Technology
Online Instruction is explain XXXXXX
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Videoconferencing
iDance
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From PhD site on Interactive Instruction:
In seeking to understand the cognition fostered in the union of technology and dance, I examined the use of distributed instruction in the teaching of dance to students in rural communities (Parrish, 2008). This work determined that regardless of geographic limitations, distance instruction presents unique opportunities and challenges for teaching students and supports the notion that community partnerships can flourish through technology. Pedagogical strategies for distributed instruction in dance confirmed that videoconferencing enables participants to share their knowledge, experience, and ideas with one another and to expand their worldview and to create communities with other students and their teachers. (Parrish, 2009). I am currently applying distributed instruction techniques developed in iDance AZ and iDance SC to support, guide and mentor student teachers whose field placement is not easily accessible (Parrish, 2016, Parrish, 2017). Strategies developed for distance assessment and mentoring were shared at the 2018 NDEO conferences and will also be discussed at the upcoming 2019 conference.
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Media advances have changed the ways in which dancers interact, communicate, teach and learn. Technology has helped transform the economy and forever changed our way of life. The growth of telecommunication, video sharing sites, and social media have exponentially increased the number of people interested in dance and dance education. Dance educators are conducting live webcasts of classroom activities and concerts or utilizing Twitter to promote, advocate, and communicate, thus expanding their viewership and increasing knowledge of dance. Social media’s immediate interactivity is similar to the improvisatory and ephemeral nature of dance. Media resources link scholars to practitioners and professionals to children in a dynamic web of ideas. Social media applications such as Snapchat, Instagram, Facebook, selfies, microblogs, and digital videos are ways we now connect, experience, and “live” in the world. With increasingly easy access to the internet and progressively more powerful “smart” devices in the hands of students and teachers alike, technology presents new ways for students to think about their learning, express their ideas, and problem solve.
My research concentrates on finding better ways to connect, engage, inform, and empower students. When used appropriately, technology serves as a way to grant access to significant resources to expand world-view and to shape community. When used inappropriately, technology restricts creativity in favor of imitation and disembodied passive experiences (Parrish, 2007). Dance teachers and artists are recognizing the digital explosion through increased connectivity in all aspects of the profession, art making, instruction and performance (Parrish, 2007). Dance scholars, however, are just beginning to understand the complex implications of technology use in dance education. There are different schools of thought as to the benefits of handheld devices, social media, online instruction, and interactive technology in the teaching and learning of dance. Some educators feel there is no place for technology in the dance studio, while others feel that technological tools should be embraced and brought into the dance classroom. Because a major direction of my research examines the cognition fostered in the union of technology and dance, I am examining applications and strategies for assessment, self-analysis, and video feedback in my training of pre-service and professional teachers. (Parrish, 2016; Parrish, 2017).
Can student controlled smartphone assessment modalities support creative skill development, efficacy, and metacognition in dance? Traditional classrooms are controlled and moderated by the teacher and students seldom make decisions about their own learning. Using freeware applications on their smartphones, however, dance students can collaboratively discuss, create, and evaluate dance. By defining key learning outcomes aligned with student’s long-term goals, students move past initial quick solutions to more informed, thorough ones (Parrish 2016).
In my coursework, I use smartphone technology to reform traditional evaluative methods and construct “flipped” assessments which are created by students, for students, serving to prepare students for making critical judgments and decisions on their own. In the process of “flipping” assessment students talk through a problem, learn to visualize relationships between existing knowledge, identify what they are interested in, what they already know, and what they need to discover. Quickly, students learn to draw inferences, spend time encoding the terms of a problem, unpack the component parts, postpone conclusions, and as a result, develop awareness about their own thinking and learning process (Parrish, 2017).
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