Browsing by Author "Kurola, Hannaleena"

According to the National Curriculum for Basic Education experiental and embodied learning and also using different senses give more positive experiences in school and strenghten motivation (POPS 2014, p. 30). Art education in school still doesn’t include dance as a school subject, even though dance as a form of embodied learning would fulfil the aims of the Curriculum. Anttila (2013, p. 52) says that the problem in school is that the conception of dance is usually narrow and teachers don’t have the knowledge of the possibilities of dance. Also the educational value of dance has been underestimated (Anttila 2009, p. 85). Previous studies have proved that dance has positive effects in school, but teaching dance in school is pretty much dependent on teachers’ know-how or separately arranged and funded projects. The focus of this study is on the co-operation between dance teachers and teachers in basic education. The aim of the study is to figure out how dance can be tought in line with the aims of the Curriculum, what kind of positive effects dance has in school and how teacher and dance teacher can benefit from their co-operation. The co-operation is also put into perspective of Engeström’s (2004) designs of interaction. The data of this study was gathered by interviewing dance teachers and school teachers who participated in Osaava Ope project. Before the interviews the teachers, excluding one teacher, were observed for one lesson (2x45min). Three dance teachers, two primary school teachers and one secondary school physical education teacher were interviewed for this study. The interviews were transcribed. This study is a qualitative case study and the research material was analyzed with a theory-based content analysis. Especially in primary school, dance was quite easily combined with the aims of the Curriculum. The theme of the dance lessons was also studied in other subjects in the class room, so basically dance was one learning method and one way to study the theme in question. In secondary school dance lessons were just separate lessons because all the subjects are tought separately by different teachers. The experiences from the projects were clearly more negative in secondary school than in primary school. Both dance teachers and teachers thought that dance has positive effects in school. Supporting different kind of learners, new learning methods, inspiring students and using creativity were considered as positive effects. The study found that both dance teachers and teachers in school felt the co-operation as rewarding and productive. Engeström’s communication design described the co-operation best.