Reflections
Taking this class last Spring semester at the Rpac was challenging due the distance that I had to walk everyday so taking it again in the department was exciting. This semester, I wasn’t just taking it as every other student in the class but as directed teaching under the auspices of my supervisor Momar Ndiaye.
Contemporary classes are the classes that I feel nervous about taking as a student and most importantly teaching. Within my dance career, I have not had a lot of contemporary dance classes except for my time at the National Dance Company of Ghana where I got the opportunity to work with some international artists. I plan to face my fears and teach a contemporary class during my final year in the department so doing a directed teaching all semester to work closely with the instructor was a huge step in the right direction. I had a little pep talk from Quianna who was in my shoes last semester and told me how important it was for her.
Finding time out of my schedule and that of my professor was not a huge task because we both had a lot of free time on Mondays so 4pm to 6pm was what we settled on. The studio sessions were great and tiring because it was just me going back-to-back and repeating the materials that were just created. Regardless, I knew that was an opportunity to build stamina and get stronger. I am a person who does not complain because I like to do what is asked of me. There were times that I felt that I needed a break or a moment to catch my breath because of the intensity of the movements but I depended on my professor to give me that break. Obviously, he was in my body and could not tell how I was feeling so I was supposed to voice out what I needed.
Then came the week that I was supposed to teach. I was nervous and excited at the opportunity. I was creating materials to teach in class, and I had to show it to the professor who helped me modify it and make it intense like most of the materials he created. After I felt so confident with myself and felt I could teach a contemporary class. I learned a lot from how materials are created and how materials can be made more challenging based on the level of the students in the class.
In conclusion, I gained a lot of confidence from taking, creating, teaching, and understudying in this class. I can tell how different it is from when I took it in the Rpac and now. With this confidence, I look forward to teaching my own African contemporary class in the near future.
The Creative Process 