Throughout Roberts’s class today I decided to focus on the development and progression of the posture and alignment of the cohort. “Somatic principles may provide useful tools in injury prevention among dancers; one proposed way in which this may be achieved is through self- awareness of poor alignment and faulty movement patterns” (Hutt, 2010, 251-260). They started the class by going through exercise seven. This exercise includes a lot of movements extending and kicking the legs. As the exercise has lots of movement in the legs, I focused on the posture because it was easy for the posture to curve when performing the grand battements.

In order to help the dancers keep their correct alignment Robert told them to squeeze their abdominals really tight to make sure they were engaging in a 25% contraction and this was to be maintained for the physical state of their dancing. I could see throughout the exercise that the posture deteriorated and towards the end, many dancers began to release in their lumbar spine causing bad posture and alignment.

The three key postural focuses within this exercise were pelvis alignment, releasing and relaxing in the hips and stretching through the back of the knees by pushing through the floor. By aligning the pelvis correctly this enhances the aesthetics of the movement and it will make sure the grand battements are performed correctly. By relaxing and releasing in the hips this will make sure the ‘baby hips’ movement is soft and loose rather than rigid and placed. By using the floor to push through the knees this will develop the length which is required in the tendus.