I am in a vaporous state: a look at chaos in dance pedagogy for children

Abstract

This article focuses on the question of chaos within the processes of artistic training for children, with emphasis on dance training. Dance is assumed as an expressive practice that, more than an aesthetic language, operates as a manifestation which activates the recognition of the body and the corporealities, and enhances the creative and symbolic capacities for the construction of the self and its participation in the community. Hence the value of chaos and its relevance in discourse and pedagogical perspectives for life. A study based on the experiences of the dance training project Danza Contexto is provided. Since 2010, their activities have been developed in different academic institutions in Bogotá, mainly in schools that are part of the Educational Alliance (Alianza Educativa). The analysis around the question regarding chaos is based on an approach that we have been developing since 2014, which we have called “a pedagogy of creativity”. From this approach principles such as play, questioning, context and impulse are raised. The development of this analysis is based on the participation of the people who have been part of the project (coordinators, teachers and facilitators, participating children), whose perceptions are reflected in pedagogical reports and activities recorded during the process.