Oral Presentations

I just wanted to say a huge "Good Luck" to everyone on the Oral Presentations today and tomorrow. I hope everything goes well for everyone.

I'm already getting stage fright about mine on Thursday!

Let us know how it goes!

Best wishes,
Emily

Healthier Dancer Updates

Recently I have been talking about "hub sites" which the National Institute of Dance Medicine and Science have been setting up through the Healthier Dancer Programme.

This video by the BBC shows a dancer talking about her experience at one of these Hub sites and how much it helped her to see a dance specialist who properly understood her injuries.

I previously blogged about my thoughts on whether dancers should be entitled to free specialist healthcare and discussed my opinions with a few students on the course. It is interesting to see that this is developing into an argument after collecting survey results from my participants who are spread over a wide range of professional dance companies all over the world. It is especially interesting to see that there is even a divide in the opinions from dancers.

Another point about the Healthier Dancer Programme is how little dancers seem to know about it, although this  could be due to the network of dancers that I have. Many work abroad although they reside in England. 

I think the National institute of Dance Medicine and Science would probably do well do advertise what they are doing further to gain more support. 

Had you previously heard about the programme?

How are things going?

Hi everyone, how are things going for you?
I've almost finished collecting in all of my data and have started drafting up parts of my critical review.
I actually found the interviewing really interesting. Before going ahead with it I couldn't really see different answers to the questions than my own. Some of the answers really surprised me and some were different to the observations that I had made. Did you find the same thing?
Now that I've started typing everything up I've found it's a tricky business to try and get everything out of my head and onto the page but I'm just trying not to get too snowed under with all of the information. I've found it difficult not to start evaluating in my inquiry analysis and to know which piece of what I'm trying to say should go where.
What stage are you at?
A notebook to jot down stray ideas has still been my saving grace. Is there anything else you can suggest to help?
I've also started to think about what I'm going to do for the professional artifact. This seems like quite a challenge and I've had a look at some previous blogs for some ideas but still not sure what to commit to.
Hope things are going well for everyone,
Emily

"NHS based dance injury Clinic accessible free via GP referral"

I have been spending a lot of time looking at "The Healthier Dancer Programme", which is going ahead with Dance UK. Previously in module 2 I blogged about the Healthier Dancer Programme (HDP) but now as it is going ahead I have a lot more information on the ins and outs and access to what is really going on.
This is really important to me as I am looking at ideas that the HDP is putting into practice and using some of their ideas alongside my own for inquiry.

All of the information about the HDP can be found on the Dance UK website at:
https://www.danceuk.org/healthier-dancer-programme/

The HUGE deal about this project is that it aims to help freelance dancers like myself who do not have access to specialist care for injury without either paying a lot of money to be privately seen or waiting for a long time to be seen by someone who may not be a specialist in dance. It aims to do this in many ways, one of them being setting up hub- sites around the UK.

The first hub- site is being set up and based at the Royal National Orthopedic hospital. This service is an "NHS based dance injury clinic accessible FREE via GP referral.":  Dance UK 2012,

Six Major Dance Organisations, Universities and a Hospital Unite to Launch The First National Institute of Dance Medicine & Science, DanceUK website [online], available from: https://www.danceuk.org/healthier-dancer-programme/national-institute-dance-medicine-and-science/, accessed 22nd October 2012.

This is great news for dancers but it would seem not so much for the rest of the non dancing population as I found out from the comments of an article that was published in April by the BBC news.http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-17846564

There are many views in the comments, most show that the audience who have read the article do not appreciate dance and a lot are flippant remarks but it has made me think that maybe it is wrong to have free treatment for our high risk sport- I can't make up my mind. On the other hand, a lot of money in the NHS is spend on things that are irrelevant to myself and one example that I know of is the help of quitting smoking and treating smoking related diseases.
Of course I believe that the NHS should treat smokers, this is just an example, but if the general public allows the NHS to spend money on projects like this where there are no health benefits of smoking in the first place (what I mean is all smokers know smoking is unhealthy before they start), why not spend money on helping injured dancers when dance has so many health benefits like increasing general fitness.

Is it wrong to spend NHS money on helping injured dancers?
Is it wrong to spend NHS money on helping ill smokers who knew the health risks?

I intend to ask my interviewees the question of whether they believe this is a good idea or not to try and justify whether or not it should go ahead. What do you as a dancer think?



 Dance UK 2012, 
Six Major Dance Organisations, Universities and a Hospital Unite to Launch The First National Institute of Dance Medicine & Science, DanceUK website [online], available from: https://www.danceuk.org/healthier-dancer-programme/national-institute-dance-medicine-and-science/, accessed 22nd October 2012.

Branwen Jeffreys, April 2012, First dance injury clinic for NHS to open, BBC news website [online], available from: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-17846564, accessed 22nd october 2012

Documentary Review - "First Position"

After reading Paula's Blog entry I decided to take some time out to watch the documentary "First Position". I found that as well just enjoying the documentary I could relate it to my inquiry.

First Position is a documentary that follows the lives of children and teenagers who come from a wide variation of different backgrounds through their training for an international ballet competition where they can win scholarships to prestigious ballet schools and apprenticeships to top ballet companies around the world.

The documentary filled me with amazement and inspiration and I felt very emotionally involved with what the children were going through. I felt like I could feel their passion and that the documentary stirred up my passion for dance and made me remember why I love dancing so much even though I hadn't realised that I had forgotten it.

I was surprised to see that one of the girls who the documentary focusses on is Michaela DePrince who Jacob Hughes has recently posted about. The girl who was adopted from Sierra Lione. I could not believe what a down to earth young woman she came across as being, given her traumatic past experience in life. How was she ever able to move forward from those experiences?

The documentary showed a lot of things which could be deemed to be unethical such as some of the children being fed low fat foods to keep them skinny, children dancing many hours of the day and possibly missing out on important parts of their childhood and children being painfully stretched by their parents and teachers.

The unethical point that relates to my inquiry also showed the young dancers dancing through injury. Many of the clips showed the dancers showing off their feet and how cut and bruised they were and lacking of toenails. One girl said "They look pretty in pointe shoes but not so pretty in real life." But she said this while smiling. There was also footage of dancers lying at the side of the studios, icing their injuries but they focussed quite a bit on the main injury story of Michaela DePrince.

Unfortunately Michaela became injured with tendonitis in her achilles before the final of the competition and was unsure if she would be able to take part and perform. Her family and teachers did not push her to do it if she didn't want to, but the competition was for a huge prize. In the end Michaela went to the competition.

I don't want to ruin the documentary as it's definitely one to watch so I will not reveal the outcomes but it raised some questions for me.

If the judging panel knew that injured daners were taking part should they have done something to stop this?

By taking part in the competition Michaela could have ruined all her chances of becoming a dancer by making her injury too bad to recover. Therefore is it unethical that Michaela took part in the competition or was the chance of the prize to great an opportunity to risk? 

Is it unethical that her parents allowed her to take part as she is only 14? Or, Is it ethically ok because it is Michaela who decided wether or not she should dance and take responsibility for her own body even though she is only young?

Through these questions my personal answer is that from Michaela's point of view what ever she wants to do is morally right as it is her body and therefore her decision. What do you think?

Watch this space for Michaela DePrince and my other favourite from the documentary Joan Sebastian Zamora. Amazing.

Official poster from First Position

Literature Review "Graham Crackers"

I have just uploaded a review to Google Docs, heres the link: Literature Review, "Graham Crackers" by Renee D'Aoust here's what it's about:

"A Suggestion of literature from Adesola through my feedback to read is:

Renne D’Aoust, Nov 2008, “Graham Crackers”, R Gottlieb, Reading Dance, United States: Pantheon Books, pages 749 – 755.

I would recommend many of you to read this chapter especially if you have worked or are working in a dance company. I could relate to almost everything that was happening and for every character that Renee described there is a person in my working life that is that character... though maybe not all are quite as eccentric."

If you get a chance to read it I would appreciate a bit of help. If I keep citing quotes from the same book or chapter do I need to reference them after every single quote, or is once at the beginning of the piece enough? I looked up in the handbook, but I'm not sure. Any advice much appreciated.

I have enjoyed reading published works from a professional dancer and it has inspired me to possibly review more literature published by authors in dance to gain a view from their perspective. How did they work through injury and what were the ethical implications and their opinions on this? 

Do you think this is a good idea? If not, what are you doing or do you think I could do that would possibly a be better alternative?

I am also concentrating on factual data or ideas that are being or have been bought up by projects involving more scientific explanations. Perhaps it is a good idea to focus on a mix of the two ideas.

Thanks for reading, all comments welcome and much appreciated.

What am I doing?

Many thanks to Sarah and Liam for writing up about what was discussed at the first campus session for module 3.

It's been good to see how other people have been getting started on this module and I thought by writing a blog about what I have done so far and what I plan to do could be a help to others as well as myself.

General advice has been to take a good look back at the feedback and plan from module 2 and "tweak".
I found that I was getting lost with what I needed to do. What was I supposed to be getting out of my plan? I needed to summarise it which I did in a note book under a title of "what am I actually doing?" and now I have this page sat infront of me so that if I get lost I can look at this and get my head back in the game.

So, What am I actually doing? Here is what I have summarised.

Well, in my overall inquiry I'm exploring how dancers work through injuries and how they can prevent these injuries from happening. I am looking at ideas of developing a healthy lifestyle along with the ideas of dance UK and the healthier dancer project. What are their ideas, and can I relate them to my inquiry?
I have been searching through their website and making notes on a lot of their research and plans so far. I have subscribed to their Facebook page but I am not a member of dance UK. As I would like to know so much about their project it could be a wise decision for me to become a member...

In my inquiry I'm looking at the key times that injuries occur and after my feedback have decided to look at other risks of injury. Before I was looking at simple things such as doing a good enough warm up but i've added some other variables such as whether dancers are more vulnerable when they are for example ill, tired or emotionally low - depressed, sad, stressed etc.
These different areas all have different ethical arguments about them for example the way dancers can be treated in training and rehearsals can cause a dancer to become tired and stressed and therefore more likely to become injured. Some would argue that this is wrong and others that it is a necessity to be treated that way in order to become a better dancer. So these new variables will help to discuss ethical arguments around the subject of injury.

I have also started looking more at published literature that has been written by dancers to look at their opinions and feelings on the subject.

This is all helping me to finalise the questions that I will be asking my participants in both surveys and interviews which I have also begun to jot down in my notebook.

Reading advisers blogs has also been a great help and Adesola makes a good point that I need to sticky label to the laptop:
"The module is about the process, NOT about me finding an answer to a problem..." That's where I keep going wrong, but at least I know that now.

Im also working on a timeline although this is actually a more difficult task than expected.
Notebooks are saving me. I find it easier to organise my brain on paper so I have note books filled with random words and sentences but it helps me to understand what I mean somehow.

So now that I know where I'm going I have started progressing with my literature reviews and finalising my questions for surveying and interviewing participants... watch this space, I'm watching yours!

Let's get started!

Hi everyone, I have at last been bought back up to date with technology with a smart phone! This is coming directly to you from the blogger app. So hopefully I can blog whenever, wherever!
Feeling very overwhelmed at the thought of this next module but hopefully we'll be ok.
I have seen a lot of timetabling from fellow module 3ers, I think this is the way forward to keep on top of everything and am following suit.
I've sent a summary and briefed my participants so its time to begin! Good luck everyone and post any problems or queries, hopefully we can all get through them together!

Welcome Back!

Just a quick post to say welcome back to everybody!  Hope the Summer was good, looking forwards to getting back on with everything again. Post soon! 

Critical Reflection Portfolio

Hi Everyone, here's the link to my Critical Reflection, enjoy reading!
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1-MxdvnnfLwvLXimWtOxUk5uzZSehQNVycHW3YLPEpSU/edit