My Artefact

Through the findings of my inquiry ‘How do freelance dancers achieve a positive career transition and career development?’ It was identified that pre-planning is one of the main factors when trying to attain a positive career transition, however many dancers do not to do this. It seems they deliberately choose not to think about until it is too late. Once the transition is upon dancers it has the potential to take a very negative route with some dancers suffering depression. Pre-planning can help prevent this downward spiral and I want to help prevent dancers finding theirselves in that position. Hence why I have made a short interactive video meant for dance students who are about to begin their career in dance. A task sheet is to be downloaded before so they can take part and complete the tasks throughout the video. I have made sure that the video is light and fun to watch even though transition can be dark as I do not want to dampen students spirits when they are just about to embark on probably the most exciting journey of their life. My aim is to ‘plant the seed’ and hopefully they will take it onboard to not only create their own pre-plan but start to put it into action.

Please follow this link to print the task sheet before watching the video-

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B3eZ2ba6GbViVl9lTkxMeG9oakU/view?usp=sharing

D. Austen Oral Presentation BAPP Middlesex University

This is my oral presentation, I'm not sure if it was quite along the right lines however, this is what I had on the day so I rolled with it. (the sound on the quotes is not great).

well well well, it is the end of that chapter.

Yesterday was my oral presentation. I felt so nervous but it was actually a really nice, relaxed, friendly experience. It was so good to finally meet the Bappers, everyone was so lovely. My presentation could have gone a little better, I feel I missed a few things out, stumbled over my words, lost my place, didn't look up from my notes enough but all in all it was ok, I guess it could have been worse and to think how much I practiced it before hand as well, I think my husband knows my presentation off by heart as do my mum and dad, ha ha.

Well it is all finished now (well, providing I pass). Although times have been stressful I have enjoyed this learning journey . My inquiry was not perfect, however I did my best, I made mistakes but most of all I have learned from this experience to which has improved me as a professional and my practice in the sense of being a more informed individual. I can take this life long knowledge away and apply it throughout my life. I feel this process has helped me to ‘let go’ in a way but also, to keep hold. The way I see transition now is ‘if a dancer dies twice”, a dancer most definitely lives twice and in addition to that, I am excited to be starting my second rainbow.



                   'A dancer lives twice' Austen, D, BAPP Arts Student, Middlesex University, (2016)

Ethical Considerations

Ethical Considerations

As I learned from module two, ethical considerations are very important. A lot of my fellow students I believe have very complicated ethical issues due to working within schools and working with children. I feel quite lucky in that respect as I am working with adults who are well over 18 so I do not have as many implications in that area. However, my inquiry is not without ethical concern.

My topic of ‘career transition in dancers’ can be a highly sensitive subject for some individuals and I was fully aware of the impact it could inflict on my participants if not approached with caution and sensitivity. This  means I did need to tread very carefully. I was very mindful when putting my questions together but still made sure that all my dancers were aware that they should not answer any question in which they did not feel comfortable with and they could terminate the interview or withdraw from my inquiry at any time for any reason with no repercussion. 

I verbalised that all was confidential with great attention to the (Data Protection Act 1998) and that I would follow the BERA (British Educational Research Association) guide lines. I also sent out consent forms to make them aware of this too. I made sure I stuck closely to the ethical guidelines to ensure I did everything correctly. My main aim was for the welfare of my participants to which I think I managed achieve.

References

British Educational Research Association (2011) Revised ethical guidelines for educational research. BERA

https://www.bera.ac.uk/researchers-resources/resources-for-researchers

Data Protection Act (1998) http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1998/29/contents

Tools

Here are the tools I used within my inquiry

Interviews

I decide to use qualitative research over quantitive because I really wanted to get  thoughts and feelings. I wanted to know  how people coped with the transition process because it can be a very distressing for some dancers. I felt that I was just not going to get those thoughts and feelings through questionnaires. Doing interviews allows you to explore deeper into what the person is meaning. Questionnaires provide good factual statistical data and are good for anonymity but I did not feel I would get the data I was looking for that way.

“this is not a question of which is better, quantitative or qualitative; rather, the question is, Which is a better fit for the research questions to be studied?” (Grady. M 1998 p.9)

I selected my dancers very carefully, I wanted to have a well rounded group to get true to life results. For example I did not want 6 dancers who have all transitioned into teaching, I wanted a mixture. I had dancers who are now teaching through to one who  now runs her own business in the catering industry. I did not want 6 dancers who had all got injured because I feel that could bias my results. I selected 3 girls and 3 boys who have all been colleagues of mine at some point in my career. I decided to keep it to 6 because it is my first ever inquiry and I did not want to bite off more than I could chew.

I enjoyed putting the questions together however, I do feel that they could have been better. I put them together quite early on and did one interview early on which then meant I could not change them because everything needs to remain as consistent as possible. I did find it interesting how each person could interpret the question a little differently and end up talking about something else but I was very mindful of trying to explain what I meant at times because I was worried I was ‘leading a question’ which I did not want to do for obvious reasons, so that was a tricky one. If I wrote my questions now they would be quite different. I wrote so many questions covering so many things because I was worried I would miss something. I would try and keep my questions to a minimum but try and explore deeper into them for example a few questions I received a simple yes/no answer and I left it at that because I had so many questions to get through and I did not want to take up too much of their time, I tried to keep my interviews to 30-40 minutes. If I only had 10 questions I could try and encourage them to go into more detail if they were willing to by asking how and why? Having said that though I did manage to extract some really good data from the questions I did ask.

Transcribing was a torturous affair. I really did not anticipate how long that was going to take. It took hours and hours to do just one. I did not find it easy because how we speak does not necessarily transfer to paper very well, people start to say something then half way stop and say something completely different so on paper it makes absolutely no sense but it has to be verbatim regardless.

Once the transcribing was over the coding started which was a long winded process and very confusing trying to sift through reams of information that all seemed extremely relevant but unrealistic to use it all. It was really satisfying once things start to click into place and I could start to make connections to theories or the same themes kept reoccurring. I don't think I have got this down to a fine art though, I need more practice. I found this youtube video by (Löfgren, K. 2013, online) very helpful, https://youtu.be/DRL4PF2u9XA. 

Focus Group

The focus group I coordinated was a mixture of colleagues, friends and fellow students. We only got together 3 or four times mainly on Skype but the sessions we had were invaluable. Everybody got really into it and got quite passionate about their thoughts and feelings, each challenging the others ideas and challenging theories and themes in which I instigated. It really was thought provoking and unveiled new ideas to which I had not thought of before which got me thinking to an even deeper level. Although the focus group was for my benefit everyone seemed to really enjoy it. I am aware that focus groups can encourage some people to shy away and not say too much, but that really didn’t happen with mine, everyone contributed and everyone seemed very comfortable in doing so. 

I conducted one of focus group at my house when one of my other friends happened to be over from Portugal for the weekend, she is a nurse. She sat in on the focus group but remained quite quiet. We were talking about passion and how we all have passion for performing and we were unsure we would ever find that level of passion anywhere else. For example I asked my husband ( who is an engineer) are you passionate about engineering? do you think ‘oh I cannot wait to take that engine to bits? do you get a buzz from putting it all back together?’ his reply was he gets satisfaction from it and he does very much enjoy it but he is not passionate about it like we are with dancing. I think the only thing that would give hime the same passion and buzz would be being a formula one driver. So I asked my nurse friend, are you passionate about nursing? is that all you have ever wanted to do? her reply was very similar to my husbands. She loves nursing and helping people and she is very good at it too,  but she could not say she was passionate about it like we are dancing. I asked her what she would have loved to have done, she said dance and sing. Unfortunately she wasn’t given the same opportunities to do that when she was younger. I found incorporating ‘outsiders’ opinions and experiences very interesting. It made me realise we are very very lucky to have been given the opportunity to live our dream because many are not granted that chance.

Observation

At first I thought I cannot really do an observation, how can I observe someone’s transition, transitions can take years, but then I realised I have actually already observed quite a few. A lot of my friends are no longer dancing anymore for different reasons and I have remained in regular touch with them, so I have actually witnessed quite a few transitions, some positive, some negative  and some almost neutral. So I could call upon those experiences in order to help understand theories and related them to real life.  So it wasn’t an observational exercise I conducted as such but still very much an observation which really helped with my understanding and relating to the theories.

References

Grady. M (1998), Qualitative and Action Research: A Practitioner Handbook, Phi Delta Kappa International, - Action research in education, Indiana USA.

Löfgren, K. (2013) [online]. https://youtu.be/DRL4PF2u9XA

Getting there

I feel like I am sort of getting there, although what I have written might be a right load of old waffle. As Jessica mentioned that she was struggling with the word count, I am also. I have managed to get my introduction bob on with 500 words! Boom! I was going to try and carry on the word count perfection, however it hasn't happened and I probably shouldn't  go down the road, it's not necessary, I have bigger fish to fry right now. 

Those transcripts took a long time, I almost wanted to defer 😂. I am using a lot of quotes  from them, I hope I'm doing this right. I almost feel like I'm sailing somewhere with no map, compass, in thick fog, blind folded and just hoping I'm going in the right direction. It's ok though I have acquired some help. 

A dancer dies twice-radio show

Below is a very interesting radio show I came across it is well worth a listen. It is very truthful and covers aspects of dance that all dancers can relate to. 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b075pm41

Skype with Adesola

So this evening I had a good Skype session with Adesola, Jess and Lauren. I didn't have too much to say at the start but then soon got waffling on about different things. We talked about all sorts but I think the most important thing that I took from todays session was the idea of a 'shift' in thinking, we all managed to identify a shift in our thinking somewhere. Mine was- when I started out this course and started to think about my line of inquiry, I was thinking of retirement within dancers, then it moved on to transition, then onto career development and then it moved onto making a career transition into a transformation.

Adesola asked me if now I had a better understanding of what transition is, my reply was I think so- I hadn't really thought about it in this much detail before doing this course, to be honest I hadn't thought about it like this at all, I just thought of it as I needed to find a new job, but now I know a lot more and I know transition is different for everyone, there are all sorts of transitions people face Schlossberg et al says  “A transition is defined as any event or ‘non event, that results in changed relationships, routines, assumption or roles”. I think transition has a lot to do with mind set. Two people could be going through the exact same thing and cope in different ways. Schlossberg et al also stated “Even though some transitions are out of our control, we can control the way we manage them”.
Here is an excerpt from a book I read which I think sums it up really well.

Here is a small except from the book-Counselling Adults in Transition - “Parkes (1971) proposed the term, psychosocial transition, which he defined as a change that necessitates “the abandonment of one set of assumptions and the development of a fresh set to enable the individual to cope with the new altered life space” (p. 103). A transition is not so much a matter of change as of the individual’s own perception of the change. For our definition, a transition is a transition only if it is so defined by the person experiencing it. If, for example, menopause does not have much impact on a particular woman and does not change her set of assumptions or her relationships, then, in our view, it cannot be regarded as a psychosocial transition (though, of course, it is a biological change). If, however, another woman experiences menopause as an event that marks her passage from youth to old age or from sexuality to non sexuality, it does constitute a transition for her. For yet another woman who sees it as freedom from the necessity of using birth control, it is also a transition—a positive one”. 

In an earlier blog I talked about an article I read 'A dancer dies twice' this was actually a quote from Martha Graham, I agreed with this quote but then thought, if this should be true this also means a dancer lives twice. So this reaffirms my ideas towards ‘mind set’. It is about how it is perceived by the holder of the idea.

So this 'shift' in thinking is very important and a good thing, however you have to be able to articulate this well, which I think I manage to do within writing ok but when I have to vocalise it sometimes it comes out as mush and I get myself all lost which is something I need to work on ready for my oral presentation. 

We also talked about how the inquiry does not require you to discover a new planet or a ground breaking theory that will rock the world. We just need to find a greater understanding of ourself and to 'shift' our thinking. Ask yourself, how does this apply to me?

Goodman. J, Schlossberg.N, Anderson. M (2006)

Counselling Adults in Transition Linking Practice with Theory.3rd Edition

Parkes, C. M. (l971). Psycho-social transitions: A field for study. Social Science and Medicine, 5, 105–115.

Reading Reading Reading

I came across this quote from Martha Graham in some literature I am reading and I just had to share it with you because it is so unbelievably true!!!

Super's Life Career Rainbow

I have been doing lots of reading with regards to career transition/development in dancers and athletes and I came across Donald E Super,  a career theorist who came up with this 'life career rainbow'. 

Below is another version that I like purely because it is colouful. 

Now I agree that it is a great model for the average person with a traditional career progression, however it is not very fitting for a dancers performance life because the maintenance side of things is not attainable due to a number of factors and if they don't get you, age will eventually. Let's face it I will not be able to kick my legs to my head at 60 and even if I can, a 60year old dancer in a sequinned leotard is probably not going to get too much work, (hmmmmm maybe that is a business opportunity), so I guess it is possible, but highly unlikely.

I have also been thinking about Martha Graham's Quote "a dancer dies twice" to which I agree. However whilst I was thinking I realised, if that is true, this also means a dancer must live twice! Every cloud has a silver lining! So, dancers get to have a go at a second career, the first one we conquered, now what next? The world is our oyster. This then lead me to realise actually with some adaption Super's rainbow could work, dancers just have a double rainbow,  so after a bit of thought and doodles I came up with this. (I hope Super doesn't mind). 

So here is Super' model with an Austen twist! See "a dancer lives twice".

What do you think Bappers? 

Danni .X.

Module 3

Well here we are in module 3. I have just arrived home from being at sea and I have an awful lot of catching up to do. I am confident I can catch up as I have plenty of time on my hands now (and internet whoop whoop) I am going to become a BAPP recluse, It is just finding where to start, that overwhelming feeling is back again. HELP. I feel I have most of the pieces to the puzzle, I just need to put them in place, I'm no good at puzzles. Any advice you have, please throw it my way!