My anecdotal experience tells me that some of the teachers I have used are very reluctant indeed to part with the "secret knowledge" of how to dance.

They want you to keep coming back, for years on end, paying them for the tiny snippets of technical instruction they are prepared to give out, and won't even give you a proper explanation for a routine that a class is learning. Instead, the routine has to be learned, that is, committed to memory, at the pace of the slowest, and usually step by step, rather than in groups of standard figures (because even the names of most standard figures are part of the "secret knowledge" that you have to pay for years to acquire).

I cut out the middleman, and bought the standard technique books. I look to my teachers to help me work on aspects of technique and style. What they actually DO in most lessons, and certainly in most classes, really has very little to do with teaching dancing, and a great deal to do with earning a living.

Clive, I really do not understand who and or why, anyone would be so clandestine about the teaching of material.

How on earth can any teacher develop a line of instruction without nomenclature ! ?.

You must have come across a very poor e.g. of teaching (?).

From day one , to the 1st step taken-- cardinal rule-- name and demonstrate .

What it implies, is the person(S) in Q, had no formal training in the " art " of teaching.

Terence2,
Sadly, what Clive said struck a cord with me. Running a studio is apparently very expensive, and they have to squeeze every last penny out of the marks...er...students, to keep their heads above the water.

The studio I'm in now is better than my first, but still lacks a level of standardization that would make learning more productive.

The whole organization of the studio seems to lack some sense. They have group classes, but they are purely optional and have no tie to the students progression.

It seems to me, group classes should almost always be taught as progressives, where the steps for a level are taught as a practice routine. Only when the student can perform the routine, should they then take that routine to their private instructor so they can be taught the finer points of actually dancing it. Only when you can perform that routine, and a second created by the student (and early on with the aid of the instructor), to the level of proficiency acceptable to the instructor, can you be allowed to check out of that level for that dance.

Such a progression would prevent something that happens to me time and again, despite my attempts to avoid it. That is, coming up to checkout time and still learning new steps a week or two before checking out. At that point, all efforts should be aimed at technique, not learning new steps.

But I rant...

Now to address the class method-- in todays market, unfortunately , unless a medal type class, the "joe public" are not sufficiently interested in the minutae, that we as pros are trained to give.
Its all about instant dance .
All my classes over the last 2 yrs have been "social " b/room and salsa.I tried one class giving technique in a small dose-- boredom quickly set in-
Todays social dancers want a fun experience with a light atmosphere .
( how things have changed from my early days )

Also-- be very wary of getting caught up in the trap of " routine " dancing .

The whole purpose of a good social dancer is improvisation-- using the material you have been taught and expressing it in your own manner .

I do understand , that in the very early stages, some basic format is going to help in " stringing " things together -- but-- do not make that the be all and end all .

Hmm.

I observe the social dancing of the couples with whom I share classes. They seem singularly unable to break down the "routines" they have leaned, by rote, into groups of figures that can be successfully led on a social floor, as space and other couples require.

As far as I'm concerned, they haven't learned to dance at all. Perhaps that is because they are bad students, or perhaps they have been badly taught.

The Basic footwork must be taught correctly in the beginning if it isn't everything that goes from there on will not be correct. In the main I am refering to Heel Leads, and before a Heal Lead a Toe Heel. Now that isn't too much for the average person to digest is it. This I would have written on the wall, which should indicate to the pupils that there is such a thing as Basic Footwork and we do not walk around the floor pleasing ourselves on how we plant out feet..

Ah yes, the 'routine' or 'pattern' dancers as we call them. We have one couple at our studio who comes to every Friday night party.They always start in the same corner and if they make a mistake in their routine, they stop dancing and walk back to the corner - against the LOD - to start again. We all take a perverse and childish pleasure in cutting them off whenever we can. Just as they set up to start off again, one of us steps in, in front of them and makes them wait for us to start. As you say, they are absolutely incapable of any improvisation.

I have studied with several different dance instructors. As with any subject matter, teaching styles and methods will vary from one individual to the next, but Clive does have a valid point. My first experience was much like what Clive described. It wasn't until I took a lesson from another instructor that I realized how badly I was being "milked" by the first one. I would reccomend to anyone interested in learning to dance to do a little research prior to signing up for lessons. I have discovered the hard way that the highest priced studios don't necessarily mean the highest quality.

Yes, perhaps I overstated the idea of a routine. My main rant is about instructors that are completely disorganized. Frankly, I've yet to find even one where I have an understanding of where they are progressing.

That's why I suggest some structure is needed. A framework from which both the instructor and the student both understand the path toward, at the very least, whatever immediate goals are in front of them.

It rather bothers me when I come to my expensive lesson and the instructor is asking me if I have any idea what we should cover today. Does he not have a plan??? Apparently not. Yet, through two studios and 7 instructors (plus all the ones that were not "my" instructor), I've yet to meet one that really does have a plan.

There's a syllabus, but that's mostly just a step list, and there's no structure for moving through that syllabus.

If I might just give an example of what I mean. In my first studio, an Arthur Murray, we took just over a year to complete our bronze 1 program in six dances. Still, we actually learned the last step the DAY OF the checkout for the last dance, just in case we were asked to demonstrate that particular step.

Well, we had a fairly new instructor, so I wrote my own syllabus for bronze 2, and made him follow it. We finished bronze 2 in 5 months, and we always new where things were going. That would not have happened if I had not taken the bull by the horns, as it were.