Project name: Accelerated Motion: Towards a New Dance Literacy in America
Project lead: Led by Dan Schnaidt, Academic Computing Manager for the Arts and Humanities, Wesleyan University. (Initial lead: Michael Roy)
Key collaborators:
Wesleyan Staff:
- Suzanna Tamminen, Wesleyan University Press
- Dan Schnaidt, ITS
- Anne Loyer, Wesleyan, ITS
- Phil Isaacs, ITS
Faculty Leads
- Ann Cooper Albright, Professor of Dance, Oberlin College
- Ann Dils, Associate Professor of Dance, University of North Carolina at Greensboro
Wesleyan Faculty
- Liza McAlister, Wesleyan, Religion
- Laura Grabel, Wesleyan, Biology
- Mark Slobin, Wesleyan, Music
- Katja Kolcio, Wesleyan, Dance
- Pedro Alejandro, Wesleyan, Dance
Summary: Accelerated Motion has two multifaceted features: First, fifteen teaching modules designed by dance scholars, focused thematically, with applications to courses in dance, American studies, popular culture and other humanities. Second, an interactive on-line environment where students, scholars, teachers, and practicing artists will connect with others beyond their institutions, allowing them to conduct moderated discussions and to share resources for teaching dance studies.
Accelerated Motion will be designed for teachers of dance studies and history survey courses and humanities teachers who wish to incorporate dance into their curricula. It will offer teachers and students primary text documents, images, and audio; an annotated guide to relevant websites; guides for analyzing primary dance sources with interactive exercises; model teaching assignments; sample syllabi; and moderated discussions about teaching dance history.
Intended outcomes:
Accelerated Motion will have significant impacts on the participating institutions and the liberal arts community. Specifically, it will:
- Encourage an integrated, multi-media approach to the teaching of dance and the incorporation of dance studies into a wide variety of settings.
- Be an important resource and interactive environment for critical discussion for the whole academic dance community.
- Serve as a model for online teaching practices in the humanities, particularly those areas (film, theater, American studies, African American studies, history, classics) that could benefit from the classroom integration of technology and multimedia.
- Impact teaching and learning in dance history in the humanities across multiple NITLE schools and at colleges and universities around the country.
We believe Accelerated Motion will assist educators and students in realizing at least three learning goals:
- Improve critical thinking skills by promoting analysis of the representation and social movement of varied people through dance;
- Increase understanding of the resources and practices of the intellectual traditions of dance;
- Increase skills in descriptive and analytic writing.
Project timeline:
Spring 07
- outreach to other NITLE schools
- kick-off with lead faculty, Wesleyan faculty, faculty from participating schools
- design/program first online module
- write accompanying texts
- copyright research
- video production/post-production
Summer 07
- website design/programming
- write site text
- design/program five more modules
Fall 07 - Spring 08
- Roll-out website with six modules for use in curriculum at participating schools
- Develop assessment plans
- Present at conference
- Build community of teachers around website and modules
