Sources of information

This task really got me thinking, what are my sources of information? It got me thinking am I taking for granted how easy I have it to access some of the information that I need.
So after long deliberation my 5 sources of information are;

Internet
I thought I'd start with the most obvious of sources. Could you imagine life without the internet, well i certainly would not be blogging now if that was the case. The internet plays a big role in my life. I remember when I changed internet provider, I had no internet for 3 days whilst the change over was made. Well I can honestly say I thought my arms and legs had been cut off, I didn't know what to do with myself or my time. The internet is a brilliant way of keeping update with information and keeping in touch with people. The internet keeps me updated with information, ideas, music, e-mail's, events and jobs. Through the internet i use websites such as Facebook, Dancers pro,You Tube, Star Now and The stage to keep me in the loop and see whats out there in the big world of performing arts. Although Facebook is brilliant for keeping in touch with friends, it also allows me to be part of groups and events which can lead to work.
I also dont know where I would be without Google. Google is like my best friend, if i ever need help, Google is there for me. I use Google for research of plays, directors, choreographers, producers its also brilliant for directions and maps.
After reading Jessica Hunt's blog, I realised I also use the Internet for music, whether its buying or downloading. I had never thought of this as I always use I-tunes and i had never thought of this as the internet, just as the place where I get my music from.

Blackberry/ I-pod Touch
I am very anti touch screen phones, so I have a Blackberry as my phone an Ipod touch for my music. I use both for the internet. They both have easy access to the internet, sometimes one is faster than the other. They are great for getting back to people, as all y e-mails come straight to my phone. Before i had my smartphone I missed out many of time on jobs as I hadn't been on my laptop to check my e-mails. I feel since having my smartphone I am more update with whats going on the Dance world and feel I have   had more opportunities open up for me.
I also use my Blackberry for video and recording my work. I teach 16 different classes a week i find it hard to remember what I did or where we got up to, so I am always recording the end of my classes to help me with this problem. Sometimes an idea just pops into my head and I have to record it there and then and then when I have the time I'll look back at my idea and then adapt it for my lessons. I also love to look back at what i choreographed and see if it works and ask others what they think.

Talking to people
Although the internet is brilliant. I dont think you can beat a good old chat with someone. The majority of my friends are in the business. We are always talking about auditions, castings and jobs that are around. In this business you can get people that dont like to share or dont like helping someone out. But I am a great believer in things definitely happen for a reason. I love talking to people and asking there opinion. As Jessica Hunt said in her blog "If we cooperate with each other, in sharing information about auditions, offering accommodation, etc, in turn we can each gain beneficially from the situation."




Colleagues
As I teach in primary/secondary and private dance schools, I have different types of colleagues. In the dance school I teach at I interact with other teachers like me that have been to Performing Arts college and are still auditioning or want to go into more teaching. We share ideas and help each other with any problems we have within the school or general teaching.  At the primary and secondary schools i teach at, I have more of a formal relationship with my colleagues. I tend to fill inferior around them. This is something I feel this course will help to overcome and become more confident in my teaching.


Agent
Where would I be without my agent? Properly working in Burger King (although there is nothing wrong with working in Burger King)
When I left college my agent was my life line and got me many auditions and from the auditions I have had many contracts. As well as getting me auditions, she gives me feedback when she can and also guides me to courses/ workshops that might help me in my career. My agent has guided me to new adventures that i never thought I would be able to do. My agent has opened many doors for me. Although my agent only gets me closed auditions she often informs me of open auditions too, I know some people prefer one or the other  (open or closed auditions). I actually dont mind either, I try to make to best out of every situation. I always think it could be worse there could be another 50 people here or i'm lucky that I actually got the audition. 


So there they are my 5 main sources of information. Whilst writing this i have realised that I make more of an effort in easy situations and sit back where im less comfortable. So this is something I am going to try and work on, push my self in less comfortable situations.

Reflective writing

Looking back over my journal I have decided to pick thursday the 25th of November as the day to the my reflective writing task on. Thursdays are my busiest days and this thursday stood out from the others. 

I woke up nice and early as i knew it was going to be a hectic day. One of the secondary schools I teach at had the dress rehearsal for their dance showcase today, but I had 3 classes to teach before I even got to that school. 

My first class is called Musical dots, its a class for 18 month olds- 3yrs, The child's parents/ grandparents or carers come in with them and join in, its a class for the adult to bond with the child through music, story telling, singing and movement. I am always nervous before this lesson as every week can be different, depending on the children and todays class was no different from most weeks. One child in particular loves joining in for about 20mins and after that they get very distracted. The child's mother seems distracted today, her phone rings and she leaves the lesson for about 10 mins and didn't really join in much when she come back in. After the lesson all the children have a juice together and the parents had a chat. I spoke to this parent today, I said that her child seems a bit distracted and maybe getting the cd and practice together at home might help, and she said she’s extremely busy and is being made redundant and is very worried and stressed. (which explains everything). I explained the children pick up on stress and maybe even just spending 5-10 mins a day singing a couple of songs together might relax the child, she agreed with me. I find as soon as one child doesn't want to join then the rest soon follow. I have to think quick and the lesson back on track.  This lesson is very structured as i feel this works for younger children.I worry that the parents will think i cant control the children if they dont join in.  I have show cards with pictures on for each exercise/ song that we do. I show the children the card and the older ones tell me whats on the card and so they know what exercise/song we are going to do next. Although this lesson is only 45 minutes long, I find this the most tiring class i teach as I have to keep my energy levels up at all times. 

Another view;

Its so cold outside, wish mum wasn't making me go out. Its so boring being in the car all i want to do is be at home and play with my toys. Mum has the same cd playing on the car, she keeps telling me to sing along, but she doesn’t so im not too. We get to dance school, I see Nikki she’s with Jay he’s crying again. Shannon is here we start playing, mums on the phone again, i love playing hide and seek. Nikki calls us in, Me and shannon run to the studio, mum shouts as me for running. We start with the dingle dangle scarecrow my favourite, Mum never lays down with me all the other adults lay down. I love singing in musical Dots, Nikki tells me she loves my singing. Mums phone goes off again she leaves the room, so i now have no one to sing and dance with so im not going to join in anymore. i dont want to be Nikki’s partner i want to be mummys partner. Nikki says if im good i’ll get a special sticker, so i start dancing with nikki. Jay starts crying again, where’s my mum? ooo its raining outside, i wonder what i’ll play with when i get home. Mum comes back in. I want to go home now i think mum does too. Mum makes me do the last few exercises. we stay for a juice after. Me and shannon play hide and seek again. Why is mummy hugging Nikki.

I then have a hour and a half drive to cambridge for my next classes. On my drive I always planning ahead, But today I had a thought. Maybe the reason why some of the children loose focus is because they know whats coming. So I came up a plan for next weeks lesson of Musical dots. If i lay they cards on the floor in the middle of the circle at the beginning  and let each child pick a card each and then that would be what we did that lesson and just go round in a circle so it was all in a different order but still the same exercise’s and then that would be each individual child exercise for that week. 

I then arrived at my next school where I teach sixth form p.e lessons. In the 2 classes i teach here today we have been working on a piece of choreography, they have all had to come up with a individual character. I am always worried when asking them to come up with ideas as i dont want them to think i’m being lazy. In the previous weeks I have asked them to write diary entry’s when something happened in their daily life and then write about it as if they were there characters and how there characters would have delt with the situations differently to them. I really wanted them to know there characters. Today, they had to read out one of there entry’s starting how they dealt with the situation and then how there characters would of dealt with it. I then put them into pairs, I had set them 2 counts of 8 and from there i wanted them to adapt and add on to this chreogprahy, in their pairs, using the the thought of how would this two characters interact with each other. Both of these classes went really well and had some fantastic feedback from another teacher. Both of these classes could of gone tragically bad if none of the students had done what i had asked them to do at home. I find sometimes it can be dangerous to put classes into pairs, as you never who’s friends with who (as this clearly changes every week). There is normally one person who doesn't want to be with that person. I would love to say that the students might just really love this project we are working on, but I think they must of just been having a good day. 

On the drive to the next school I felt worried and nervous about the showcase. When I arrived at the school there was chaos everywhere there was no running order, students everywhere, no music, due to lack of organisation from the school. It needed organising and fast. I was quite angry as the p.e department were meant to of organised the show. I was annoyed that they hadn’t asked for any help before hand. So i sat all the students down, split them in to there dance classes and put one the oldest in each class in charge and told them they have 20 mins to go off in there groups and go over and clean there dances whilst I tried to put a plan together I had 4 pieces in the show but there were 20 pieces in total and no other teachers to be found. I quickly put together a running order and rough plan for the day. I then bought all the students back and sat them down again and told them whats going to happen and how, as I was doing this another two teachers turned up (phew). 

We then started running everything and it seemed less chaotic. The students seemed distracted and a bit on edge, I thought this was due to nerves. Some of the students who always perform and give it everything also seemed distracted, I asked one of my older students what was wrong and she said that they were all worried and felt unsupported for the show as the school had not organised anything. They didn't even know the time of the show. My heart melted for them, because they were all worried about the organisation and what they should all be worrying about is the choreography and their performances. I spoke to my colleagues about this and we decided before the dress run through to sit them all down and have a chat. We told them how proud we were and how far they have come, lots of encouragement etc. As they went off to get ready my colleagues and I had a talk with the p.e department of the school, who were supposed to be organising the showcase. After having a chat we decided that my colleague and I will be running/ organising all of the next showcase. I felt much happier about this and had many ideas that I would love to use but had never had the chance. The dress run went really well, the students seemed a lot calmer and more focused. 

Looking back on this day, it wasn't as bad i first thought. Whilst writing this I can see I need to trust my ideas and not worry as much. I think I need to be more positive im quite hard on myself when it comes to choreography. `Even if someone said I loved that piece, I always think they are just saying that and dont really mean it. If im more confident then i think the students will be more confident when performing. I really valued the girls who really got into their characters and got stuck in on the project. This made me happy and I then enjoyed going back the next week as I find when I have bad class I get anxious about going back the next week. Reflecting back on just every day I can see me getting frustrated when something doesn’t go how i planned it to or getting annoyed when students dont understand what or why i am trying to get them to do something. I think when I prepare for my lessons i should prepare for more than the one kind of learner and try and different teaching strategy. I think taking a step back and seeing it how someone else might be seeing it could really help me as a teacher. 

Flickr

http://www.flickr.com/photos/nikkilouisemcgowan/

I hope this works, i'll soon find out!!!

Its been a while!!

Ok ok, so it has been a while. I have been extremely busy, trying to choreograph for 3 shows before christmas and another 2 before February, whilst trying to do a million other things.

Excuse's excuse's i know, this is the week for me (think positive nikki).
I have set up my flickr account and uploading a few photo's as we speak. The photo's are of me and some of the work i have done. I hope to upload some pics and video's of the work i have been choreographing within the next week or so and would love hear some feedback on those (once i have posted them).

My Professional Profile

My name Nikki Louise McGowan I am a professional dancer working mainly within the dance and commercial industry. 


I didn't find my love for dance till I was 14, when i decided to join my friend in a workshop class consisting of dance, drama and singing. From then my love for dance grew and grew, within a month I had signed up for Ballet, Tap, Jazz, Street, Drama and Singing. 


As I knew that dance is what I wanted to do I decided that a-levels were not for me. I auditioned at Hertford Regional College (HRC) and got accepted onto the B-Tec National Diploma in Dance course. I studied there for 2 years, whilst there I started to take my exams in Ballet and Tap. I also found a new love for musical theatre. In my last year at HRC, I looked into applying for university's and also professional dance colleges. I applied for both, but after visiting many different universities and college's I decided that dance college was the place for me. I received places at many college's, but decided that Bodywork at Cambridge Performing Arts was the place for me. I was also very fortunate to be awarded a Dance and Drama Award (DADA) here. 


Whilst at Bodywork I got to study some new styles of dance such as, Contemporary, Matt Mattox, Pa De Deux, Commercial and Lyrical and many more. Although I decided to major in the dance path I still got to focus on acting and singing. 


I graduated in 2008 with a Higher National Diploma in Dance. Here is some of the work I have done since graduating. 

• Last Forever music video, Sony music productions, Dancer
• Hollyoaks football match, Channel 4, Cheerleader/ Dancer
• Everybody dance now, Itv productions, Dancer
• Alan Lawrence Hair show, Model/ Dancer
• Snow white Panotomine, Dubai, Dancer/ Skin character
• Albert's Speech, BBC productions, Featured extra

Since graduating my love for teaching has grown. I have now taught at many schools and teach many styles of dance. As a teacher I enjoy watching children and adults grow, improve and enjoy dance. I try and combine a mixture of learning and development in ability with the pleasure and social aspect that dancing gives. I love to dance and when I can i love to share my love of dance to all that i teach. The genre's of dance which i teach are; Ballet, Tap, Musical Theatre, Jazz, Street/Commercial and workshops. I am currently choreographing for many of the schools that i teach at. I am currently choreographing “Hansel and Gretel” and I am assistant choreographer for “Our House” both for the valle academy I thoroughly enjoy teaching all styles of dance. I currently teach all ages from as young as 4 to adults. 

BAPP, is the next chapter in my life. I am looking forward to learning from others, meeting new people and broadening my career opportunities.

My first post!!

So i've been putting this off for a while now, think i just need to break the ice and do it. Not really sure if we are supposed to upload our CV as a profile or actually post it so im just going to do both. Why not.

I'm really gutted i missed the induction day (had to teach all day), i feel i would of got more from the day than i did from the morning session. I feel i came out knowing the same as i did when i went in. Since then I have read over and over again all the module's and handbooks etc, to try and get to grips with everything. It seems less daunting every time I read something again, so fingers crossed it will all be alright. Im looking forward to the morning session next Friday, to hopefully get to know some of you and clarify any questions I have.

Please feel free to comment on my Professional Profile/ CV which i will be uploading asap.

Thanx guys.