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Assessment show

In our assessment show today we performed our contemporary phrase that we’ve been working on. I think that my performance went quite well and I think that a strength  for me was that I worked with the music and kept the timing well. To improve on my performance I could’ve worked on the directions a bit more. My target for my next performance is to ensure that I am confident with the movement. However, from reflecting and reading my padlets back I have noticed how much my stamina and my energy levels have improved. When we first learnt this phrase I was so tired at the end that I ended up making the material sloppy but now I am able to execute the movement properly.

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Today in contemporary we started with our normal warm up. We then went on to do our shifting weight cartwheel exercise. My feedback was too try and control the recovery. We then went to do our warm up jumps exercise and my feedback was too relax my arms. When I realized that I was tensing my arms I immediately correct myself and relaxed them so this has showed me that sometimes I need to remind myself to relax if there’s no need to hold them.

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In contemporary today we started with our crayon exploration warm up. I really feel like I’ve improved in my improvisation skills since starting this as I have now started to use dynamics and space a lot more then I used too. I think that the fluidity of my movement was a strength for me during my exploration. We then went on to do our hand stand exercise and I would like this to be my target for the next couple of weeks as I would like to build more strength in my arms so I can hold myself up. I also think that my strength in my arms was a weakness for me today as I couldn't execute the end of the cartwheel properly. In the floor travelling exercise that we did today I did feel a lot more grounded which I was pleased with but I would like to work on my travelling skills as I need to use the space and travel further. We then went on to focus on the phrases that we have been working on over the last couple of weeks but mainly focused on the timing and I felt like this helped me execute my movement a lot more.

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Today we started with our usual warm up. I feel like my agility has improved since we’ve started doing these excercises that focus on stamina and agility.  I feel that my agility for me was a strength today. Today we started our first year contemporary piece for OVDC. We used the phrases that we have been creating and working on over the last couple of weeks. The material is very energetic and fun to dance so I am enjoying watching the piece come together. The song that we are using is Hero’s by the Foofighters for this piece. I feel like my performance when I am dancing is getting better as we continue dancing the material but I would as like this too improve a lot before the performance. A target of mine that I would also like to work on is my confidence and I think this will also help my performance so I am going to start working on this by going over material. I feel that a weakness for me today was my use of breath and I need to continue to think about this while dancing.

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Today we spent a lot of time reflecting throughout the session as we usually do but today we wrote down our reflections on the dance feedback wall. I found this very helpful as I could keep looking back at it and reminding myself what I need to work on. During our floor swings exercise today we focused mainly on breath and I found that my fluidity through the movements improved a lot as I thought about it so this was a strength for me in today’s session. I think that because I focused on my suspension and my extension today that I did these well. A target that I would like to keep working on is staying low while travelling as this was one of the difficulties I faced today. Also I noticed today that a weakness of mine is that I am not lunging correctly as I am too high so I need to get lower in my lunges.

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Our dance feedback wall for today’s session.

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Today a weakness of mine was that I felt very unengerised but I tried to push through it however, I think that this affected me demonstrating good technique as I was arching my back a lot and not holding myself properly, even though I thought I was. However, as it came to the end of the lesson when we were focusing on our phrase I felt that I started to manage myself better and I pushed through and tried my hardest to execute the choreography right. We relearnt the piece in sections and this made me feel a lot better about the choreography as I felt I reminded myself and knew it alot  better. Although it was not the best I had danced today I really felt like a strength of mine was that my focus had improved when performing and my energy levels were good when doing it section by section. In section one of the piece I felt like I performed the choreography very accurately and especially in the first move where our left hand is on our shoulder and our right arm is straight and they both circle backwards I think I showed confidence as I did not hold back. The 3rd section for me was the hardest and I am aware that I will have to practise this section and try and maintain the accuracy of the movement. When we put all of the material together I noticed that my target is I have to work on my stamina as my movement seemed to get sloppy coming up to the end of the phrase as I was tired and I seemed to throw away movements. Overall I think that I demonstrated basic contemporary technique okay throughout the lesson but at this level I would like to improve the standard a lot.

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We were unable to have our contemporary session yesterday as we were in London but today we visted Laban Contemporary school in London and did a contemporary technique class and creative class there. I felt like these classes were really benieficial and I feel like I have learnt a lot. In our technique class we did a lot of excercises that were very similar to what we normally do but a little harder. I’m going to try and retain some of the excercises that I learnt so that I can keep practising them to build on me technique. In our creative class we spent a lot of time on suspension and the idea of catching and falling. I really feel like a strength of mine today was that I pushed my self out of my comfort zone, which in result made me dance better, but my target is  to ensure that I work on not to be scared of falling. We then worked with partners to create a sequence with contact still working on the concept of falling and catching. I worked with Chloe Harrison and I felt like she was very creative when coming up with ideas so she has also taught me to have an open mind. Chloe’s feedback to me was that my weakness is that I need to make sure I am giving weight because although sometimes I feel like I am giving her all my weight I need to give more.

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Assessment week
Last contemporary class of the term
I felt like I had a really good class today and that I really pushed myself. I made sure I caught up on the additional material for the phrase and this really helped in the class. My execution of the movement was a strength for me today as I felt confident while dancing it. I felt more confident in what I was doing today and I really feel like I’ve improved a lot with my contemporary technique since starting in September. Direction is still something I need to work on as a target however it is improving the more I think about it. Considering I my first ever contemporary class was 13 weeks ago today I feel very happy with my progress but I would just like to continue pushing myself especially in contemporary and trying my hardest to improve everyday. I have really enjoyed learning about contemporary and I find it very interesting but there is still a lot to learn about and I’m very excited to go into next term.

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In today’s session a weakness of mine was that I really struggled with direction so this is definitley going to be one of my main target throughout all of my classes from now on. I am going to ensure I go through all of the excercises to show that I know the phrases so that I can do them confident and individually rather then following other people. I am really enjoying having the extra time in the contemporary lessons and I feel like this is really beneficial for me as we’re going through steps in more detail. We spent a lot of time on jumps today and safely landing them. I feel like a strength for me was that my knees are quite strong and my jumps are usually supported, when I think about them, so I am going to continue thinking about my jumps across all classes now. I’m also going to do some more research on how to improve my knee strength and I’m going to carry out the excercises.

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6 Exercises that Will Teach you How to Strengthen Knees

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Page 1 | Don't let bad knees ruin your leg workout. Try these 6 exercises and stretches to decrease knee pain and ultimately increase muscle growth.

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I feel like with every lesson my confidence is building more and more in contemporary. Personally I think there has been a big improvement from the first class we did and now I feel like I move more freely and more comfortably. I would like this to continue improving but I feel like it is quite naturally anyway every week.I think that a strength for me today was that I was able to take risks in my exploration. I think a weakness for me today was my use of dynamic range. My target from today’s class is that I would like to improve in a lot more is the exercises. I need to make sure that they are strong and that I completely know what I’m doing so I am going to try and improve this by going through the exercises with my peers outside of classes in my independent study time.

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In contemporary today we had an extended lesson so we could go through the excercises in a lot more detail. I feel like a strength for me was that i know understand the movement a lot more. However, a weakness of mine is that I am struggling with my timing which is something i didnt realise before todays session. The more we went through the material the more i understood it but i still think that timing and breathing will be my targets for improvement this term.

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Today I mainly focused on my alignment in class as this is something I wanted to work on from the last lesson. I feel like my alignment is improving the more I focus on it and I think that this was a strength for me today. I also noticed that a weakness of mine today was that I need to relax more in some elements of contemporary as I do not move as freely as I should. My target  is to feel more comfortable at the start of the class when we do the improv movement and not worry to much about how I look as I think the dancers who don’t worry about how they look during improv look a lot better.

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I have used this picture of toast to remind myself of the metaphor that we used in class today to correct our alignment at the side. The metaphor is that when turned out in first or second we should be flat like a slice of bread, and I feel like this as really helped me understand my alignment throughout the excercise but it also helped me throughout the class. I think my travelling has improved a lot as today in class I noticed I was travelling a lot further then usual so I would say this was my strength in today’s session. However, I need to keep building on this so it is also my target. A weakness  that I noticed today that I was arching my back a lot in certain postitions and I need to correct this and think about it a lot more during classes. My overall target for my next contemporary class is that I would like to improve on my posture but my target overall for all classes is to feel the music more.

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I think that a strength for me today was that I'm starting to feel the music more while I am dancing. However, this is also something I would like to carry on focusing on this as one of my targets as I think it would noticeably allow me to improve my performance and dancing. A weakness for me today was that I didn’t feel as confident.

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Today we had a contemporary lesson with Craig and I learnt a lot about the pelvic floor muscles and some excercises to strengthen it. My target is to strengthen my pelvic floor over the course and in result it should improve my dancing and my balance.