Michael Barraclough wrote: > > the tradition of calling the 1st 3 times fully, the next 3 partially > and the last 3 not at all. Tradition does not have to be followed, > but announcing that this will happen certainly sharpens the dancers' > attention. It is a useful tool in encouraging the dancers to > actually learn the dance rather than be spoon fed by the caller.
By dropping out gradually over the course of a dance and giving dancers just enough prompting, you're teaching them the dance without making them feel anxious and on their own. This applies to triplets just as well as regular dances. The old method of calling in full and then saying "you're on your own" actually requires more total calling from the caller *and* leads to more dancer frustration. This is because the caller hasn't built up the dancers' memories for figures by exercising them in each dance. Calling triplets as "1x-full, 1x-partial, 1x-none" isn't as bad as "you're on your own calling" but suffers the same problems. Instead the caller should watch the dancers closely and always try to give only prompts that are needed. Jeff
