Victoria, Australia who set out to include First Nations content in curriculum. Each teacher came to the project with a shared moral purpose and a lot of fear. To embark on a journey without a final destination. All made mistakes along the way but were joyfully rewarded by their work so I thought I'd share their stories with you. https://performingartspd.com/first-nations-content/Thanks for listening! Follow us on Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram or check out our https://performingartspd.com

We are hearing more than ever about how  teachers are burning out. How young teachers aren't coping with the stressors of this demanding profession. I was wondering how graduates could be better supported and came across this 2022 article which describes a year long, online mentoring program between a network of advanced and novice music teachers. Instead of a one-on-one relationship, the network sought to spread the load. Providing a breadth of experienced and support to these junior colleagues. So let's hear how it went?https://performingartspd.com/mentoring-networks/Thanks for listening! Follow us on Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram or check out our https://performingartspd.com

This week we look at a study which did a review of 21 studies measuring the effectiveness of feedback interventions on motor skills. And the good news for me in this is that we have a purpose! Apparently our feedback is important if students want to make progress.https;//performingartspd.com/feedback-finale/Thanks for listening! Follow us on Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram or check out our https://performingartspd.com

How to teach Pop when you've only even known Classical?There is increasing pressure on music programs to include popular music genres however arguably the biggest stumbling block to this is us. The teachers! Sadly most of us studied classical genres in our school and university life and many of us continue to pursue these genres in our leisure time. It therefore comes naturally to us to run music ensembles based on our own experiences but we are less likely to encourage and foster ensembles that take us out of our sphere of comfort. Yet, whilst the ensemble programs we run are certainly valuable, they are often taken up by the most privileged students whilst popular music education advocates seek to create a broader audience and include marginalised perspectives.https://performingartspd/teaching-pop-music/Thanks for listening! Follow us on Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram or check out our https://performingartspd.com

Whether we teach dance, drama or music, motor learning is an integral part in performance achievement. Aside from class, there's an expectation our students will work on their performance skills in their own time and for this, they need to be motivated. Goal setting, lies at the heart of how a student initiates, sustains and evaluates their progress. Building impetus and drive to continually do better. So today's study is looking at the role of achievement goals for people learning to juggle in their spare time. Not in class, not under the supervision of someone else, but how goals work to motivate practice and create a cycle of improvement….or not.https://performingartspd.com/effective-goal-setting/Thanks for listening! Follow us on Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram or check out our https://performingartspd.com

I remember when I first had my babies,  I was astounded at how much they practiced. Without me doing anything to encourage them!When they learned to use their voice they would lie in their cot and experiment with slides and sounds. When they learned to roll they would roll at any opportunity, when learning to crawl they kept practicing, same with walking, and talking and so on. So why on earth does this change as we get older?To be honest, I haven't got a clue but it did spark my interest in motivation and so when I saw this study on motivational interventions, I was keen to see if there was anything that might be useful for us in motivating our students. https://performingartspd.com/motivating-students/Thanks for listening! Follow us on Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram or check out our https://performingartspd.com

As performing arts teachers there is an expectation that we are brimming with creative vibes! That we are able to come up with inspiring and innovative solutions to anything from lack of budget to poor commitment in our students.  Sadly however, this is not always possible. As we become exhausted and run down our creativity can also become depleted. Therefore I thought I'd give your creativity a boost with some ideas of how to assess your creativity, how creativity works and some ideas on how to give yourself a creativity reboot! https://performingartspd.com/reboot-your-creativity/Thanks for listening! Follow us on Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram or check out our https://performingartspd.com

We work in an age where our students are more often fixed on their phones than on faces of their friends. Presentation of self is stylised and without the imperfections of everyday existence. Students whose attention is habitually split find it harder to get into flow and to remain mindful and present for classes and performances. Today's podcast is from an acting teacher who discovered strategies to create meaningful performance work for this group of students. Enjoy! https://performingartspd.com/actor-training-for-the-iphone-generation/Thanks for listening! Follow us on Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram or check out our https://performingartspd.com

Do we really need to demonstrate? This 2018 dance study trials movement vs instruction. To answer “how necessary are visual demonstrations to embed performance skills”. Enjoy! Thanks for listening! Follow us on Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram or check out our https://performingartspd.com

Our students are constantly being pushed to extend their boundaries, recognise what they don't know and try to expand on that knowledge base. This for many causes considerable discomfort which can lead to poor learning outcomes. Today's 2022 article looks at how we cope with discomfort and how to assist students to confront it head on!Thanks for listening! Follow us on Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram or check out our https://performingartspd.com

What does it take to make a confident ensemble that works cohesively? This 2020 study of an amateur choir comes up with some interesting ideas. Enjoy!Thanks for listening! Follow us on Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram or check out our https://performingartspd.com

Welcome to Season 2 of Bringing out their Best. This season we are going to look at effective feedback for developing performing artists. Today's episode is about whether we should bother with feedback at all or are we wasting our breath!Thanks for listening! Follow us on Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram or check out our https://performingartspd.com

Today's article reviewed over 3700 studies to see how the performing arts plays an integral role in improving and maintaining well-being.So let's remind ourselves of these benefits and how we can renew our wellbeing and be rewarded too!Https://performingartspd.com/blog/post-pandemic-wellbeing/

Be honest… have you ever thought about using drama to teach scientific concepts to a group of 10 year olds? I know I haven't. Today's study looks at how 10 year olds research Electricity and turn it into an award winning play!Https://performingartspd.com/blog/teaching-science-with-drama/

In recent years there's been a shift towards recognising and empowering those in our community whom have historically been without a voice. e.g. Black Lives Matter, Me2 and LGBTQI+ movements.As teachers there has been a growing requirement for our cultural competence but can we ever learn sufficient skills to achieve competence in another culture?Https://performingartspd.com/blog/cultural-humility/

In the last few months we have examined how Actors and Musicians memorise. Today we are going to look at how Dancers memorise hours of complex movement sequences, and find out if there are any symmetries between their strategies and those of other performing artists.Https://performingartspd.com/blog/memorise-like-a-dancer/

Are you a performing arts teacher and a perfectionist? I suspect if I asked who wasn't I might get a more manageable response. Well, we've talked about perfectionism in our students and what we can do to help them but today I thought I'd talk about perfectionism in ourselves, the teachers.https://performingartspd.com/blog/perfectionist-teachers/

Are you the kind of person who can't stop thinking about a performance after it is done? Particularly if it didn't go as planned? I confess I am guilty of this and as it turns out, I'm not the only one. This is actually a thing. It's even got a name - Post-Event Rumination.So does it matter if our students' ruminate after performances? Is it something we should be concerning ourselves with? And if so, what can we do about it?Https://performingartspd.com/blog/post-performance-rumination/

We all know that as performing artists we are expected to perform whilst others are watching. Well our students arguably have it worse. From their perspective, they have to perform whilst others watch and assess their performance for grading, admissions, competitions and the like. Ok, professionals have it bad too but we are teachers so we have to focus on the kiddies.The thing about artistic performance is that it is qualitative and experiential, making measurement of techniques used to focus for performance quite tricky. This is where sport is helpful, because there is usually a points system that is undeniably quantitative. So today we are going to take a look at a study of focusing techniques as trialed on soccer players kicking goals and hopefully we can draw a few lessons that can help our students to better focus when they are performing under pressure. Https://performingartspd.com/blog/performance-under-pressure/

I don't know about you, but I certainly have some “entitled students” come into my studio. You know the type I mean? Who feel they deserve special treatment that isn't warranted based on their academic performance. The students who believe their minimal effort should be publicly rewarded, that you are available to them at anytime and that everyday problems should mean extensions and special consideration. Well recently, someone shared an article about academic entitlement stemming from the “dark triad” of personality traits. In light of my experience and the mention of a dark triad, this article captured my attention, so I thought it might be fun to spend this week looking at how to handle our most difficult students and see if this article can offer any insights or suggestions.https://performingartspd/blog/difficult-students/

Musician's memorise enormous amounts of music using kinaesthetic, visual, auditory and conceptual memory. So how does this process work and what we can do to enhance and speed up memorisation. https://performingartspd.com/blog/memorise-like-a-musician/

How to thrive and remain positive as a performing arts educator?  These  teachers explore how they have battled overwhelm and are able to bring out the best of themselves in their pedagogy.https://performingartspd.com/blog/thriving-as-a-performing-arts-teacher/

Mother Nature has given us an antidote to stress known as the Tend and Befriend Response which  neutralises stress hormones in our system.The Tend and Befriend response can be a fabulous tool to assist developing performing artists to maintain a stable activation level for strong performance.  Listen to this episode to find out how!https://performingartspd.com/blog/tend-and-befriend/

“our best moments usually occur when a person's body and mind are stretched to its limits in a voluntary effort to accomplish something difficult and worthwhile – this state can be called FLOW” - Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi Studies in dance, music and theatre have shown flow to significantly improve creativity, intrinsic motivation, teaching, performance artistry and authenticity. This week's podcast looks at how to develop flow in our student and perhaps in ourselves....https://performingartspd.com/blog/flow/

Have you seen peer assessment build up some students and deplete others? Can peer assessment build self-efficacy for all performing arts students, when as humans we are biologically pre-programmed to cling to negative feedback? https://performingartspd.com/blog/benefits-to-peer-assessment/

In this episode we look at the second step to managing performance anxiety,  understanding  Activation Levels. How hyped or how chilled do your students need to be to perform their best? Should they all be the same?  Understanding their optimal performance zone and how to achieve it is the focus of this week's episode. https://performingartspd.com/blog/performance-anxiety-step-2/

I can't hear you! Do you ever have this problem with your students? of inadequate vocal projection?This week's episode looks at a study in which singers' volume and tone increased by simply changing the focal point for the sound.

Have you ever noticed that you can memorise some things easily and others you have to labour over endlessly to make them stick?Recently I was reading an article on how actors are able to memorise and assimilate texts in such a short time space and with accuracy. How they do this feat was being analysed and successfully transferred to assist elderly persons suffering cognitive decline. So back to our students, could the way actors memorise lines in fact have some lessons that can help us all? Are there key elements that make a difference?https://performingartspd.com/blog/Memorise-like-an-Actor?/

Dance teacher, Susan Pope, developed a gratitude practice during lockdown which she then turned into a lesson plan for students. In modelling her vulnerability and sources of strength, she empowered them to develop their own movement meditation based on their experiences of gratitude.

Was Gratitude  part of your self-care during the pandemic?Today we look at the evidence-base for gratitude practice through a performing arts lens. Then next week we uncover a lesson plan created by dance educator Susan Pope employing her gratitude practice in a movement exploration and empowering her students to find their own. 

Overthinking? Have you ever been concentrating so hard on the mechanics of a task that your body was literally tripping over itself and completely uncooperative? Have you also found as you grew in accomplishment and performance experience that this problem was less common?Today's episode looks at the difference between amateurs susceptibility to overthinking versus professionals who do it much more rarely.Find out more at https://performingartspd.com/blog/overthinking/

Beta blockers are used to manage performance anxiety across the performing arts. As their usage is so common, it is important as a teacher to understand how they work. This episode is not about whether they are a good choice or not. It simply provides information around this commonly used but poorly understood topic. To find out more https://performingartspd.com/blog/beta-blockers/

Does what we think matter? Does it really make much of a difference to student's performances?Encouraging students to think in ways that facilitate strong performance has been a hobby of mine for a while now. In today's episode I thought I'd share with you what sparked this interest and why I think it's important and so translatable to performing arts spaces. Read more

One of the ways professional performing artists and elite athletes maintain strong performances is by consistently using a pattern of thoughts and behaviours prior to performance that assist them to get in their Performance Mindset be that an Onstage Persona or a Peak Performance version of themselves. In this episode Sarah explores the research uncovering what professional performing artists do to get into a peak performance mindset for consistently strong performances. The complete episode transcription can be found at https://performingartspd.com/blog/

Sarah Marshall from https://performingartspd.com takes performing arts educators through a  complete explanation of Performance Anxiety and how the Fight or Flight Response triggers our biology, behaviour and cognitions. She explains how these responses can be managed and what you can do to as an educator to assist your students so that they  can decrease their anxiety levels and feel more confident performing. The complete episode transcription can be found at https://performingartspd.com/blog/

Perfectionism is rife in the Performing Arts. I'm guessing you know may have noticed this but interestingly it doesn't seem to impact everyone in the same way…. For some artists they find their perfectionism deeply rewarding,  their relentless ambition to keep at a performance until it shines enables them to create extraordinary performances. Whilst for others their perfectionism is overwhelming, leading to constant self-flagellation and paralysis as they fail to achieve the performance goals they are pursuing.Today's episode explores the different types of perfectionism and how we as teachers can act as a buffer against some of its more debilitating effects. The complete episode transcription can be found at https://performingartspd.com/blog/

Trailer for the Podcast "Bringing out their Best: for Dance, Drama & Music Teachers". A weekly podcast to energise and renew Performing Arts Educators everywhere! Industry specific topics and interviews with educators who strive to bring out the best in their students every day. Brought to you by Sarah Marshall, Founder of Performing Arts PD