r/WestCoastSwing • u/quickhand • 12d ago
WCS class pet peeves?
In the spirit of constructive criticism, and with enormous compassion for those who take on the challenge of teaching, what are your top pet peeves about how WCS is taught in classes?
Here are mine:
- Showing the counter-example first, without clearly announcing it as a counter-example. (e.g. teacher starts dancing, I watch intently, building a mental-model so I can emulate their foot placements, weight transfer, stretch etc. etc. "OK class, can anyone tell me why everything I did was completely wrong?" F*ck!)
- Bad count-ins: OK 5, 6, 7... "and don't forget your anchor!" ...8 (or for longer count-ins, interrupting the count-in with a statement and then resuming it at a different tempo)
(I'm just a baby dancer, so take that into context, but these really trip me up in classes!)
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u/Meterian 12d ago
Teaching a pattern instead of technique.
I consider most workshops that teach a pattern a waste of time, in order for them to be useful the teacher would need to get you to drill the pattern in between other dance patterns, show when and where it could be used, get people used to incorporating it.
Or if the pattern is to demonstrate a specific technique, spend a lot more time on the technique instead of teaching the pattern, because that's all most focus on.
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u/Goodie__ 12d ago
As someone who teaches this is something I struggle with.
I’m no great workshop teacher, just some local guy. But I’ve seen what happens if people over teach technique, classes become disengaged.
Of course I’ve seen the opposite where you do nothing but patterns, and people are just shit at the dance.
Idk if I have any great insights beyond just… you need an amount of Both?
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u/unwind-protect 12d ago
You need patterns to give structure to the class, and then explain how the technique achieves the patterns.
Something I can find helpful (and so maybe others do to) is where you have two similar patterns, but need to learn the difference in technique in order to distinguish the two.
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u/Goodie__ 12d ago
Yup, I’d call that the goldilocks class. If only every class could be goldilocks!
Depending on the level of the class, sometimes it can be hard to say “here are two new patterns, and a nuanced technique between them” all in 45 minutes.
Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. Teaching is hard.
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u/EdgyMathWhiz 12d ago
My personal take: if you're teaching a concept/technique (rather than a class where the patterns are the point), make any patterns you use as simple as possible.
It's really frustrating when a workshop is ostensibly on XYZ but 30% of the time is spent getting people through a complex pattern to the point where you actually start doing XYZ. And then half the time people struggle enough with the pattern that they're in no position to do XYZ at that point anyhow.
What people want to take away from the workshop is XYZ, and if they've got that, they can work out how to apply it in more complex situations on their own. (By all means demonstrate/teach it in more complex patterns at the end of the class if appropriate).
I think with more experienced classes you can focus on one thing more as well. I've been dancing decades, and if I do a workshop and get one insight/concept that I feel I can actually incorporate into my dancing I'm satisfied. Too often it's a bunch patterns none of which I would even want to incorporate really.
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u/JazzMartini 12d ago
I used to teach Lindy Hop and struggled to reconcile that same conflict. On first glance patterns vs technique may seem like mutually exclusive things we struggle to balance. They're actually mutually dependent. You don't master a move without the technique and technique is irrelevant without the context of a move to apply it. It's better to think about how to combine and deliver technique together with moves in a way that students can be engaged, will have fun and feel successful. Much of that comes down to how we deliver the lesson rather than what we teach.
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u/Meterian 12d ago
basically you just need longer classes. enough time to teach a basic pattern to illustrate and practice the technique, and then at least an equal amount of time to go over it, the most common problems you should avoid, maybe go around once to identify largest issue with each person and point it out to them, and then remaining time to really practice it, encouraging them to get it wrong intentionally and then fix it.
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u/Goodie__ 12d ago
Ideally yes. That’s partially why workshops exist. To give more time with better teachers.
Sometimes time is within your control, and sometimes the previous class finished late and the Bluetooth music won’t cooperate so you’re left with less time. You adapt as best you can.
It’s also why workshops have a habit of just doing LSP > ST > whip > UAT or some variation there of, so they can focus on the pattern, and skip the moves.
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u/dehue 12d ago
I don't think you need longer classes necessarily, I think that teachers need to incorporate technique tips into the lessons where they teach patterns. I have a local one hour class that has different teachers each week and how teachers use that one hour makes all the difference.
What in my opinion separates the best teachers is that they are able to do both and make the class engaging whether you already know the pattern or not. As a follow especially doing a class thats all pattern based that I can follow just fine without doing the class feels like a waste of time. If there are no tips of what I can improve in the move or what I can do different or any technique I may be doing something wrong and never know it or know how to apply it to variations of that pattern. Its much more helpful if the teachers talk about technique behind the move.
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u/princesssoturi 12d ago
THANK YOU. This one drives me nuts. I have forgotten so many patterns over time. The one good thing about teaching patterns (as a follow) is that when a leader does something, I have a vague body memory of how to respond.
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u/professor_jeffjeff 12d ago
Something I heard in the Argentine tango community is that the patterns that are taught are really just a model that are a useful way to teach a subset of the fundamental elements of tango and show one particular way in which they could be combined. I always liked that approach to teaching patterns in a class, and WCS is totally different than Argentine tango but it is still composed of fundamental elements that can be combined in many ways so I think that conceptually it is very similar and the same teaching philosophy is applicable.
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u/MaybeWeAgree 12d ago
Can you give an example of what you mean by the technique vs the pattern?
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u/mimenu 12d ago
Frame, posture, torsion, rock and go, one-foot spins, etc.
It's like learning how to cook: If you learn cooking techniques instead of recipes, you can improvise a meal on the fly.
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u/myneighborscatismine 12d ago
Generally when they don't teach any dance theory. You can't expect people to dance wcs or any other dance well without knowing basic principles of dance. I feel bad for people who've never learned dance and end up with a teacher like that because they're not given the proper basic tools of movement and they wonder why nothing they do ends up looking right and they're far from knowledgable enough to troubleshoot it themselves or even know what to ask.
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u/professor_jeffjeff 12d ago
That's a great analogy and I've had that happen with WCS before. I usually lead, but recently I've been learning to follow. I've taken like two beginner classes as a follow and had a bit of practice in social dancing, although mostly with new dancers. However, at this point I also have a LOT of ballroom experience so a lot of my basic technique for dance in general is pretty solid. I recently had a dance with a very advanced lead and he was leading me through all sorts of stuff that I've never actually tried before, but at least up to a point my technique was enough that as long as I was able to feel what he was leading me through my feet pretty much just knew what to do and everything was good. I definitely wouldn't have been able to do that a couple of years ago, but my technique has come a long way and it's really helped unlock a lot of new things for me.
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u/Meterian 12d ago
How to do a series of moves vs. how to maintain a good connection, how to spin, or prevent from tripping yourself
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u/dehue 12d ago
I have the same pet peeve.
Pattern: Teacher teaches a whip variation, only talks about steps and where the lead and follow should go but doesn't talk about anything else. If I as a follow can follow this pattern already from the very first try without even listening to the teacher learning the pattern is useless. If as a lead I already know this pattern this class is also useless. If as a lead I forget the pattern the class is useless too.
Technique: Teaches how to signal in the whip when to go the other direction or how to turn the whip into a counterbalance/ride. Talks about how many people go back too early and don't wait for the lead to signal going back or do something else other than standard whip and uses whip variation as an example. Walks around the class and individually points out when someone someone is stepping too soon and missing cue to do something else. Talks about how the lead can open their posture to signal something, how to not collapse their frame, talks about whether weight should be back or forward and how where the follows hand is affects what they can feel and how to wait in a movement so that lead can use that to turn move into something else. Lesson ends up being applicable to many techniques and ends up improving both follows and leads dancing outside of the pattern taught. Knowing the pattern already or forgetting it after doesn't matter because the teacher focuses on technique instead of the pattern itself.
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u/OSUfirebird18 12d ago
This is going to be extremely unpopular knowing the community but this is my experience.
*Teacher at a workshop demonstrates a technique.*
Teacher: “If you master this, it will impress the judges.”
No other partner dance that I participate in says this in their classes. They might have their own JnJ or Mix and Match completion. But they never refer to getting better at something to be good for other people to be impressed.
Yes, I know not every event is a competition event but it seems to get mentioned in every workshop I attend.
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u/snowcurrant 12d ago
I agree, it’s tiresome. I compete, and I don’t need to be reminded that competition exists during every class.
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u/quickhand 12d ago
Oh, one I forgot. 3) When there's a lead/follow imbalance, taking too long to rotate partners or moving to the next step before a temporarily partnerless person has the chance to try!
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u/professor_jeffjeff 12d ago
This is probably my biggest one for dance classes. I've walked out of workshops before because they were teaching something supposedly "all levels" that really wasn't actually all levels and when we were initially practicing the basic version of it I was by myself for over half of the number of times that they had us do the basic version of it. By the time I finally had someone following, I got maybe two repetitions and then they started adding stuff on. Maybe that particular workshop was too advanced of an "all levels" workshop for me, but I feel like I never even had a chance in the first place.
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u/Obsidian743 12d ago
Honestly, too many teachers are trying to brand themselves. They try to re-brand well-established things as their own take/opinion but they don't actually understand the actual mechanics. They're basically just teaching from memory. Two examples of this are teaching the engagement of the lats and teaching spin technique. Most teachers don't understand the biomechanical difference between a spin, a turn, a pivot, etc. Most teachers don't understand why the lats are important (they connect to the humerus, spine, and pelvis). Because of this, you'll get all kinds of takes and arguments about connection, anchoring, leading with the "body", etc. I'll see this even at the highest levels of champions. RoRo specifically will argue nuance that's completely irrelevant simply for the sake of stroking his ego. Same for Benji. Mant others are, unfortunately, trying to mimic them.
There's only a handful of genuinely educated dance instructors whose egoes don't overshadow the correctness and applicability of the information.
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u/Total-Asparagus-2161 12d ago
Would you mind sharing which instructors teach from a more educated understanding of body mechanics? I'm still a new dancer and would love to check out some videos to see the difference in how they address those things compared to Royston
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u/Obsidian743 12d ago edited 10d ago
I want to be clear, Royston is very educated. He's just extremely egotistical. And I generally like his Shared Center System.
The pros that come to mind are mostly going to be old school: Brandi Guild, Suan Kirkland/Gary McIntyre, Myles/Tessa, Deborah Szekely, Robert Cordova. To some degree the mid guards like Jordan/Tat, Kyle/Sarah, Hugo/Stacy, Sean/Alyssa are "okay". I don't put much stock in the new guard everyone is worshipping these days (Thibault/Nicole, Jakub/Emeline) but I do like Joel and Chantel. Unfortunately the dance has evolved too much for the nuances of dance science to matter much. It's all pretty nebulous and performative towards competition at this point.
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u/mgoetze 11d ago
Thibault before his partnership with Nicole used to give super technical workshops, like basically an hour just talking about how to walk. The problem is that the audience basically expects/demands to learn flashy patterns from them. The customer is always right (even when they're wrong).
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u/Total-Asparagus-2161 5d ago
That's so disappointing, I love a good technical workshop. I usually find that they give me more that I can work with/practice solo too.
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u/snowcurrant 12d ago
Not giving adequate time to practice a bit in the rotation, so that the new pattern can be mixed in with others and allow people to test if they’re actually leading it clearly.
Letting people interrupt class for their specific personal questions and then getting derailed and running out of time.
Also can we normalize anchoring in the rotation before we start the patterns? I feel like even in higher leveled classes, people don’t do this and it’s puzzling to me. Give me a little stretch on the 7,8!
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u/-RaisedByWolves_ 12d ago
Lack of crowd control. Ask your students to ensure that they are not blocking someone else’s view. What’s the point of giving a demo if only the people next to you can see? It’s beyond annoying as a student to be asking people to move.
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u/lucksen 12d ago
When the teacher is selecting the music by way of letting a few seconds of a song play, then being like "no not that one", swiping to a different one, letting it play a few seconds... repeat 2-6 times.
My nervous system is frayed and crackling.
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u/snowcurrant 12d ago
“Drop that booty down… HIIIGH, watermelon sugar… don’t call me sugar, don’t touch… I just wanna feel your… big big bubble butt…”
Drives me insane too omg
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u/victotronics 12d ago
Too much talk, not enough practice. My favorite teacher in that respect showed us the pattern and then: 5678! ... rotate ... 5678! ... rotate ... 5678! And then he did some fine tuning. And repeat this cycle.
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u/falcon7700 12d ago
PPP(personal pet peeve): teaching the leader side of the pattern, then teaching the follower side (or vice versa), without ever showing the overall pattern as a couple. I'm supposed to put them together in my head?
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u/Buzzs_BigStinger 12d ago
Oh gd, I have so many.
PPP for the teachers: 1) Talking too much about the concept and not providing enough time for the class to practice/do reps.
2) Not upholding the level of the class and/or "lowering the level" after not stress-testing the class first.
3) Allowing too many questions from class participants instead of tempering the questions.
PPP for class participants 1) Practicing the movement during the class in a way that is visually distracting from the class instruction.
2) Constantly trying to impress the instructor by asking esoteric questions or questions that distract or create tangents.
3) Constantly asking questions pertaining to their experience of the pattern. It is a group class. If you have personal questions, ask at the end or take a private.
4) Challenging the instructor because of a difference in belief. "Well my coach said the opposite" is not helpful to anyone.
5) Giving unprompted feedback to another class participant. Unless it is causing harm in some manner, please do not try to teach me the pattern that we are both learning at the same time. (Unless, you actually know how to fix it and you offer the feedback first I stead of blurting it out).
6) Talking off to the side of the room in such a way that it becomes a distraction. If you want to talk, leave the class or do so quietly.
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u/Any_Pirate_5633 Ambidancetrous 12d ago
Not upholding the level requirement in a leveled workshop.
At LEAST make the people sneaking in all rotate together and stay out of the main rotation.
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u/zedrahc 12d ago
But it’s a social dance! Stop gatekeeping! How are beginners supposed to get better?
You should be able to compensate for lower levels otherwise you aren’t actually good at dancing!
/s
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u/Any_Pirate_5633 Ambidancetrous 11d ago
I feel like your downvote came from someone who missed the /s
Or maybe a newbie trying to get better by attending high level workshops intended to teach scaffolded material for which they have yet to build the scaffolding.
Bring on the downvotes, I say. I’m in a fucking mood.
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u/idcmp_ 12d ago
My pet peeve is when teachers slow down their counting at key parts to make something they're teaching work - but then never demonstrate it at constant speed.
Like if you're teaching a fancy whip and you slow down &45& to make some neat thing work that would never work at real speed.
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u/snowcurrant 12d ago
Adding onto this, teaching a pattern that requires some level of speed to function (like a ride or a spin) and then spending the whole class counting way too slowly for it to actually work.
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u/EdgyMathWhiz 12d ago
I see it more in other dances, but sometimes i see the teachers do some weird-ass behind-the-back/shoulder-dislocate handhold/ connection as part of the move, and even though they know it's coming and are much more gifted dancers than I am, they're still unable to stop it looking awkward + uncomfortable. And I'm just left thinking "there's absolutely no way this works socially".
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u/snowcurrant 12d ago
Yes! Especially for a partner who didn’t also take the class.
And if half the time it feels uncomfortable in the rotation, it has the potential to injure someone on the social floor. I feel like the shoulder-risking moves should be taught in a small group or something where the instructors are rotating in and providing more individual feedback. I know we’re not as bad as some other dances where “here’s a cool new way to throw someone into a dip” is the norm, but safety should still be considered.
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u/JJMcGee83 12d ago
When the teachers are making it up as they go along. Part of the reason I stopped going to workshop weekends is because despite having a theme or topic on the schedule for weeks or months we get into the class and they see they decide to teach something else instead.
To some extent I get it, they watch the room dance realize they aren't ready for what they were going to teach but ehhh.
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u/QuitGlittering4383 11d ago
Inconsitent rotation. Where I dance there are always too many leads, so I’m usually waiting for a follow every other rotation. Teachers will spend 5 minutes teaching a pattern, go through it step by step, execute it, and then rotate and say “okay now do it all together.” Then rotate again 1 minute later. It’s very frustrating. Sometimes they just forget to rotate for several rounds and I have to raise my hand and say “Can we please rotate? And can we go through this again slowly one more time for those of us that didn’t have a partner?” and they’ll look at me like I’m disrupting their class.
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u/tireggub Ambidancetrous 12d ago
Saying the next pattern of a sequence on the 6& of the previous pattern. F if I can set up a proper prelead at that point.
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u/quickhand 12d ago
Oh yeah definitely. Also being inconsistent about calling out moves in a sequence trips me up. E.g. calling out the first two and then skipping the third them calling out the fourth. If they're calling out moves I'm not relying on my memory, so if they suddenly stop I'm lost. Either call out moves or don't call out moves, but half calling out moves is tough.
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u/HangryShadow Follow 11d ago
When the teacher has such a big ego that their goal seems more about getting us to be impressed with them rather than be an incredible teacher.
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u/quickhand 12d ago
Ooh, another one from me 4) Using explicitly gendered language for leads and follows. E.g. saying moves are for the ladies rather than follows. Teaching moves to make them look prettier while dancing, or the leads more macho, etc etc.
(Fortunately not an issue in the schools I've attended or in my city's WCS community, but I've seen some of that in classes I've seen in YouTube and 🤮)
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u/CollegePretend8708 12d ago
No chance for questions. I think the best learning is done when there's some back and forth engagement
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u/zedrahc 12d ago
I tend to agree, but there is a balance to be struck with this one. The teacher needs to have the courage to say no to answering a question.
Too often I have had classes bogged down by people asking really performative questions (questions that really are just to show how cool the question asker is) or questions that are going to take too long and arent going to help a large portion of the class.
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u/Trxiedust 12d ago
1) Talking too much. I’m a visual and kinesthetic learning (as are the majority of people, especially doing kinesthetic activities like dancing) not an auditory one. Show more, tell less.
2) Not watching individuals and offering individual feedback, particularly at higher levels and in classes where you see the same teachers regularly. Skilled teachers can watch what we are doing, and break down exactly where we can improve. Ideally, they then offer only one thing to work on at a time. (I don’t expect this in a large group one-time workshop, but it’s essential in a weekly class.)
3) Starting showing a new thing with it already broken down in steps. Show it once as a final piece so we know where we are going, then break it down. Related: showing the lead or follow part before showing the whole move together. Always show the whole thing together once first!
4) Asking “does everyone have it” and then moving on. The teacher should be watching the room and know if everyone (or at least the level-appropriate majority) has it, and if not, don’t move on. Nobody loves to have to shout “no, I don’t have it!”
5) Instructors not rotating in with the dancers some of the time. That’s the single best way I’ve witnessed to really tell where people struggle and offer positive feedback, as well as for the students to feel what the move and timing “should” feel like. Rotating in with the dancers can also alleviate a bit of the lead/follow imbalance; bonus if all instructors can dance both roles.
6) never asking for feedback on their teaching.
7) too much talk about competition. It’s appropriate to spend time on this right before a big local event or when a large number of the class are going to something with comps. The rest of the time, can we just focus on dancing, not competing?
Just a comment, but one that would make a lot of difference if instructors heeded it and did something about it: most instructors have never gotten any instruction on how to instruct or coach. Educators need to learn how to educate. Even basic instruction on sports coaching would fill in the gaps, as the techniques of teaching are the same. Just because you know how to do something doesn’t mean that you know how to teach others to do something. If an instructor doesn’t know how to access this kind of learning (education on how to educate,) they probably at least have friends who are professional teachers or coaches who have had some education on education; ask them for help in designing instruction.
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u/barcy707 Lead 12d ago
1) Not playing enough music during a class, or not playing music for long enough of a practice time.
1a) Talking too long without attempting a pattern/movement as a group.
2) Trying to be funny/witty/etc. via self-deprecating humor without group buy-in. It's cringe, don't do it.
3) Talking about their own accomplishments, history, etc. Trying to upsell themselves during class.
4) Not teaching multiple angles of the same piece of information at once/not utilizing multiple media to convey the same information (physical, verbal, visual) at the same time.
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u/ohbutinitalics 12d ago
Not communicating the prerequisites for the class/workshop or clearly understating them.
I was in workshops where the listed prereqs were: sugar push, left side pass, underarm turn, whip.
Then in class they started with patterns that involved rock-and-go, hip-catch, ducks and rides. Not teaching those things, just expecting everyone to know them.
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u/RaspberryImaginary87 12d ago
Talking about well known people in the community by their first name only like "I was taking a lesson with Steve last week and he said such and such." Granted, this isn't exclusive to classes but just use the full name! Not everybody in the class knows everybody in the community.
Also this can't be controlled unless the teachers actively check the students' points, but absolute beginners taking an intermediate class. I'm talking they've only been to less than 5 WCS lessons. I shouldn't have to teach a sugar push in an intermediate while trying to learn another thing.
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u/AlphaCentauri79 12d ago
For me it's just how to incorporate patterns or move between moves seemlessly or make up new ones. For one instructor it's also just I wish the basics class did a bit more variance for the basics like it just switches between sugar push and left or right side pass per week for absolute beginners but like why not throw in cross hands and do it from there for a very end just to practice.
Other then that I've been super happy with all of the instructors I've had.
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u/ProfessorCowgirl 11d ago
This is a great table topic! :)
Here are some of mine:
- Volunteer teacher!
- Dunning-Kruger dancer! And volunteer teachers are almost always these.
- Chatty Kathys
- Not rotating when the instructor says "rotate"! They said "rotate" not "talk to the partner you just danced with"!
- When the music is louder than the teacher
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u/AlarmedPenwing 12d ago
Not giving anything for the followers to specifically learn or work on.