Apply Sewell's five skills of ecological perception as eco-somatic listening activities¶

Strategy · All strategies
Evidence · no claims cited

Description¶

The article translates Sewell's five skills of ecological perception—"(1) paying attention; (2) perceiving relationships, contexts, and interfaces; (3) perceptual flexibility; (4) re-perceiving depth; and (5) using the imagination intentionally"—into dance-learning activities, often metaphorically. One activity pairs students: one improvises with a specific image and dance element while the other focuses attention on a single aspect (quality, tempo, or pathway), then responds with an improvised phrase reinventing that component. Another has duet partners improvise studies exemplifying a relational view, such as how gravity stabilizes or destabilizes, or giving and receiving weight.

Design Implications¶

Context¶

Requirements¶

• Willingness to work metaphorically, since the skills "may seem a bit abstruse when their application to a dance context is considered."

Constraints¶

• The article states the phrases produced need not look alike; both participants should see evidence of the selected component, reinvented.

Target Learners¶

• dance students at any level

Target Learning Goals¶

• narrow and refine focus of attention; re-perceive the familiar to discover new movement possibilities and interdependent working

Affordances¶

• Body Listening Five Somatic Components Framework

Related Strategies¶

• Thread conscious breathing strategies through warm-up, center work, and class conclusion
• Moving toward the touch: partnered touch-guided improvisation for spatial-perceptual listening

Examples¶

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Key Sources¶

• Enghauser, R. (2007). Developing Listening Bodies in the Dance Technique Class. JOPERD, 78(6). https://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ795590. doi:10.1080/07303084.2007.10598039