I have to do a ballet presentation.

School Project!!! On the history of ballet!!!!!?

• Ok so i have this huge project for school where i have to write a 10 page paper, make a product and make a power point on the topic of my choice. Well im a dancer and i love to dance and i have for 11 years now and so i chose ballet. I had to narrow my topic so i chose the history of ballet. Im done with my paper and powerpoint. Now i have to make my product and have no clue what to do. I wanted to do a video of me demonstrating the different styles of ballet and ho steps have evolved but i have to present this to a panel of judges who most likely know nothing about ballet and so they wouldnt really understand my video.. Here is my teacher's explanation of what our product must be: The Product should be related to your research and completed by you. Your parent(s) may assist you, but the principal participant is the student (think 80%/20% ratio student to parent). The product should be something that you are comfortable with sharing with others, as it will be a part of your presentation. You can have something like a performance, a work of art, photography, an experiment, a model construction, an original composition, etc. The product can either be presented live, or hyper linked into your power point presentation, which ever works best to enhance your research topic and presentation style. Ok so now i have no clue what to do. What kind of product could i do about the history of ballet... Maybe a timeline of pointe shoe progression but that is just about shoes not ballet itself.... HELP ME PLEEEEASE I WILL LOVE YOU FOREVER!

• Answer:

  A few of suggestions to narrow the topic: 1) Discuss the development of the main techniques and then you can demonstrate some of their main points: Vaganova, Bournonville, Royal Academy of Dance, etc. 2) The history of contemporary ballet from the 20th century to the present: You can talk about Balanchine and Robbins all the way to our present ballet greats (Ratmansky, Villella, Martins) and maybe do a little bit of choreography from some of their most famous works (a few seconds to illustrate more classical style vs. contemporary). 3) General history of ballet comparing the Italian Court Dances of the Renaissance to the present. You can do some research to illustrate similarities between the movements of the court dances (i.e. use of plie, releve) to what ballet technique is today. How are they different? How are they the same?