As they wait their turn to perform, the little boys can barely sit still. And soon, they won’t have to. After a month of practicing, they are about to leap and bend in unison — to dance in front of a packed gymnasium at their school. As the music starts pumping and the crowd of parents and teachers begins to cheer, each group of boys moves into the performance space to show what they’ve learned.
The dancing is not part of an after-school program, but a segment taught during the school day for a month at the Kenneth Clement Boys’ Leadership Academy in Cleveland. Getting them to dance, explains head of school Damon Loretz Sr., is just one step in building the foundation of experiences for the students, which he hopes will help them become “global leaders.”
The school educates 127 boys, pre-kindergarten to second grade.
As boys start to get absorbed in the dancing, they move more fluidly. They crouch low on the floor as if they are hiding beneath their arms, and then jump up toward the ceiling. When they are finished with their routines, kindergarten teacher Tracy Reid cheers for them and highfives them as they go to sit down.
Reid says that dancing is a good skill for boys because they learn better when they can move and be dramatic. “When we have movement, we have creativity; when we have creativity, we have thought; and when we have thought, we can succeed at everything.”
“We want them to understand that they can choose art, they can choose science, they can choose mathematics, they can choose literacy, they can choose whatever it is they want to choose.”
The dancing was made possible through a grant from Young Audiences of Northeast Ohio, partnered with the MetLife Dance For Life program. The program brought education outreach director Desmond Davis, from the Cleveland Contemporary Dance Theater, to work with the boys for a month.
Copyright2008 The Plain Dealer, All rights reserved. Used with permission of The Plain Dealer. |
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| Date |
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| 2/11/08 |
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| Author |
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| Tracy Boulian |
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