BrainDance – Valerie's Voice

Cannon Valley Elder Collegium (CVEC), in Northfield, oﬀers learning experiences for learners aged 50+, and has done so for nearly 30 years. Classes are are taught by retired professors or anyone with knowledge on a certain subject, and are usually eight weeks in length. It’s a wonderful offering.

For the second time, I signed up for a class called BrainDance through CVEC. The instructor is a professional dance artist and educator who lives in New York, but grew up in Minnesota and comes back to teach dance classes occasionally.

The BrainDance, is an “official” dance, created by Anne Green Gilbert. It is a sequence of eight developmental movement patterns (adopted from infant/toddler development) that reorganizes the brain, improves focus, and reduces stress.

It is a fun class! We practice the brain dance to music, before moving onto other movements and dances, using our creative minds plus exercising our bodies. I wish this class continued all year.

This picture makes me smile. Each week I put my mat and water bottle under this picture in the dance hall. It brings joy to my heart every time I see it. I remember it from last year too. Sometimes I’d mimic her movement in our free dance.

Each week we took time to practice a choreographed piece to the song “Imagine” by John Lennon. A fitting song for these days. At the end of our eight weeks, we put on a recital! We invited family and friends to watch our “production” and then the instructor invited the audience to join us in a circle dance…which my husband did! He couldn’t say no! Everyone enjoyed themselves.

BrainDance is described as “cultivating joy and enriching your mind, body, and spirit through the power of dance… it improves balance, strength and flexibility…” In addition to all that, I found it to be a delightful and energizing experience.

One Sunday evening, while looking for something in my junk folder on gmail, I noticed a misplaced email from CVEC; Cannon Valley Elder Collegium. During our busy moving schedule, I didn’t notice I had not received the winter class list. I took a quick peek and the class titled Get Your Brain Dancing immediately caught my attention. The description was, in part, as follows:

“Cultivate joy and enrich your mind, body, and spirit through the power of dance, one of the liberal and performing arts! We will practice safe, accessible, brain-compatible dance technique and alignment, including the BrainDance, for improved balance, strength and flexibility…”

Sign for Northfield Dance Academy where the class is held.

I couldn’t resist…I only hoped I wasn’t too late to sign up, which I did the next morning. The class was capped at 15, and I was number 18, but the instructor ok’d it.

The “X” on this photo marks my in position in this dance line when I was seven years old.

I have always liked to dance, but my experience is limited…at least one dance class when I was a little girl, going to high school dances, dancing the waltz and polka with my dad, dancing at weddings, a ballroom dance class, an Irish dance class and a Norwegian dance class. My husband does not like to dance so we haven’t much. I have often thought that one thing I’ll regret is that I didn’t dance more.

I’ve been to two (of eight) dance classes and they have been a lot of fun and good exercise. I’m learning the BrainDance (I love the title), an actual routine that involves “a series of eight developmental movement patterns that help to organize the brain, strengthen neural pathways, energize the body, and reduce stress” (based on developmental skills of infants – developed by Anne Green Gilbert, a renowned dance educator and author).

The class is very interesting, interactive and enjoyable. Who knows? Maybe this class will lead to other dancing opportunities. Dance on.