Movement-based experiential learning in dance/movement therapy graduate education: facilitating and hindering factors for competency development

Abstract

Dance and movement are used as the primary means of learning in graduate education programmes for dance/movement therapy in the United States. This paper reports the findings of a qualitative study that used thematic analysis to identify factors that facilitate and hinder student learning in movement-based experiential learning. Learning was facilitated when the learning community, the students, and the faculty worked synergistically and enabled the students to enter personal journeys into developing competencies and the self of the therapist. Factors that hindered learning were those that were internal to the learner, such as their mental, emotional, and physical states, as well as factors that were external to the learners. These included lack of clarity about the purposes for experiential learning, unclear boundaries, and lack of structure. Social constructivist embodied pedagogy is proposed as a pedagogical philosophy for movement-based experiential learning.

Keywords:

• Dance/movement therapy
• dance movement psychotherapy
• experiential learning
• movement-based experiential learning
• competency development
• social constructivist embodied pedagogy

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Eri Millrod

Eri Millrod PhD, LPC, NCC, BC-DMT is the Director of the Dance/Movement Therapy Concentration in the Master’s program in Clinical Mental Health Counselling at Rider University. She was a dance/movement therapist for over 20 years with clinical experiences in psychiatric, addiction, and dual diagnosis treatment. She earned her PhD in Creative Arts in Therapy from Drexel University and MA in Dance/Movement Analysis and Therapy from New York University.