Zumba As A Second Language

After hearing a lot of hype about Zumba, I started taking classes about a month ago.  Instantly, I was hooked.  Therefore it should come as no surprise that being a Zumba newbie has impacted my teaching.  First of all, it is important to know that I have pretty good rhythm and am quick at picking up dance moves thanks to years of gymnastics, ballet, and (umm. . . ) cheerleading.  Despite this, it is very, very clear that I am a Zumba beginner.  I don't have the cool clothes.  I don't know the steps.  I have trouble keeping up.  I'm the one who turns left when everyone turns right, and is facing back when everyone jumps front. Oh yeah, and I don't speak Spanish.  Talk about a true beginner!  If Zumba were tracked, I would be put in the slow group.  Zumba classes are crowded - I've counted over 50 in a room.  All levels of movement, fitness, and ages.   It's a recipe for disaster in a language learning class, but my teacher pulls it off!  She's an amazing dancer, but an even more amazing teacher.  How does she do it?

Here's what I've noticed:

1.  Differentiated Learning:  I'm brand new to Zumba.  There's a bunch of us newbies (New Year's Resolutions, I'm sure!), but there are obviously hard-core Zumba followers.  The teacher finds a way to welcome us new "students" while keeping the veterans happy too.  No matter the routine or steps, there are different levels you can do - she demonstrates all of them, and everyone works to their ability.

2.   Repetition and Routine:  I wrote about the power of muscle memory in this post.  My Zumba teacher gets this too. Every class repeats a lot of the same moves, while keeping it fresh and adding new layers.  I get more and more comfortable each class because I know what to expect, but I don't get bored because I know there's going to be something different to learn too.


3.  Feedback:  The feedback is loud and crazy.  You're doing a good job at something?  She's in your face shaking her thing next to you, or pulling the pros up in front with her to be a fun example. Those pulled up love it and beam with pride.  You're lost or struggling?   She appears next to you doing the steps side by side.  Those fifteen seconds of one-on-one are usually all that's needed to get on track.

4.  Classroom Management:  We always start out facing the front, but we don't stay that way!  The focus is constantly changing.  Each side of the room becomes the front at some point during the class, with the teacher moving from each side - this way everyone - even in the back (where I tend to hide) suddenly finds themselves with a bird's eye view of what's going on.  Other times, the class is divided, facing each other, and even turned all the way around.  In this way, a very large class is managed at all times and she constantly knows what's happening in every corner of the room.

5.  Formative and Summative Assessment:  Most of the time the teacher is modeling all the moves.  We follow her, but she finds ways to assess how we are doing.  When she stops to watch and cheer us on, we continue on without her.  If we stumble, she can tell we don't have it yet and continues to model - sometimes even breaking it down to half-speed so we can pick it up.  At the end of class, she always encourages us to let her know how class was, and if there was anything we want more or less of to let her know.

Lesson Learned:  I've been teaching a really long time, but learning something new has given me some great teaching ideas and put it all in a new light.