What is Dance about?
In conversation with
Ryan Timoko-Benjamin
Trudy Dobbie
Gillian Payne
Transcript below:
I'm hoping the outcome will be that teachers will be able to teach and learn. That assessment will happen more authentically, and will be able to be gathered as the teaching/learning occurs, rather than working towards assessment.
Having fewer Standards is going to allow students to have more time, less stress, more manageable workload, and focusing more on the learning, rather than being assessment driven, which is nice. That's the best part of it, taking it back to, in this in this subject, what is the stuff that we want to be celebrating and emphasising. And letting the assessment fall out of that later.
We started with the Big Ideas. Embedding them from the overarching teaching and learning that we want to do in the classroom. Looking at the how. There's many different ways for kids to submit their understanding of what we're doing in the classroom, what we're learning about.
It's valuing their culture, language, identity, and bringing that into the learning, rather than keeping it as an outside thing. It's part of the way we approach and the way we're changing the approach to learning.
I think in terms of Mana ōrite mō mātauranga Māori, it's about acknowledging what's always existed as two separate entities. Now we will see through the vehicles of te ao Haka. But also what we've done with the changes to Dance.
The ability for Māori medium, but also Māori learners in English medium settings to bring all of those skills that they've always explored so deeply. And now be acknowledged on a valid platform with every other learner.
Each teacher brings in their own knowledges, and experiences, and understandings. It was a really interesting conversation, because we all held different things. But what we managed to find is the fundamentals that we all agreed on. That was the driving force in our practice. It's a new tool as well for teachers, having that Learning Matrix and the Big Ideas. Using that to guide course design, and thinking about the overall, the whole year, the whole big picture, rather than separating things out. It's made me think about my curriculum design.
I'm really excited to go back to my courses, my programmes, and reimagine them and rethink them. I've worked in isolation for a very long time as a sole Dance teacher. To collaborate with other Dance teachers, be challenged on my biases, and what I think about what I'm doing, has been invaluable.
Our subject association feedback told us that there was lots about the existing Achievement Standards that they liked. There was lots that they loved. For us, the challenge has been how do we embed better practices into what teaching and learning looks like in Dance.
Strip away some of the clog in the assessment. But still give space and voice to those things that we've liked, while being able to refine and make more explicit the things that had been left to chance in the past. And now are right up there, centre stage with everything else. Change is going to be overwhelming for some people, and I think we understand that. Particularly if you just get given something and you have to make sense of it.
I think as scary as change is, not to be afraid. To think about it as a way of taking the moment, the opportunity and the time to re-look at what you're doing.
Yeah, and those tools there. That Learning Matrix, which is a new tool, the Big Ideas. Looking at the tasks, the example tasks, example course outlines. Taking time to kind of wrap your head around it. Start picturing it, how it could work for you and what you've been doing.
One hope I would have, and I'll cushion it as advice, is that we don't just jump straight to finding that piece of recognition in the change, and find ways to mould our existing approaches to assessment and practice into these new Standards we've delivered.
By design, they are different. Taking that time, and to acknowledge the complexity and uncertainty that sits in change spaces. Take time to wallow in that space. Find those moments where your perspective, and the perspective of your learners, gives you that opportunity to start afresh.
Subject-specific terms can be found in the glossary.
Dance is an embodied language. Students develop literacy in dance as they learn about, and develop, skills in movement, performance, and choreography. They learn to understand and respond to a variety of dance genres, styles, and forms from a range of contexts, past and present. Teachers enable students to understand and explore dance forms and develop their own ideas, expression, and sense of identity.
Students learn that dance is a holistic experience which links the mind, body, and emotions – integrating thinking, moving, and feeling. They explore dance elements, vocabularies (eg the key features of dance genres or styles), and processes to express personal, group, and cultural identities. Dance also provides space to ask questions, challenge assumptions, promote difference, and provoke alternative thinking.
Dance is a way of strengthening relationships. Through Dance, a number of transferable skills are nurtured that ākonga can carry with them beyond the learning environment, such as collaboration, communication, teamwork, problem solving, and creative thinking. Ākonga carry their identities into the classroom and recognise that their personal prior experiences are valid and valued components of learning in Dance, facilitating an environment that supports whanaungatanga. Working together as a collective and emphasising core values of mutual respect and alofa, dance also supports the nurturing of Vā in our learning spaces. Such values are fundamental to positive learning experiences that will support learners' potential in dance.
Ākonga will continue to deepen their technical expertise and knowledge that underpins Dance as a subject, such as the knowledge about the development of a dance genre or style. As an embodied language, Dance is expressed through movement, which may include locomotor or non-locomotor movement, spatial concepts, the use of positive and negative shapes, relationships of individuals and groups to each other and to their environment, and the effect of timing, as well as rhythmic and energy qualities.
In exploring movement vocabulary and choreography, learners synthesise ideas through dynamic interplays of dance processes and conventions. For example, composition of a dance sequence may involve personal ways of moving that emerge from improvisation and creative developmental work. It may also consist of stylistic techniques and movements usually associated with particular dance genres or styles. Learners will generate and refine ideas through cycles of action to create cohesive, fluid expressions of dance forms. They will reflect and determine which process is appropriate at a specific point. Technologies may help ākonga to curate and develop their performances.
Big Ideas and Significant Learning
This section outlines the meaning of, and connection between, the Big Ideas and Significant Learning, which together form the Learning Matrix. It then explains each Dance Big Idea.
The Arts Learning Area curriculum, including its whakataukī, informs this subject's Significant Learning – learning that is critical for students to know, understand, and do in relation to a subject by the end of each Curriculum Level. This covers knowledge, skills, competencies, and attitudes. It also includes level-appropriate contexts students should encounter in their education. The Learning Area's whakataukī is:
Te toi whakairo, ka ihiihi, ka wehiwehi, ka aweawe te ao katoa.
Artistic excellence makes the world sit up in wonder.
The subject's Big Ideas and Significant Learning are collated into a Learning Matrix for Curriculum Levels 6, 7, and 8. Teachers can use the Learning Matrix as a tool to construct learning programmes that cover all the ‘not to be missed’ learning in a subject. There is no prescribed order to the Learning Matrix within each level. A programme of learning might begin with a context that is relevant to the local area of the school or an idea that students are particularly interested in. This context or topic must relate to at least one Big Idea and may also link to other Big Ideas.
There are five Big Ideas in Dance. The nature of this subject as a discipline means aspects of Significant Learning often cross over multiple Big Ideas, and vice versa.
For example, the Learning Matrix enables rich engagement with mātauranga Māori, Pacific cultures, and the many cultures that ākonga may encounter or identify with, contributing to te ao Māori and recognising the diversity of Aotearoa New Zealand. The diversity of individual learners is also recognised and valued.
The matrix weaves together the Significant Learning and Big Ideas.
He atua, he tipua, he tangata – Dance is a descendant of culture
Dance is born out of culture. It reflects its circumstances and evolves as society does. While culture can be interpreted widely, the universal language of dance empowers learners to recognise the increasing diversity of Aotearoa New Zealand and build connections across cultures.
Dance recognises the learner’s whole self, allowing them to connect with who they are by developing confidence, wellbeing, and their own artistic identity. Teachers ensure learners’ access to dance, foster their expression, and give them the skills to communicate and share their culture or cultures.
Dance encourages the celebration of uniqueness. It enables learners to be comfortable with, and to value, cultures and ideas that are not their own. All ākonga come with their own culture, whakapapa, and indigeneity that can be expressed through movement.
Dance is tightly interwoven with the fabric of society, and nurtures one’s sense of identity. All learners are empowered to explore dance genres or styles they are familiar and connected with (ones that are part of their whakapapa). For example, ākonga in Aotearoa New Zealand are able to access and benefit from mātauranga Māori and te ao Māori.
Dance also provides space for ākonga to engage with unfamiliar dance forms, such as new styles and cultures, new ideas, and new experiences.
The creation and exploration of dance nurtures whakawhanaungatanga
Dance is a vehicle for forming and sustaining relationships. These are multi-faceted and holistic – with others, with oneself, and with the environment. Nurturing relationships is a continuous and active process. It is integral to the physical, emotional, and spiritual aspects of self.
Through shared moments, experiences, and collaboration, learners can gain a sense of belonging, community, and identity. Diverse identities, abilities, and roles are respected and celebrated, creating a foundation for collaboration and interdependence – valuing and learning from one another. Roles in the group can take many forms in this context and are not fixed (such as who leads and who follows).
Dance is an embodied language where people can explore and communicate ideas, culture, and identities
Dance is the essence of embodiment (being in your body) and learning within Dance is engaged through movement. As an embodied language, it has its own literacy where ākonga write the message and purpose of a dance with their bodies, and read dance with their eyes and minds.
Dance vocabulary is active. It involves steps, sequences, patterns, and ways of moving which can be personal or particular to a dance form. Through moving and observing movement, learners explore and transform ideas into expressive works that communicate meaning.
The language of dance nurtures culture. Through dance, learners can value, sustain, and reflect stories, concepts, whakapapa, and tikanga.
With teacher facilitation, learners can research concepts, interpret the work of others, appreciate other cultures, and examine and resolve ideas. Through increasing literacy, they can find and develop their own movement vocabulary to express ideas and identity.
Dance provides space to ask questions, challenge assumptions, promote difference, and provoke alternative thinking
Dance education empowers learners to find and use their voice through curiosity and exploration. They gain skills for life by exploring, communicating, critiquing, challenging, questioning, negotiating, and testing meanings and ideas. Through whakawhanaungatanga, a safe and respectful space is created to support this.
Dance enables learners to move beyond their comfort zones, encouraging them to be creative, take risks, express alternative viewpoints, and create impact through composing and performing movement. It gives a framework to provoke deep discussions about culture, identity, and society. This in turn creates a bridge between Dance and other disciplines and contexts.
Dance involves processes of exploration, selection, refinement, practice, reflection, synthesis, and editing
Dance education is a holistic experience not limited to physicality and movement. It is a powerful tool for developing valuable and transferable social, physical, and cognitive skills. Learners develop social skills, enabling them to work in class groups, teams, and in their dance communities. Dance heightens awareness of the body and increases the quality of personal and physical wellbeing. Creative and critical thinking and problem-solving abilities are fostered.
Dance is a unique medium for learning about self and identity, building self-confidence, and developing resilience and perseverance. Ākonga will gain a better sense of their own personal perspectives, beliefs, tastes, style, aspirations, and ways of doing things. They have a safe space to design and organise movements and structures, as well as to communicate and justify their intentions behind the sequences they compose and perform. These sequences could demonstrate stylistic techniques and movements usually associated with particular dance genres or styles, or include personal ways of moving that emerge from improvisation and creative work. This in turn encourages ākonga to explore movement sequences and ideas freely and be able to see themselves in their performances and choreography.
Key Competencies in Dance
Dance education provides meaningful contexts for developing Key Competencies from The New Zealand Curriculum. These Key Competencies are woven through, and embedded in, the Big Ideas and Significant Learning. For example, Big Ideas and Significant Learning may delve into critical thinking and analysis, collaborating and building relationships, and/or exploring cultures and identity.
Thinking
Students of Dance will:
- participate in processes of refinement, practice, and reflection
- seek to understand the communication of dance
- structure and manipulate specific movements and communicate their meaning.
Using language symbols and text
Students of Dance will:
- understand that dance knowledge and information can be represented in many ways, such as physical, verbal, and written
- interpret and communicate dance as an embodied language
- be able to examine the whakapapa of its many genres, styles, and forms
- recognise that dance is an embodied language with its own structures and systems of communication
- gain a sense of identity through designing dance movements and choreography.
Relating to others
Students of Dance will:
- collaborate and communicate with other learners as they engage in dance processes
- gain a sense of community and belonging
- be able to explore te ao Māori
- connect to the wider world by embracing the diversity of people, cultures, and contexts.
Managing self
Students of Dance will:
- be able to nurture their curiosity and creativity in order to explore movement as they make new meanings and experiences through dance
- develop self-discipline, perseverance, adaptability, and openness to learning.
Participating and contributing
Students of Dance will:
- participate in group settings and understand that this can take many forms, such as leading, following, or observing
- be able to share ideas and offer meaningful contributions, negotiate outcomes, and value the participation and ideas of others when performing and composing movement.
This section of The New Zealand Curriculum Online offers guidance to school leaders and teachers on integrating the Key Competencies into the daily activities of the school and its Teaching and Learning Programmes.
Connections
Dance provides a framework to provoke deep thinking, discussion, and expression about culture, identity, and society. This in turn creates a bridge between Dance and other disciplines and contexts. For example, expressing viewpoints through Dance education can connect to community outreach, social action, history, religious studies, ethics, and media studies.
Learning Pathway
The Arts are unique vehicles and forums for making connections between the self and the world, communities, ideas, practices, and responses.
In Dance, learners explore and acquire transferable knowledge, skills and dispositions. This is a holistic process not limited to physicality and movement. These transferable attributes include:
- cognition and critical thinking
- working effectively individually and collaborating in teams
- creative and problem-solving abilities
- self-confidence and resilience
- recognising and respecting diverse viewpoints
- valuing others' skills, cultures, and contexts.
Introduction to Sample Course Outlines
Sample Course Outlines are being produced to help teachers and schools understand the new NCEA Learning Matrix and Achievement Standards. Examples of how a year-long Dance course could be constructed using the new Learning Matrix and Achievement Standards are provided here. They are indicative only and do not mandate any particular context or approach.
More detailed sample Teaching and Learning Programmes will be developed during piloting.
Assessment Matrix
Conditions of Assessment for internally assessed standards
This section provides guidelines for assessment against internally assessed Standards. Guidance is provided on:
- appropriate ways of, and conditions for, gathering evidence
- ensuring that evidence is authentic
- any other relevant advice specific to an Achievement Standard.
NB: Information on additional generic guidance on assessment practice in schools is published on the NZQA website. It would be useful to read in conjunction with these Conditions of Assessment.
The school's Assessment Policy and Conditions of Assessment must be consistent with the Assessment Rules for Schools With Consent to Assess. These rules will be updated during the NCEA review. This link includes guidance for managing internal moderation and the collection of evidence.
For all Achievement Standards
Internal assessment provides considerable flexibility in the collection of evidence. Evidence can be collected in different ways to suit a range of teaching and learning styles, and a range of contexts. Care needs to be taken to offer students opportunities to present their best evidence against the Standard(s) that are free from unnecessary constraints.
It is recommended that the design of assessment reflects and reinforces the ways students have been learning. Collection of evidence for the internally assessed Standards could include, but is not restricted to, an extended task, an investigation, digital evidence (such as recorded interviews, blogs, photographs or film), or a portfolio of evidence.
It is also recommended that the collection of evidence for internally assessed Standards should not use the same method that is used for any external Standards in a course, particularly if that method is using a time-bound written examination. This could unfairly disadvantage students who do not perform well under these conditions.
A separate assessment event is not needed for each Standard. Often assessment can be integrated into one activity that collects evidence towards two or three different Standards from a programme of learning. Evidence can also be collected over time from a range of linked activities (for example, in a portfolio). This approach can also ease the assessment workload for both students and teachers.
Effective assessment should suit the nature of the learning being assessed, provide opportunities to meet the diverse needs of all students, and be valid and fair.
Authenticity of student evidence needs to be assured regardless of the method of collecting evidence. This needs to be in line with school policy. For example: an investigation carried out over several sessions could include teacher observations or the use of milestones such as a meeting with the student, a journal, or photographic entries recording progress etc.
Collection of evidence:
- The final grade will be based on the overall weight of evidence across two sequences.
- As such, the student must compose a minimum of two dance sequences, each with a different brief. Where manageable, students may compose additional dance sequences to allow for re-assessment opportunities.
- The briefs are to be provided by the teacher.
- Each dance sequence should be at least 45 seconds in length.
- Accompaniment may be music, sound, or silence.
- Students can work on this both in and outside of class time. This activity requires an ongoing collection of evidence across a variety of learning opportunities.
- The video recording will capture the dancer(s) in the space without camera movement.
- There is no requirement for an audience to be present during the assessment of the dance sequences.
- The sequences may be presented and assessed at different times in the year, or at a single assessment presentation of all composed sequences. If it is a single assessment presentation of both sequences, students should have had a variety of learning opportunities before assessment.
- Assessment against this achievement standard should occur at a live showing of each composed sequence. A recording of the composed sequences can be used to confirm assessment judgements.
- The composition may be for a solo, duet, or small group. The student may perform in their own compositions.
- Students may work collaboratively to compose dance sequences. Teachers need to see evidence of the students contributing to the composition.
- The focus of the assessment is the composition of each sequence, not its performance. However, the student needs to be aware that the judgement of their composition is assisted by the clarity and preciseness of its performance ie compositions are rehearsed pieces of work.
Ensuring authenticity of evidence:
- An attestation is to be submitted which confirms that the work is the student’s.
- Gathering evidence over time for this assessment will ensure that the assessment is authentic and valid.
Any other relevant advice for this assessment:
- A choreographic intention, in either written or oral form, may be presented to support assessor judgement, but is not a requirement.
- This assessment could be completed in conjunction with the Internal Achievement Standard 1.2 Perform dance sequences.
- This assessment could be completed in conjunction with the External Achievement Standard 1.4 1.4 Demonstrate understanding of, and explore, the elements of dance.
Teachers should ensure the outcome is appropriate for Level 6 of the New Zealand Curriculum.
Collection of evidence:
- The final grade will be based on the overall weight of evidence across two sequences.
- Students can work on this both in and outside of class time.
- The sequences may be presented and assessed at different times in the year, or at a single assessment presentation of all sequences. If it is a single assessment presentation of both sequences, students should have had a variety of learning opportunities before assessment.
- Students should be assessed live but will be recorded for moderation and authenticity purposes.
- The video recording will capture the dancer(s) in the space without camera movement.
- The dance sequence may be choreographed by the teacher, or a guest choreographer, and may be a collaboration with students.
- Performance length should be at least 45 seconds.
- The dance sequence should include sufficient range of movement to allow learners to demonstrate ability at all levels of achievement.
- Sufficient range of movement will include multiple changes of body parts, levels, directions, body bases, energy qualities, locomotor, and non-locomotor movement.
- Students should avoid performing in socks due to slip potential affecting size of movement, weight transfer, and confidence.
- There is no requirement for an audience to be present during the performance.
- The focus for assessment against this standard is on the performance of the individual. However, students can use a duet or group performance for this assessment.
- A group performance will enable students to demonstrate ensemble skills (as per unpacking the standard).
- A duet performance will enable students to demonstrate partnering skills.
Ensuring authenticity of evidence:
- Students should be clearly identifiable in their performances.
- Students will be assessed live.
Any other relevant advice for this assessment:
- This assessment could be completed in conjunction with the Internal Achievement Standard 1.1 Compose dance sequences through exploring whakawhanaungatanga.
- This assessment could be completed in conjunction with the External Achievement Standard 1.3 Demonstrate understanding of key features of a dance genre or style.
- This assessment could be completed in conjunction with the External Achievement Standard 1.4 Demonstrate understanding of, and explore, the elements of dance.
Teachers should ensure the outcome is appropriate for Level 6 of the New Zealand Curriculum.