MgA. Mgr. Hana Novotná (Havelková)
Even though I have a strong dance background, teaching music is an important part of my life. Music, for me, is inseparably connected with moving the body and therefore I try to emphasize sensing and experiencing music through the body and through movement. The experience of being a dancer and choreographer in various dance forms, styles and genres and at the same time a musician (singing, piano, Orff instruments) and amateur theatre actor constantly inspires me to look for diversity in my music teaching. After graduating with masters degrees in Music Education – Czech Language and Literature Education (Masaryk University in Brno) and Dance Education (Janáček’s Academy of Performing Art in Brno) I have been continuing my studies as a doctoral student at the Department of Music Education at Masaryk University in Brno with a focus on multifaceted design of music education. This led me to deepen my theoretical and practical knowledge of the Orff-Schulwerk approach by studying at Orff Institute in Salzburg and then accepting a music teaching internship at the San Francisco School under the guidance of D. Goodkin, S. I. Lopez, and J. Harding. After return I taught dance at Elementary Art School in Kroměříž and Music to children (3 – 14 years) at the International School of Brno.
Currently, I teach jazz, modern and contemporary dance at Janáček’s Academy of the Performing Arts. From spring 2019 I have opened an optional course of the Music-Movement Education at the Faculty of Education, Masaryk University in Brno.
Orff-Schulwerk provides me a framework in which I can incorporate knowledge from my previous studies, as well as my varied artistic experience, and allows me to share with children as well as adults my greatest interests and passions – music, dance and other forms of art. Through these media I am trying to inspire and engage the students to consciously and creatively express themselves, compose their own music and create their own choreographies and finally, by playing, singing and dancing in close cooperative groups, empower them to embrace positive habits of mind.
hanahawel@seznam.cz