Friday, October 10, 2014

Great Performance and Good Teaching Moment

Tossing Diabolos. What a treat!

I saw a remarkable performance last night. A troupe of middle graders from Taiwan, the Taiwanese Youth Folk Sport Troupe from Keelung, Taiwan were putting on a show of dancing, top spinning, acrobatics, rope skipping and diabolo (1. A double conical Asian yo-yo) spinning.  Average age = 14. These were very athletic and graceful young people. Very high energy.
The things they did mostly worked out fine and the coordination required to jump multiple ropes at once, or throw a top onto a 3 inch disc or keep the diabolo or indeed multiple diabolos going at once is impressive. Mostly worked out. But a few drops or trips or missed tops did happen. And here is where the real professionalism came out. In every case when something went wrong, the kids made a correction and moved on without missing a beat. No frowns, no tantrums, no pause. In most cases many performers are involved, such as 5 girls twirling and throwing diabolos at once. Someone drops a yo-yo, picks it up and seamlessly gets back into the act.
As we all know, we learn a lot from our mistakes, if we have any sense at all, and we get better by getting back in the game after an error. These kids took the good and not-so-good completely in stride, at least publicly, and are to be applauded not only for their successes, but also for their mature response to glitches.
Unlike some professional athletes I could name.


Image: http://www.taiwanembassy.org/public/MMO/Photo/15217213671.JPG

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