- Daniel Halkin

This syllabus is an adaptation of one originally created by Angie Hauser - special thanks to Angie and Columbia College's Dance Department for their generosity.

Here's the text of the e-mail I send to students after the first class, it includes questions that provide an opportunity for them to tell me about themselves- I often find their answers helpful as the semester develops.

The first writing assignment I give the class is to read Nancy Stark Smith's Harvest: One History of Contact Improvisation and write a response.

The following is the self-evaluation form I give the students at mid-term evaluation time. It arose from a conversation I had with Holly Jaycox, who teaches at Purdue University's Dance Department. She has found that having her students fill out a mid-term self-evaluation can be very helpful. Once a student wrote that the warm-up made them feel physically ill - until then Holly had no idea what the student's difficulty was! (Holly gave me examples of the questions she uses, and I modified them slightly to suit my style.)

Martin Keogh wrote an essay 101 Ways to Say No to Contact Improvisation: Boundaries and Trust . I consider it one of the essential readings for anyone doing contact improvisation. This assignment is an exploration of the issues raised in Martin's essay.

For more resources, click on this link: Resources for Students of Contact Improvisation