This summer, the Jerome Robbins Dance Division hosted three interns in continuation of the spring 2019 Barnard course Digital Footprints:  Archival/New Media Research at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts.  Barnard rising Junior, Maya Weiss, an architecture and dance double major, learned informal education theory in order to create a fixed education curriculum to be shared with students in the New York City public school system. Future goals include Maya returning to teach the curriculum to 4th and 5th graders. 

During my first week as an intern, I shadowed an educational program for a class of 2nd graders from Queens. Their curriculum centered around Heartbeat, a solo where Baryshnikov attaches a heart-rate monitor to himself and dances to the changing rhythm of his pulse. As a college student entrenched in the higher levels of dance theory, it was refreshing to walk into a class of seven-year olds. No one here was talking about the aftershocks of post-modernism, or the ethics of performance. To them, dance just meant moving. We brought the kids into the Astor Gallery, where the Library had temporarily installed a marley floor. Baryshnikov loomed large on the flat screen, and we followed along as he paced, joked, and galloped around the stage. After watching an excerpt of the piece, the students called out the moves they recognized, then tried them out in the space. After dancing for a bit, we showed them how to take their own pulses, and compared resting and active heart rates. 

To me, this program epitomized the beginning levels of academic dance education. The students were given information about dance history alongside physical interaction with the material. The short lesson showed the students that watching and moving is a way to engage with dance; it’s not only about learning technique and having skill. I’ve realized that the goal of teaching dance in public schools isn’t to create an entire generation of professional dancers, the goal is to create a generation of people who appreciate dance. Giving students ownership over dance helps them understand that there are a variety of ways to engage with the art form. Dance literacy starts with believing that you can understand dance, and what better way to understand than to participate. 

As an education intern, my job was to write a standing curriculum for the Jerome Robbins Dance Division to use during class visits. I started by researching the New York City public school curricula for elementary school students. The 4th-5th grade social studies lesson plans focus on early-1900s immigration to New York City and civic duty for NYC citizens. Because of the recent Robbins exhibition, I decided to write my interpretive plan on Jerome Robbins’ personal life in relation to his work on West Side Story. The plan encompasses Robbins’ personal history; the journey from his birth to immigrant parents to his name change so he would perceived more ethnically northern European. It is an introduction to the work of Jerome Robbins, and a primer in art literacy for young viewers. 

Robbins engaged in a variety of art forms; he created elaborate collage-like journals and wrote poetry when he wasn’t choreographing. In this lesson plan, the students will look at a range of Robbins’ artistic works and, for each medium, they will use a different method of analysis. The Dance Division’s collection is not only dedicated to performance footage; a large portion is dedicated to choreographic notes, programs, and journals. It is a process-oriented archive, and I reflected that in my interpretive plan. The first materials in the plan are excerpts from Robbins’ journals. One page of the journal features Robbins’ birth name, Rabinowitz, alongside a collection of name tags signed with his stage name, Robbins. Using this piece from the Robbins collection, I created a set of activities introducing Robbins’ Jewish heritage. The activities focus on Visual Thinking Strategies, which help the students engage with visual art and draw their own conclusions from the visual information they have gathered. 

For their visit to the Library, the students will watch excerpts of choreography from the 1961 film of West Side Story. To help them process the choreography, I wrote a series of observation prompts and discussion questions, as well as a movement activity. My goal was to combine choreographic analysis with physical movement as a way to level the playing field on who gets to create dance. The last piece of Robbins material in the plan is a poem titled "Voice of My City," written when Robbins was in his 20s. The poem reflects Robbins’ complex relationship with New York City, and my aim in introducing it to the students was for them to reflect on their own feelings towards their home. For this portion, I created a group assignment, where the students can compare their interpretation of the poem to their classmates, and understand that different pieces resonate with different people.

As a throughline, the students will also be creating a fold-out collage, similar to Jerome Robbins’ journals. The idea behind this project is to give the students opportunities to reflect on their own experiences and create based on them. Each collage assignment is preceded by an example of Robbins’ work and an activity where the students interpret and investigate the piece. This way, when they go to create their own art, they are already thinking about how their choices will be perceived by an audience. The collage is also meant to be a snapshot of each student’s identity near the end of elementary school. The first assignment is a collage of their own last name, similar to one of Robbins’ journal entries. It encourages them to think about their own lineage and talk with their parents about the culture(s) of their ancestors. The second assignment is a visual representation of dance moves that the students like and remember. It’s meant to level the standard for what counts as a dance move and teach them that dance can come from any place and any person. The third assignment is a "Voice of My City" poem. This final activity asks the students to process their own place in this city, and consider their individual perspective on the place they call home. Over the course of my internship, I created a sample journal that teachers can look at as a guide alongside the diagrams within the curriculum.

My time at the Library has been a lesson in patience. Good educational programming takes time, and seeing its effects takes even longer. Working at the Library taught me that the job of a library educator isn’t to teach kids the entire canon of dance, or even to give them a comprehensive history of a specific work. The Library is a resource, and a class visit is an opportunity to give the students a taste of what is available. The majority of Jerome Robbins Dance Division patrons are individual researchers. The students who will get the most out of the Library will be the ones who come back on their own time, seeking their own answers. The role of a library educator is to open that door.

Informal education experiences are the connection point that turns strangers to the Library into lifelong patrons. Although the curriculum I wrote won’t serve any of the researchers currently using the Library, it will help create a future generation of scholars and enthusiasts. It feels like a small act now, but after working at the Library, I’m willing to play the long game.