Reflecting on the piloted tools 6B

After conducting my research I’ve come to the conclusion that in order to achieve the best results I’m going to have to use more than one of the tools of gathering information.

Conducting surveys is a good idea. I found it the best way to see patterns and trends among specific questions. The down side to conducting surveys is that you obviously only get answers to the questions you ask. What I mean is that you can’t really find out enough about one situation or the reasons behind an answer. I also think that surveys are a bit too impersonal, it’s easy to not quite tell the whole truth and people may be unwilling to fill one in therefore it is difficult to get people to participate. They are however useful to find patterns and problems which could be of use to research into and also useful as evidence of problems.

Interviewing others is a lot more difficult than I had originally thought. I, like many others on the course found it was difficult to keep up with the note taking whilst asking questions. A Dictaphone is a very good idea and would also be useful as evidence for the inquiry.

 Sometimes it was difficult to stick to the questions I originally wanted to ask and I realised that I needed to really plan the questions to get the information off the participant that I truly wanted.

I also found it hard to get a happy medium of formality. If the interview was too formal then the interviewee was less likely to relax into the interview and the information I would then receive from them would be a bit like the survey – they would be unlikely to elaborate on their answers. However, if the interview was too informal then we were more likely to go off at tangents and stray from the questions that I was supposed to be asking and in some cases the candidate may also not take the interview as seriously as I would have perhaps needed them too.

Observations were pleasing in the results. I found that if I was taking part in the situation and not an “onlooker” that I would get the natural results that I would be after and a lot of my questions would be answered as I’d see certain situations happen.

Observations will be a great way for me to gather information for my inquiry as I will already be in a situation with my work where this will be possible while I am taking part in rehearsals.

I have already noticed situations where dancers are at possible risk of injury such as:

•        Not keeping warm in the rehearsal when not being used.
•          Repetition of movements whilst learning choreography.
•          Girls rehearsing in heels for substantial amounts of time.

I have also noticed situations where the risk of injury has been reduced:

•          A full cast warm up takes place everyday
•          Dancers are given a good amount of time to rest between rehearsals.
•          There are enough swings to cover so less pressure to dance through injury.

It would be beneficial if I could also observe other companies in order to compare different company rules and policies. This way I will be able to discover where most of the injury risks lie, if and how different companies do certain things to prevent injuries and what needs to be bought to dancers’ attention in order to help themselves hopefully prevent or work through injury.

Conducting focus groups was quite intimidating. I only managed a couple of people at a time as I really didn’t feel confident enough with more people. I found that the small groups I interviewed flowed quite well although maybe someone with a stronger opinion would lead the other person into agreeing with what they were saying if perhaps they didn’t or didn’t as strongly as they did. I would like to try an online focus group to discuss with different associates who belong to different companies. This will take a lot of planning as there could be issues with time zones and the participants obtaining internet access but would be beneficial to again gather information and compare the different results.

Prior to piloting the different tools of gathering information I was sure that the data I would need to collect for my inquiry would be qualitative as I would need to know details behind injury and personal situations. However through taking surveys and also through reading up on previous literature that has been written about dance injury I have learned how important gathering quantitative data will also be for my inquiry. I hope to compare the results and numbers to inquiries that have taken place in the past. How do my results differ from their findings? Do dancers know more now? Has anything changed? What actions/ technology have been put in to place to help prevent injury for dancers and is it working?

Literature review 2 A Survey of injuries among Broadway Performers

Literature Review

American Journal of Public Health January 1996, Vol.86, No.1

A Survey of injuries among Broadway Performers http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1380366/?tool=pubmed

Although written in 1996 this article was very interesting as it interpreted quantitative data rather than qualitative data.

The researchers surveyed different actors and dancers on Broadway and put the results into many different categories in order to decipher and understand when and why most injuries occur.

The categories are good examples of what I might use to help sort my data for my inquiry. One idea that hadn’t crossed my mind was a Raked stage as I haven’t had to work on one but it provoked a thought that I could possibly consider an extra category for those who work on ships as surely a rough sea is another risk factor for injury.

The article helped me to realise that actually quantitative data could be useful to my findings. I was starting to steer away from using it in my inquiry as I wasn’t sure that I would be able to get as much information out of the patterns and trends as I would through interviewing and observing candidates.

As a staggering number of Broadway performers had sustained injury, and "62% believed their injuries were preventable" it shows the importance of my inquiry. How do performers work through injury? What can be done to prevent these injuries?

Article Review 1: Podiatry Today

 Article Review
 Lisa M. Schoene
 Podiatry today http://www.podiatrytoday.com/article/3468
 What you should know about dance injuries
 Volume 18- issue 1 – January 2005

This article highlights the point that dancers and teachers need to be educated about dance injury. It also stresses the importance of finding injury early to “reduce the risk of damaging or career threatening injuries”.

I agree that dancers and teachers do need to be more educated about injury. In my opinion a lot of dancers go out into the world feeling invincible and don’t take the correct precautions to prevent injury not necessarily because they don’t care but because they don’t realise the difference that taking these precautions can make.

The article also points out that “rehabilitation has become more accepted”, then somewhat contradicts itself by also stating “when they suffer injuries they may seek medical care outside of the company’s medical staff and pay out of pocket in order to conceal injury. Dancers realise that their contract may be scrutinised for past injury and ultimately lead to dismissal.”

This is what I have found so far in my career. People will work through pain simply so they can keep their jobs. If you don’t dance you can’t work and the industry is very unforgiving. There are always people there to fill your shoes. I have also noticed that sometimes the company does not provide the professional healthcare such as physiotherapy or specialists in dance that a working dancer needs. Even if it does the dancer is likely to have to pay for the treatment they receive. It is totally dependent on the company and their policy. But why does this differ throughout the profession?

For example: One of my colleagues trapped her hand in the set during the show. She broke her hand through no fault of her own and was sent home to recover with no sick pay or compensation. There was no treatment or help provided by the company so instead she had to pay out of her own pocket to recover. The article backs up my ideas of inquiry of working through injury as it shows there are many discrepancies of what should and should not be expected of dancers and the pressures of working through injury. It also agrees with my point of there needing to be a greater education about injury and injury prevention among dancers.

What do you think?

Ice or Heat?

Dancers!! Are you fully aware of when to ice and when to heat an injury? I found this article it's pretty simple but explains how injuries should be treated. This is something that as professionals we should know, but do we? Do we put it into pratcice?

Rehearsals Begin

Hey fellow Bappers. Been unable to get online for a week and there are now mounds of new posts on the blogs that I'm trying to keep up with! Just started work here and the difference between this job and my last is unbelievable. It makes such a difference being based in one place and the atmosphere is so different here. I wouldn't say the differences are better or worse, just very different! I would say though, that we have been very well looked after! I am already making observations from the rehearsals and recording them in my journal. The new dancers have been made to feel very welcome here. The cast is around 33. 16 international dancers and 17 (as far as I have counted) Spanish dancers. The show involves classical flamenco dancing and the usual showgirl style, jazz and heel work that I was expecting. All the dancers dance all the styles so it is going to be a challenge to learn some Spanish! Hope all the inquiry plans are coming along well. I have begun to write mine out but discovered I was struggling to find things to talk about. Alan and Paula's blogs have been very helpful in inspiring new ideas for the plan. Ive started to save some links on delicious. Im hoping that if you click the link you will be able to see them? maybe you will find them as useful as I am! http://delicious.com/embren Hope all is going well for everyone Emily x