No more procrastination!

Hi All!

I am very pleased that i have been able to finish a piece of written work that i have just sent to Alan for some feedback. After a lot of procrastinating on this piece I now feel very motivated to get the rest of it done.

Looking at the slide show on Paula's blog about the 3rd campus session has really helped focus my ideas and I now know how to structure the inquiry. If you haven't seen it yet i would take a look, very helpful:

http://paulanottingham.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/campus-session-3-slides-for-module-3.html


On another note ... I am thinking about writing a journalistic article to be published in a dance magazine (eg. dancing times, dance europe) aiming at young professional performers about how they can start and the process it takes to become a choreographer with useful hints and tips.

What do you think?

Em

Writers Block

I am currently experiencing writers block …

I think I am trying to tackle too many things at once, which isn’t helping. I really need to think about the order in which I need to complete tasks (set by myself). I also realised that I haven’t been planning any of my written work I have just sat down and started writing with no real idea of where my writing is going. I used to love planning and creating spider diagrams of all the things I wanted to include then figure out a logical order to put them in, it really helped to structure my work. So I have answered my own problem:

1)    Write out an order of the tasks I need to tackle

2)    Plan the piece or writing

3)    Write out the piece

Jacob posted about the plans to incorporate skype in to the campus sessions in his post entitled "Link Tank". I am very excited to try this for the next campus session on the 13^th March as I feel I have missed out on a lot by not being able to attend. I hope there will be some discussion on ethics and literature reviews as those are the two areas I am having trouble with.

What do you think about the use of skype in the campus sessions? It would be nice to hear some of your thoughts.

Em 

So far so good ...

I completed my second interview a couple of weeks ago. I think it went well and I did gain more information and insight from it. However, I had family cruising at the time so I was slightly distracted. I think i could have been a bit more thorough but for the most part it was helpful towards my inquiry.

I am still waiting on my 3rd interviewee to get back to me but in the mean time am writing out my literature reviews. I found it hard initially as my inquiry topic is about opinions and experiences rather than facts and figures. However, after Skyping with Alan, I realised it is ok for me to research well known choreographers and see how they made the transition. With the limited literature I found,with snippets of biographies and newspaper reports, I could connect the dots and make some educated guesses on how they made the transition using the information I have from my interviewees.

From there I can start sending Alan some of my work to get some feedback.

I hope every one else is going strong with their inquiry.

Em x

So far so good ...

I completed my second interview a couple of weeks ago. I think it went well and I did gain more information and insight from it. However, I had family cruising at the time so I was slightly distracted. I think i could have been a bit more thorough but for the most part it was helpful towards my inquiry.

I am still waiting on my 3rd interviewee to get back to me but in the mean time am writing out my literature reviews. I found it hard initially as my inquiry topic is about opinions and experiences rather than facts and figures. However, after Skyping with Alan, I realised it is ok for me to research well known choreographers and see how they made the transition. With the limited literature I found,with snippets of biographies and newspaper reports, I could connect the dots and make some educated guesses on how they made the transition using the information I have from my interviewees.

From there I can start sending Alan some of my work to get some feedback.

I hope every one else is going strong with their inquiry.

Em x

Rereading the Ethics Handbook

So if I didn’t understand 99% of this hand book reading it for the fist time, I still don’t understand 97% rereading it.

I managed to get a few useful points that I should think about whilst researching and putting my inquiry together. However, for the most part this didn’t help me.

Does anyone have any suggestions of other sources and literature I could read on ethics that may be more comprehensible?

Thanks

Em 

Interviews

I had my first interview last week and it went really well!
I found an application that attaches to Skype so you can record your call and it saves it as a .mov file. This was so helpful!

Hopefully I will have my second interview on wednesday and it will be just as successful. My third one is going to be different as it is difficult for me to arrange a time to call my interviewee, so I have emailed her the questions and she is going to email me the answers back. I think this will be interesting as I will be able to compare the spoken interview to the written interview and see the positives and negatives of each!

Em :)

Interview Questions

Hi all!

I haven't blogged in a long time due to lots of things going on with work contracts. However, I am back now and ready to get my artifact on the go!

The fist thing on my to do list was to work out questions for my interview. I have chosen to interview 3 choreographers on how they transitioned from performers to choreographers. I did this and sent it to alan, with some improvements, these are the question/question topicsIi came up with:

Interview Question Topics

1)    What sparked your interest in choreography?

a)     What attracts you to choreography? e.g. the creative activity? Collaborating with choreographers? The freedom? Other reasons?     

b)    Did you study choreography whilst in formal training?

c)     Did your dance training impact you choreography or your self image as a choreographer?

2)    What was your first professional job as a choreographer?

a)     Where were you working?

b)    Who for?

c)     Did you already know them?

d)    What prior experience did you have? eg. Amateur or unpaid work?

e)     How did you feel about the job?

i)               Going in to it?

ii)             The outcome?

iii)            Was it in you preferred style?

f)     How did you gain the job?

g)     Where/how did you find out about it?

3)    Can you explain what motivated you to make the transition from performer choreographer?

-       Tell me about your experiences along the path from your initial decision to make choreography your career to the point you feel you became an established choreographer in the dance community.

a)     Why did you choose these paths? Were they the only option for you?

b)    In hind sight, with the knowledge you now have, would you have chosen a different rout to take?

c)     Which moment do you feel were your key turning points?

4)    What attributes do you think helped you to get where you are as a choreographer?

- Attributes: personal qualities, such as perseverance through the highs and lows.

a)     To make the transition from performer to choreographer?

b)    To gain work?

c)     To network?

d)    To choreograph?

5)    Do you still perform?

a)     Why did you make this decision/why not?

b)    Which do you prefer, performing or choreographing? Why?

c)     Do you choreograph on yourself or do you prefer to perform others works?

d)     If still performing: Do you think you will continue to perform for as long as you can physically?

If not: would you consider performing again?

e)  What is the impact of your continued dance practice on your choreography? And vice versa?

6)    Where do/did you find job opportunities as a choreographer?

a)     Is there a website that has job listings like ones for performing auditions?

b)    Was networking your primary tool?

c)     How did you start your network?

7)    Is there any advice you would give to performers aspiring to become choreographers?

            

Let me know what you think :)