[[alternative]]Opening Dancer’s Body Awareness:An Action Research of Implementing the Somatic Education Course for Dancer

[[abstract]] The purpose of the research was to understand the influence of dancer’s body awareness after participating in the somatic education course. By realizing dancers’ experiences of muscle tone, body use, past habits, the sensibility between breathing and movements, the improvement of body exhaustion and injury, and body attitude, we try to attempt to see whether or not their change and differences after taking this course. This study aimed to provide another reference for dance teachers to reflect on their teaching and training. In this research, we adopted the principle of action research. Seven participants were dance students in the department of the Taipei National University of the Arts. The major data collections were half-structured questionnaire and depth interview, and the portfolio, feedback, and videotaping were also executed in an assistant ways. The findings of this research were as follows: After accepting twenty hours’ course, in the initial stage of the research, dancers could immediately awake the muscle tone clearly. Then, with the increasing of the research time, they understood a tendency in their body exhaustion, and discovered the types of their body use in dance technique class obviously, especially the relationship between breathing and movement. The learning of breathing, imagery, and relaxing methods exposed their various past habits. After this course, these dancers had similar change: that was, after dancers opened their body awareness, they finally found that they had more choices, which changed their body attitude as well. However, owing to the limitation of individual differences at the research time, the improvement of their injury wasn’t evident. The suggestions were provided in the following: 1.It is important to offer somatic course in the dance education system, which can help dancers pay more attention to the intrapersonal intelligence between body and mind. 2.Dance teachers should emphasize on absorbing new knowledge, such as different ways to train and treat body, communication with the body, and more experience from within. Besides, dance teachers could use the method of action research to promote their professional teaching. 3.To establish well body attitude, dancers need to learn how to dance healthily and safely. Learning how to learn in somatic education should be put into effect for dancers, choreographers and every dance educator, and they also had to ponder their learning process, teaching strategy, and training principle.