Thought Process

At the beginning of the semester, I had no idea what I wanted to do for my inquiry project.  My first idea was ancient Egypt because I had been fascinated with that as a child and my interest in ancient Egypt had been recently resurrected by a book I read.  I wrote my first creative challenge on ancient Egypt, but I soon realized that I would struggle writing about that topic each week because I did not have the knowledge to be as historically accurate as I would want to be.  

 

So, I began searching for what really fascinated me.  Being away from home this semester in a much more urban setting than I grew up in, I began to realize how much I love the outdoors, quiet nature, and especially mountains.  I have always marveled at the moon and the stars, how the tide changes at the beach, or how the earth looks flat, but is actually spherical.  On my first visit back home, I took a hike that I had done a millions times before, but this time, something felt different about it, almost magical.  In this moment, I started to realize how much I love being outdoors and need nature to be happy.  

 

I adopted nature as my inquiry topic, but left it vague because I was not sure what about nature I wanted to study. At home in Asheville, I always did my studying outside on my back porch, but at school I had not been working outside.  I began making an effort to make sure I kept my computer charged so I could work outside by the pond.  I found that I was much more efficient with my work and I was more relaxed working outside than in my room. This lead me to narrow my inquiry.

 

Why did I feel more relaxed outside in nature? What was causing me to be more efficient?

 

Here is where I began my scholastic research.  I needed a springboard to get me started, so I began searching the internet to find some trends.

​

I began finding lots of information about negative ions and that they are good for the body.  I found many studies affirming that nature is calming and relaxing.  For example, people who took a walk in nature opposed to a walk on a city sidewalk were more relaxed afterwards.  I went on several hikes of my own to observe nature and see if I felt more relaxed afterwards.  I found that I was! This made complete sense to me, but I wanted to know what changed physically in the body that caused relaxation.  The human body has always been a fascinating thing to me and this is what I wanted to understand. 

​

When forming my final project idea, I wanted to combine what I was learning about nature with the human body.  Given that I am a dancer, I thought it would be neat to do something with dance, but what, I wasn't sure.  Then one day, an idea clicked.  I noticed how the technique I was learning in modern class was based off the elements of nature and I could connect what I was learning in these two classes. So I decided to make a dance based on nature and perform it outside to see how it felt to dance outside.  

​

I started planning out the choreography for my dance inside.  There were many factors to consider during this choreographic process.  First, I needed to cater the dance to be safe for an outside performance. Then, I needed a location safe to dance in and one that was peaceful and natural.  I also wanted the dance to reflect the elements of nature and the recent wildfires. Originally I began making a piece for multiple dancers, but this fell through due to the complexity of scheduling with several people, so I ended up having to do a solo piece. Another aspect of putting a dance together is music selection.  I wanted the dance to focus on nature, so I chose a nature sound track of bird calls and forest sounds. The goal was that the viewer of the video may not even notice that music was used in the making. 

​

I had to record the dance on two days because the first set recordings accidentally deleted. Once I had this major component of the project, I was able to begin putting everything together on my website.  I was nervous about designing the website because I have never done website work before and I normally struggle with technology.  I was proud when I figured out how to make a survey, upload a video, make slideshows, and make buttons. I was also surprised that I had fun with webdesign.  

​

I was excited to be able to learn about nature, dance, and the human body in one project! This class make me think outside the box and use new tools for learning and researching.