Professional Inquiry.. Initial Thoughts

Thursday 7th February 2013

"Professional inquiry is a way to learn about what we are doing whilst we are doing it."

Immediately, I am excited by this quote from the course reader. I enjoy learning as I go along and I hope that the more research, reading and exploring I do, the further my professional practice development will go. Module 1 taught me to reflect and examine what I do, whether it be every day life or tasks and events linked within my practice. I am now aware that I do this on a daily basis, always thinking about what I am doing and how I go about doing it. For me, it allows my routine to be simpler, more structured and easier to handle. I am conscious of what I do, how I do it and what may become of it. 

These first thoughts take me straight to the idea of becoming a therapist and analysing every thought, emotion and movement. Having an organised lifestyle allows me to keep on top of tasks and gives me the time to break down certain events or feelings (as a therapist would) to really 'get down to the bottom of them', enabling a smoother and clearer understanding of everything involved. 

When reading: "Inquiry-based learning expects the adult learner to engage with relevant problems and scenarios, draw on existing knowledge, seek out new evidence, and analyse and present that evidence in appropriate ways (Kanh and O'Rourke, 2004), I think back to my time and experience in full-time dance education. There were several occasions where I feel, and to this day, previous students also feel, a counsellor or therapist within the school would have been beneficial. Ideally, I should love to gain the relevant qualifications and become a counsellor for students within a dance school, whether it to just help deal with home-sickness or other issues from the pressures and demands within the hard-working environment.

I feel that 'learning from experience' will be an important and key part to the start of my thoughts for my inquiry. Having been through the motions of a dance school life, and seen what has gone on around me, I have a good understanding of how students feel and what they go through both mentally and physically. To me, the mental side to dancers is just as important as the physical.. however, it tends to be forgotten as dance is about performance and making sure the audience sees what it expects. Dancers, and dance students go through such enormous pressures when in training and during their professional careers. The outside world is aware of the physical strain, fast-paced and hard working life they lead but I truly believe that people need to be more aware of the strain they take mentally too.
Rejections, competition, jealousy, pressures of keeping a high standard, staying slim, working with others yet being above the rest... the list goes on but there is so so much that can be brushed aside, or not even noticed by those who do not go through it themselves.

It may all seem quite serious to read but I really do find it such an interesting subject and I wish I could help those who should want it. Whilst at school, I was often the one that people turned to for advice or support, and I want to continue to do this but at a professional level, actually being able to help people through their dance training. I think that if a dancer has a healthy mind, their overall performance, lifestyle and confidence will be positive, giving them the strength to take on the physical strain.

I could continue talking about this for hours, but these are my first ideas and I look forward to exploring them further with research and reading. Allowing me to begin to understand the mind of dancers and students and how I can go about helping and improving them.

Judi Marshall talks of her own self reflection: "Often these days I state overtly that an issye, event, theme, dilemma or whatever is an inquiry for me. This is a deliberate means to keep my questioning open and to help it develop." (Marshall, 2001, p.g 6). 
As mentioned previously, module 1 has taught me to do this also. I like the idea of taking every day life and events, whether linked to my professional practice or not, to help develop my inquiry skills. Reflecting and acting upon nearly everything I do allows constant practice and improvement on these and, sooner rather than later, it will become second nature to look at and deal with everything in such a way.

Using WBL for this inquiry will enable me to talk with other BAPP students and learn about their personal experiences in a professional arts school and the subjects, issues and emotions etc that they dealt with or learnt from. It will be easy to access them and to talk to them because, as the reader quotes, WBL "..can also accommodate workforce development strategies where more than one learner in the workplace is involved in the educational experience.' 
This could mean the educational experience we are all involved in now as BAPP students, but also the educational experiences we have all had previously, how they compare, and the similarities and differences that may have occurred. 


As you can see, just from starting this blog, I am already gathering so many thoughts and it's only day 1! I apologise for the long-winded entry but for me, it is best to get everything down as it comes to me and eventually after research and further development, I can whittle it all down to have one focus and aim.