The Dancing Heart:
Vital Elders Moving in Community
Helping to shape the field of Creative Aging
The Dancing Heart is an award winning, evidence-based arts program and a best practice model for working with frail elders. We invite older adults and their family members and caregivers to help co-create a new vision of dance--one that is inclusive of all ages, all bodies, and many different ways of moving, exploring the "language of dance" through movement improvisation, the interweaving of dance and story, and the collaborative development of choreography that draws on their memories and life experiences. It is designed to to create a sense of community and well-being in participants of all ages, and from all walks of life. We bring The Dancing Heart weekly to long term care facilities, adult day cares, and senior community centers, working most often with elders diagnosed with dementia, where we see improvements in flexibility, energy, balance, memory and socialization of older, frail adults. We have received local and national recognition for our innovative Dancing Heart model.
We are part of the emerging national field of Creative Aging, working alongside professionals in the arts, health care, social service and community development to raise awareness about the importance of creative involvement across the lifespan. Our culture is witnessing a paradigm shift in attitudes related to aging. We are moving away from a model that assumes the inevitability of declining health and isolation toward a strengths-based approach that focuses on potential, vital engagement, health maintenance and prevention, and continued connections to community.
Read about the Dancing Heart in the Fall issue of the LLI Review.
In November, 2008, the Dancing Heart was featured on KTTC-TV, Rochester, MN. You can still read the story: Never Too Young to Dance
