Become a Ballroom Dance Teacher & Make Your Dreams Come True
by Dolly Reynolds Tavasieff
November/December 2001
For
two weeks this November, the Metronome Dance Center in San Francisco will host
the first national Professional Ballroom Dance Teachers College.
The Teachers College aims to provide aspiring dance teachers from around
the country with the essential tools they need for a successful career
as a ballroom instructor.
"So many people dream of a career in ballroom dancing, but they feel trapped working in jobs they hate," says Diane Jarmolow, director of the Metronome Dance Center in San Francisco. "I want people to know that a wonderful career as a ballroom dance teacher is a possibility. Basically, I want to make their dreams come true."
A tall order? Not for Diane, who has run a year-round professional teacher training program for the past fifteen years. She has trained hundreds of professional dance teachers, including U.S. and International champions. "Becoming a ballroom dance instructor is a very viable career option," she says. "The hours are flexible, and the pay can be quite good, especially as the teacher acquires more training. People seem to think to be a professional dance instructor, you need to have started training at age five and have a ballerina's body," she continues, "but this is not true, there is much more to being a good dance teacher than just being an excellent dancer. There are specific skills that all students can acquire with determination and hard work."
Diane herself could be a model for the hopeful students in her training program. She had her first dance lesson at age 28, after working as an accountant and nurse. "I was electrified," she said of her first dance experience (at a San Francisco disco), "I knew then what I wanted to do with the rest of my life." Diane has been a professional dance teacher for twenty-five years. In 1991, she founded the Metronome Dance Center, the largest ballroom in San Francisco and a veritable Bay Area institution, many times voted "Best Place to Learn to Dance." The Metronome employs 30 professional dance instructors and offers more than 50 group classes and workshops each week. All full-time dance instructors receive health insurance and 401(k) retirement accounts.
Diane has also had a very successful professional career on her own, and is a fifteen-time winner of the "Top Teacher" award at national competitions. She is currently an adjudicator for national professional and amateur DanceSport competitions. A real "teachers' teacher", she has successfully prepared U.S. Champions Victor Veyrasset and Heather Smith, Olga Forapovna, and current Rising Star Smooth Champions David Weise and Valentina Kostenko for their U.S. Terpsichore examinations.
Diane was inspired to create a formalized training program, after her own challenges in acquiring the training to become the wonderful teacher she is today. "I had excellent teachers," says Diane, "but they were focused on teaching me how to dance. There didn't seem to be any place I could go to learn how to teach. I had to take a bit from this teacher, a bit from that teacher, a bit from this workshop, a lot of trial and error. It was a very expensive, inefficient way to acquire information."
Successful dance teachers need to have s very specific understanding of the mechanics of each individual dance step. Diane teaches her students to break down each step into its component parts (foot position, alignment, rise and fall, amount of turn, footwork, sway, contra body movement, and timing), and do so for both the leader and the follower's parts. Every dance teacher must understand these elements and be able to demonstrate them in isolation. This is a learned skill that requires a systematic study program.
"Many gifted dancers are able to dance the patterns perfectly, because they have an intuitive grace," says Diane, "but this does not necessarily mean they will be able to teach others how to dance, especially if their students do not have a dance background. There is no substitute to learning the steps element by element, from the ground up." Diane cites the familiar paradox that the greatest dancers do not always make the greatest teachers. "You do not have to be the U.S. champion to be a wonderful teacher with a great deal to offer your students," says Jarmolow, "but you must understand every aspect of the dance you are teaching."
Several other elements also contribute to a wonderful dance teacher. Diane cites enthusiasm, patience, compassion, and the ability to teach students with a wide variety of learning styles. "No single method will work with every student," she says, "a good dance teacher will have a flexible teaching style, and will be able to present the information in many different ways. Above all, the teacher should support the student's individual learning style."
The November Teachers College will be divided into two one-week segments. The first week will cover the American Style Smooth dances (Waltz, Foxtrot, Tango, and Viennese Waltz) and the second week will cover the American Style Rhythm dances (Rumba, Cha Cha, Mambo, Bolero, and East Coast Swing.) Students may take the sessions individually or together. Students will receive 43 hours of classroom instruction and will learn to lead and follow five basic patterns from the Bronze syllabus of each dance. Although as experienced dancers, most students will have already mastered these patterns as a leader or follower, students in the Teachers College will approach and master these steps from a teacher's perspective. One hour each day will be devoted to specific teaching challenges (e.g. how to start a group class to music, how to deal with couples who fight, how to help a student who can't hear the beat, etc.) Two Saturday sessions will be devoted to preparing for professional licensing exams.
Diane will be using the Dance Vision International Dancers Association (DVIDA) Bronze Syllabus, which was recently been approved by the National Dance Council of America. The DVIDA Syllabus manuals and accompanying videotapes were created by dance luminaries Ron Montez, Jim and Jenell Maranto, Victor Veyrasset and Heather Smith, and Corky and Shirley Ballas. DVIDA's Director Wayne Eng plans to hold the first national conference of professional ballroom dance instructors in December 2002. "I am absolutely thrilled that someone of Diane's caliber will be implementing the DVIDA syllabus in her teacher training program," says Eng. "This has really given a shot in the arm to our entire organization," he adds.
Can you really learn to become a ballroom dance teacher in only two weeks? Diane laughs. "We will give them the tools," she says, "but they must provide the day to day practice and hard work once the course is over." Due to the compressed time frame, students who attend the Teachers College must already know how to dance. Diane says they should have been social dancing for at least a year, and should know several patterns in each of the dances they will be studying at the College.
"We will teach students how to understand dance steps from a teacher's perspective," says Diane. "We will teach them the professional vocabulary they need to read dance manuals. These are tools for future study. In November, the students will learn five steps in each dance. But more importantly, they will have acquired the tools to learn the entire syllabus."
Similarly, students will learn how to prepare for professional licensing exams. "It often takes working dance teachers a year to prepare for a professional exam," says Diane "I will show the students how to study for the exam, and what to expect from the examiners. Again, these are the tools they need to do well on the examinations, but the students will also have to make a significant commitment to mastering the materiel on their own, once the course is over."
If students are willing to make this commitment, the rewards can be truly great. "If you are a professional ballroom dance instructor," says Diane, "you have the greatest job in the world. It's good for your body, your mind and your heart. You get to introduce people to the joy of moving together to the music. Every time I stand up in front of a class of eager dancers, I get a tremendous feeling of joy."
Diane feels that it is her personal mission to bring the joy of ballroom dancing to as many people as possible. "Every single student, even the most challenging, can learn to dance. Maybe he will never be the U.S. champion, but he will learn how to do a simple foxtrot. It is the teacher's great privilege and joy to develop the student's skills and confidence," says Jarmolow, with a smile. "At the end of every workday," she adds, "the teacher will be a better dancer, and a better person."