Posts Tagged ‘Erma Colvin’

h1

Focus on the Process

April 20, 2016

Teachers as learners

Thanks to dancer Erma Colvin who provided this blog post.

IMG_0318In today’s world so much focus is put on the final product as opposed to the process. Dance schools now go to dance competitions. All sports are rated by how well they do in competition. Schools are rated by the standardized tests their students take.  There seems to be a competition for almost every thing we do in life.

For the past decade, I have had the amazing opportunity to work with middle school students at the Camden-Rockport Middle School in Camden. I do not know who has learned more from this experience, the students or myself. Yet again, the final product is of utmost importance. We work tirelessly for three months to produce 3 performances of an exceptional musical. So, for me, the process has become equally as important as the final product. My partner in crime, Dan O’Connell, the most dedicated parent volunteer I have ever met, spent every Saturday putting together the materials that the tech kids would need during the following week to construct the set. Incidentally, his middle school daughter is now a freshman in college.

IMG_0319The photos included are of Ursula, the sea witch in “The Little Mermaid Jr.”. The director, Allysa Anderson came up with the concept. I developed the plan, and the schematics. Students put in their thoughts to complete the project. The Ursula character consisted of a box 30 inches square and 6 ft. high. It was on wheels. The person playing Ursula stood on a platform inside the box. The eight tentacles were attached to the box on all four sides and were operated by 8 students dressed fully in black. Three tech crew moved the box from the back.

After I gave Dan the dimensions of the box, he carefully cut out all the pieces and labelled them as a kit. It would have been much faster for him to just build the box, then and there. However, that was not the goal of our tech crew program. The following week, we met with the tech kids for our two hour sessions on Tuesdays and Thursdays.  There is nothing more exciting than seeing a middle school student, boy or girl, with a portable drill in their hand. Every week, they eagerly awaited their assignments and put together the pieces that Dan and I had made on the previous Saturday. The process of seeing their creation come to life on stage will never be forgotten. I watched them as they created the tentacles by adding purple glitter after I had cut and sewn all eight. They were thrilled to paint the box black and fought over who were going to be the Ursula handlers.

2016 mermaid shannon

Photo taken by Ellen Curtis

The role of a middle school tech adviser is unique. The students are old enough to be creative, to design sets, costumes and props, like King Triton’s crown that I left totally to three 6th graders and it was exquisite. They are physically capable of sawing, drilling, sewing and painting. The final product is so important but I cherish the long hours we spend with the kids in the old, decrepit MET basement section of CRMS, our home. There, the magic of the process takes place.

Posted in Creativity, Food for thought | Tagged , , , | Leave a Comment »

h1

Thunderbolt

November 24, 2013

The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County

puzzled play 6The Camden-Rockport Middle School, under the direction of Ellen Curtis, presented “The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County”.  One of the characters in the play is Thunderbolt, an old but impressive horse. In pre-production talks, the tech director, Erma Colvin showed the director footage from “Warhorse” on Broadway. “Warhorse” is a play about the horses used in World War I. The horses were portrayed by life-size puppets, the creation of Adrian Kohler and Basil Jones,  founders of the Handspring Puppet Company of South Africa. Ellen Curtis suggested that the CRMS tech crew make a life-size puppet modeled after Joey from “Warhorse”. After thinking that was impossible, they both agreed, “Why not!”

thunderbolt 2The creation of Thunderbolt began with chicken wire and flexible plumbing tubing, The CRMS Tech crew made the head out of paper mache and designed the moving tail mechanism. They then became the puppeteers. One student was the horse wrangler. Having had horse experience, she taught the puppeteers to do the proper horse gait ( created with coconut shells, of course) and designed the halter for Thunderbolt to wear. The horse puppet is controlled by two people in the body, moving the front legs, back legs and the tail, and one person outside the body controlling the head.

Thunderbolt was a huge success. Besides from his appearance in “Jumping Frog”, Thunderbolt has made guest appearances at the Owl’s Head Transportation Museum, the Camden Mini-Maker Faire and this fall’s National Hispanic Heritage Month Celebration at CRMS.

thunderbolt mini maker fair

Posted in Community, Creativity, Curriculum and Instruction, Dance, Theater, Visual Arts | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

h1

Dance! CRMS

November 17, 2013

Camden-Rockport Middle School Dance and Social Studies

cumbia 2013National Hispanic Heritage Month is celebrated from September 15 to October 15 in the United States. It celebrates the Latino citizens of the United States and where they came from.  The Camden-Rockport Middle School holds an assembly in mid-October for this celebration.

Under the auspices of a Bisbee Grant, Erma Colvin, a Maine-based dance educator works with all the 8th Grade Spanish students in teaching them dances from Hispanic countries. They spend three weeks in the fall preparing for a school-wide assembly. This year dances from Columbia, Mexico, Spain and Argentina were taught.

Part of the grant stipulated that the dances be taught in Spanish. This was accomplished with the help of Aaron Henderson, the 8th Grade Spanish teacher at CRMS and Nohora Estes, a native Spanish speaker who teaches Spanish at the Riley School in Glen Cove. She worked with Erma and Aaron on dance vocabulary to teach the students. Participation in the dances was part of the students grade requirement. Authentic costumes were created. The CRMS Tech Club provided technical assistance in setting up the performance space.

Thank you to Erma Colvin for providing this post.

tango 2013

Posted in Curriculum and Instruction, Dance | Tagged , , , | Leave a Comment »

h1

Dancin’ at Camden-Rockport Middle School

October 19, 2011

Erma teaches dance

80s- Dances of the Decades

I am a dance educator at Camden –Rockport Middle School in Camden, Maine. I have a BFA in dance performance. My dance journey has taken me from the love of performing, to the love of teaching dance to middle school students as a part of their academic studies. It has been a rewarding journey. Seven years ago I took a job as a substitute teacher with the ulterior motive of learning the academic curriculum, getting to know the teachers, and seeing where I could insert my dance training and knowledge into the school day.

No Child Left Behind and the “teaching to the test” have made my quest more of a challenge. My personal mission statement:

All children should feel comfortable with their bodies and enjoy expressing themselves through movement and dance.

This is most evident in the middle school population. The pre-teen years are a time of discovery and change, physically and mentally. For most students (particularly the boys) dance is tied to social events and all of the insecurities there in. I want all of the students to discover that dance is an individual activity that helps one develop self-esteem and just feel good inside.

La Cucaracha

Working with the 6th Grade Social Studies teacher, I developed a dance component for his academic unit called “Late 20th Century”.  Through dance, the students became a part of those decades. My success with that program is documented through 100% attendance during the residency week and the continuing mention of the event through high school. We are now in our 7th year. The new 6th graders are already asking me about the dances that will not take place for another 8 months.

This year, I collaborated with the 8th grade Spanish teacher to celebrate the National Hispanic Heritage Month. I was concerned that the 8th Graders would be more self-conscious than the 6th graders. I was pleasantly mistaken. All of the students were eager to get involved. I taught traditional dances from Hispanic countries in Latin America and the Caribbean. The 8th grade Spanish teacher gave the students Spanish vocabulary and we taught the dance classes in Spanish (as best as I could, not having a Spanish language background). Students also researched the different dances and created a slide show to accompany the dances.

Erma at the state-wide arts coference, At the Creative Center, the Arts in Maine Schools in 2007

There are many different ideas of how dance should be taught in public schools. Dance can be taught through the Performing Arts program, Physical Education and integrated into the academic curriculum. My interest is in the third choice. Learning dance through the academic curriculum has benefits. It does not take away from the precious academic time. It introduces dance to the entire student body. It connects students to real people in other cultures and time periods. It brings classes of students together to work on a group project. Dance is an integral part of the human experience. I hope students will keep these experiences in their memories for years to come.

Thanks to Erma for contributing this great post!

Posted in Curriculum and Instruction, Dance, Integration, Music | Tagged | 2 Comments »