Journal 3: My Journey with Laurie

During this week I wanted to further my progress with my interview portion of my project for my community connection. For my community connection I have chosen Laurie Ewart, who is the owner and founder of Laurie Ewarts Danceworks studio in Niagara Falls. Laurie and I have had a long journey together in the dance world filled with personal experiences and memories. Laurie has been my dance teacher from age 2-16 years old. My plan to incorporate this significant individual into my passion project is to go to the Danceworks studio to have a mini interview with Laurie. The answers I will get can help show how the impact that the studio I was enrolled in, the atmosphere and the dance teachers have shaped me into the dancer I am today. I believe that her interactions with me as a dancer throughout my years of dance will play a significant role to why dance has become such an enriched passion within me. However to accomplish my goal of exploring who I was as a dancer in the beginning stages, middle stages and later stages of my dance career I need to create direct, concise questions to ask during my interview. The first step to this was to research other examples of interviews people have done in the past. Below is an example I used:

When watching this interview I found many tips I could use when writing my own questions for a dancer/dance teacher and conducting the interview. The first thing I found was that they asked about past knowledge to know more about the person being interviewed like where they grew up and their family life. I think that making this background connection helps establish reasoning for events that may have happened in their life and gives the interviewer an overall better perspective of the person. Secondly, I noticed that they asked very specific personal experiences to get detailed events on the dancers life. For example in this interview they asked about her favourite performance she was in, why she liked it and her feelings before entering the stage. I think these details are important to have a deeper connection on a personal level to gain information. Lastly, they did not only ask about the success' in the dancer's lifetime but also the challenges that guided them to their success. This is an essential part of the interview to show how they overcame obstacles in their lifetime to accomplish all that they have today.

With the tips from this interview I began to write my interview questions for Laurie Ewart:

1) What city and dance studio did you grow up in as a child?

2) What inspired you to become a dance teacher and how long have you been teaching? 3) Were there any obstacles when opening up your own studio? 4) What is your most memorable moment(s) with having me as a student in your classes? 5) If you could describe teaching me in 3 words what would they be? 6) What challenges did I have as a dancer or did you have teaching me as a child? 7) If you had to choose one of the most memorable dances you taught me, which dance would it be? 8) How has the studio evolved from when I was a child to the children taking dance classes now? 9) What were my biggest strengths and weakness' as a dancer? 10) What is your favourite part of being a dance teacher? Now my plan is to email Laurie this week to set up a day and a time I can go into the Danceworks Studio have a face to face interview with her. I think by getting a specific day and time set up it will help me stay on track with my progress and allow me to use this information to demonstrate my evolution as a dancer. With this interview I hope to explore all of my past experiences, reflect upon them and connect them to my dance career today in regards to the way dance has impacted my life.