Associate Professor Ralph Buck

In one of the articles in the New Zealand curriculum that I read for an essay in Dance Education mentioned Ralph Buck, my favorite professor here. It immediately caught my eye and I thought that I would just mention what he has done, because it inspires me on so many levels! He is the head of the Dept. of Dance Studies and has worked in the dance education communities in NZ and Austrailia. Ralph has presented his research on teachers' meanings of dance and community dance in New York, Montreal, Melbourne, Lisbon, Hong Kong, and Malaysia.

So cool! I just wanted to have that down. He has so many cool experiences but yet has this fun, energetic being to him. He is one of those kinds of teachers that make you think...no THAT is what a teacher is supposed to be like.

Ralph is hilarious. He doesn't give a piss about stuff sometimes, but in a funny way. He uses the word "things" and "stuff" all the time to explain ideas and concepts which actually do the trick! It's funny because we all are understanding what he is getting at. He is very casual about his teaching as well. It may just be due to the fact we are in college and can handle naughty words, but he uses swear words and it cracks me up! It's just a part of his personality so he gets away with it.


It's about 12:40 now and I'm still up. I finished my papers...woohoo!!! I'm not that tired which is why I decided...heeeey I'm gonna blog! :D


Hot lava.

Ok. So in my blog from earlier today I forgot to mention why I titled it hot lava. Yes. Me and my "meanings." I'm such a deep person ;)

When I was younger Jordan and I used to play this game we called "hot lava." We used this red and black plaid blanket (which I don't know where it is...Kristofer probably has it :P ) but we put it at the bottom of the stairs and pretend like it was LAVA! You couldn't fall down into the lava or you'd die. I know...kinda morbid. Kids....haha. So we would be falling down the stairs and the other person would have to pull them up and save them! That's about all there was to it. We would do it over and over and it never seemed to get old.

Basically the moral of the story is that anytime I think of volcanos or lava I go back to this little childhood game hot lava and it makes me smile :)