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When the children’s charity UNICEF first approached the ISTD Dance Examinations Board to discuss the merits of working together on a project relating to the teaching of citizenship, I have to confess my knowledge of the subject was limited, writes Jon Singleton.

At the time, citizenship was being considered as a compulsory subject in the National Curriculum and I was unsure how an organisation operating in the dance sector might be able to help. My uncertainty stemmed not just from my limited knowledge of citizenship but my awareness that dance has traditionally struggled for acceptance in the curriculum in its own right. The likelihood of dance being used to assist the teaching of another subject seemed remote.

However, it soon became clear through discussions with UNICEF that a marriage of citizenship and dance could prove to be the perfect partnership. UNICEF was concerned that, laudable as the new citizenship syllabus outlined in the national framework may be, its implementation in schools might prove problematic, particularly with teenagers at the Key Stage 3 level. UNICEF voiced concern that the issues citizenship addresses are often perceived as being very serious. Teenagers find these issues difficult to relate to and traditional text book teaching doesn’t always enthuse.

This led UNICEF to believe that not only was a more multi-media approach appropriate, but in order to address the issues citizenship deals with, a more practical and motivational method was required. Having worked on a musical theatre-based project before, they were confident many of the core issues of citizenship could be explained more evocatively through the teaching of dance in the classroom.

Through both organisations working together with a choreographer, composer and 40 young dancers, a multi-media resource pack called Chains was produced. Chains teaches children about human and children’s rights through topical issues like child labour, the situation of refugees and issues of global interdependence like trade and sustainable development.

It achieves this through a video that consists of six dance routines. The dances are taught through individual workshops with the choreographer and students. The workshops were specifically constructed so that children with no previous dance experience could participate and just as importantly, teachers with limited experience of dance could use the tape easily in their classes and at their own pace. Although each dance works individually, by combining them together a story is formed which can be used to create a production for a school show. The resource pack also includes a teacher’s handbook and a CD of the original music used on the video.

As the collaboration progressed it was interesting to discover that although citizenship was to become a compulsory subject in the National Curriculum, the actual method of teaching of the subject was very much in the hands of the schools. Unlike traditional subjects such as geography, which is taught exclusively by geography teachers, the teaching of citizenship was far less rigid. For example through the use of resource packs such as ‘Chains’, the subject could be taught by teachers of dance, music, drama and physical education. For the teaching of a subject still in its relative infancy this gave schools much more flexibility in its delivery.

Since Chains was launched in the secondary school market the response has been very encouraging. It is hoped that as more secondary schools take up this resource the merit of teaching citizenship through dance will spread. I also hope that this collaboration will help to encourage a broader acceptance amongst secondary schools of what dance and the arts in general can achieve if given the chance.

Jon Singleton is Head of Marketing and Publicity of the ISTD Dance Examinations Board. w: http://www.istd.org/chains