Uppingham Goes Morris Dancing

On Saturday morning, the teachers from both the Academic English Course and the English Multi-Activity Course Accompanied the Students into Uppingham Market Square to watch the National Morris Dancing Competition.

Morris Dancing is a form of traditional dancing that dates back as far as the mid 15th century. It is usually composed of patterns of rythmical stepping and movements with items such as sticks or handkerchieves accompanied by the sound of bells attached to the clog style footwear of the dancers. Often performed by more mature members of the community, it has been a focal point of many village social lives around England.

Our students went down to the square equipped with quiz questions to answer and photo tasks to complete which involved using their English to communicate with the Morris Dancers.

Later, on returning to the classrooms, many of the groups choreographed and performed their own Morris Dances as you can see in the video at the bottom of this post.