Bad Knees?
Dancing Smart Newsletter
December 1, 2005
Announcements
I'm sending the newsletter out a day early as I'm traveling tomorrow to visit my daughter and help her celebrate her 20th birthday! Time flies so quickly, doesn't it? Especially watching your children growing up.
I'm so excited to announce that inspirational dance posters that were created especially for my Dancing Smart newsletter list are now for sale. (At an excellent price, too, I might add) At a recent seminar I attended we discussed how important it is to keep your dreams and plans in clear view – where you are reminded of your dreams on a daily or even hourly basis . This inspired me to find beautiful photos and add a quote that reminds dancers why we dance – it certainly isn't because we make loads of money right out of college, is it? As dancers we are unique creatures, willing to work incredibly hard to share our love of movement. To you, my dancers and dance teachers, I dedicate these posters.
Go to www.thebodyseries.com and click on the product button to view a larger image of the posters. (Orders that come in today will go out in tomorrow's mail, orders over the weekend will go out in Monday's mail)
If photos of the posters are not in the space above please go to www.thebodyseries.com. I'm just learning how to put images into the newsletter - it's very exciting, but I'm still working out the bugs. Order now to receive your posters in time for holiday giving. They'll be sent asap via priority mail.
Question of the Week
What a wonderful pleasure to have met you at the Dance Teacher conference in NY and now to receive your educational and very interesting newsletters. My question for you is: a large percentage of my teen jazz and tribal dancers are coming to me with "bad knees" or recent knee injuries from skiing or skateboarding, or recent soreness.
I have been graced with "good knees" and I honestly don't know what I am doing to increase their soreness. I am very conscious about floor work, that we use kneepads, but how do I do a warm up or dance without pliés? Is there any one's video you can recommend? Should they ice after class? Do jazz sneakers help or hinder? I feel super trained in choreography and directing, but I feel the deep need to learn so much more on injury prevention. Are there injury prevention workshops held anywhere?
Thanks, Ra-el
Deb's Answer
It's true that our dancers will often bring their 'other' injuries into the dance class and notice it because of the demands of dance. With any knee injury, no matter where they did the original injury, my suggestion would be the same. Listen to your body and work within the constraints of the injury.If you have students coming into class with knee injuries that occurred outside of class then they should self monitor what feels okay or not. Take note of what bothers their knees. See if there is a pattern to when they hurt. If their knees hurt all the time, and they have not yet seen a doctor strongly encourage them to do so. Icing is always a good idea after class, as a way to calm down irritated or inflamed joints and/or muscles.
Pliés are not inherently bad for knees, and I would not take them out of class. They are a foundational movement for so much and train the dancer in correct alignment. Kneepads are essential to soften the force of rolling and moving on the knees, it is great that you require them to use kneepads.
I suspect that these dancers may be having a problem with their leg alignment and the knee is showing the strain. Watch carefully and see if the alignment of their feet, knee and ankle are in a line. Are they turning their feet out too much?
It is not uncommon in ethnic dance that when you are moving or jumping into second position plié, that the dancer has their feet more turned out than what they have in the hip. When the knee is bent as it is in second position, you can create more turnout at the knee joint than is optimal. Then if you lean to the back or side with your upper body as you are moving in this plié position you can add even more torsion and stress to the knees. The solution would be to lessen the amount of turnout at the feet and watch the placement of the pelvis.
Also check if any of the dancers are pronating or rolling their feet in. This occurs for the same reason – they are trying to get more turnout than what their body is designed for. This is when the jazz shoe actually comes in handy, as I have had some dancers who pronate put an arch support in their jazz shoes to help control the tendency to roll in.
Finish class with stretches for the hip flexors, such as the runners lunge and quad stretches which balances out all the time spent in flexion.
Your students are lucky to have you for a teacher. You are clearly dedicated to learning as much as you can to helping your students enjoy dance without injury. I'm pondering whether to offer a workshop this summer for teachers and will certainly let the newsletter list know what I decide.
Until next week,
Deborah