April 3, 2006, 5:33 p.m. (Message 44969, in reply to message 44938)
Malcolm wrote: > The worrying thing about the children dancing in Scotland is > that despite the fact > these large groups of children have been dancing at festivals > for years, the average > age of the dancer seen at a Scottish dance in Scotland is > increasing. > > It might be something to do with growing up, fitting in with > the crowd, and the many > more pleasurable things available to try, but I always find > it sad that young > competitive highland dancers rarely transform into the next > generation of Scottish > Country dancer. Why do we concentrate efforts on getting children dancing? They're far too fickle. It's the adults we need to hook. If we can get the students and newly free parents (whose children are now old enough they can start to have a life again) they're much more likely to keep it up long-term. > And there is plenty of anecdotal evidence to show that the > year end school Christmas > dance was the place where Scots were turned off SCD for life. In my experience, (both personal and from talking to other people who grew up in Scotland) no-one liked the lessons, but everyone enjoys doing it once they start going to real ceilidhs, and are glad then that they had the lessons. Cheers, Ian Brockbank Edinburgh, Scotland xxx@xxxxxxxxxxxxx.xxx http://www.scottishdance.net/