WEST COAST DANCING - CALLS & CONCEPTS LIST

 

LESSON # 1: 1. DANCER NAMING:

A. PARTNER / CORNER / BOYS / GIRLS

B. COUPLES: HEADS / SIDES #1, 2, 3 & 4

C. CENTRES / ENDS (Teach with (15) Couples Circulate, Ends & Centres)

2. FORWARD AND BACK

3. CIRCLE LEFT

4. ALLEMANDE LEFT

5. DOSADO

6. PROMENADE (1/2 way, inside, single file.)

7. RIGHT AND LEFT GRAND /WEAVE THE RING

8. SWING ***Teach in Lesson 3)

9. RIGHT ARM TURN

10. PASS THRU / (DOUBLE PASS THRU***Teach with W&D Lesson 6)

11. COURTESY TURN

12. LEAD TO THE RIGHT

13. VEER TO THE LEFT

14. BEND THE LINE

15. COUPLES CIRCULATE

16. STAR THRU

 

LESSON #2:

17. (2 / 4) LADIES CHAIN

18. ROLL AWAY

19. NAMED DANCERS TRADE

20. CALIFORNIA TWIRL

21. SQUARE THRU

 

LESSON # 3:

22. RIGHT HAND STAR / LEFT HAND STAR (WW GRAND BOX GNT)

23. FLUTTERWHEEL / REVERSE FLUTTERWHEEL

24. SWEEP ONE QUARTER

 

LESSON #4:

25. SIDES FACE GRAND SQUARE

26. TOUCH ONE QUARTER

27. MEN RUN

28. SCOOT BACK

 

LESSON # 5:

29. ALAMO RING / SWING THRU

30. RIGHT AND LEFT THRU

31. PARTNER TRADE

32. U TURN BACK

 

LESSON # 6:

33. DIVE THRU (PASS TO THE CENTRE)

34. CIRCLE TO A LINE (Single file circulate)

35. WHEEL AND DEAL & (***Double Pass Thru) (1st couple LT 2nd couple RT)

 

LESSON # 7:

36. STEP TO A WAVE / SWING THRU

37. PASS THE OCEAN

38. EXTEND

 

LESSON # 8:

39. FERRIS WHEEL

40. FOLD / CROSS FOLD

41. FACE LEFT / RIGHT / IN / OUT

 

LESSON # 9:

42. FULL TAG

43. HALF TAG

44. WALK AND DODGE

 

LESSON # 10:

45. RECYCLE

46. TRADE BY

 

Calls / Concepts Not Covered in West Coast Dance

Centres In / Cast-Off 3/4 Etc

Chain Down The Line (In some figures use own discretion)

Circulate - Split/Box/All 8

Cloverleaf

Cross Run

Dixie Style to a Wave

Dopaso

Eight chain Thru

Half Sashay

Hinge - Couples

Ladies In Men Sashay

Separate / Split 2

Thar Family

Shoot The Star

Slip the Clutch

Spin Chain Thru

Spin the Top

Slide Thu

Trades Couples

Walk Around / See Saw

Zoom

 

 

Calls that don’t need a formal teach and can be included. Dancers can pick up after some floor time, Such as Backtrack, Wrong Way Grand, Star Promenade

 

TRANSISTION TO FULL MAINSTREAM

 

It is recommended that new graduates from the WCD program be given a "completion card" that will include a "to be completed" list of remaining calls to be learnt. Dancers can use it as follows:

• When visiting a different club, to inform the club caller how far they are along and which moves are left in their "to be completed" list.

• If they learn a call from the "to be completed" list, they can check it off.

• Once they have done the moves on the "to be completed" list, they have learnt the entire Mainstream program from standard formations.

 

They can then go back to their home club, (or any club), and ask to complete the full program from extended formations, (if they wish).

 

Callers and Clubs can help by advertising that they are "WCD friendly", (West Coast Dancer Friendly), to inform visiting dancers that WCD dancers can dance with them. Dancers will start looking for clubs that are WCD friendly when looking for clubs to visit. (Just like many country towns now have signs up that state they are RV Friendly and want people to stay.)

 

Please remember that dancers do not have to learn any more if they don't want to. It is anticipated that clubs will start operating primarily with the West Coast Program and will eventually out number clubs operating at other programs.

 

THE FOLLOWING IS EXTRACTED FROM A CALLERS ASSOCIATION OF WESTERN AUSTRALIA DOCUMENT (July 2015)

 

West Coast Dancing is a program designed to expedite the initial teaching process. The intent is not to provide a comprehensive curriculum which will make expert mainstream dancers out of our new dancers right away. It is to get them dancing a variety of calls from the most common set ups as quickly as possible. It is a compromise between teaching just the basics which would be boring for experienced dancers, and teaching the entire mainstream program which tends to overwhelm our new dancers with so much information that they bow out of the activity before becoming confident dancers. The overriding principle behind WCD is that if we hope to recruit and retain new dancers in today’s world, we need to lighten up the burden of learning we pile on people who come to sample our product and get them dancing with us. People just want to dance!

 

The first question callers always ask is: “When do we teach the rest of the Mainstream Program?”

The answer should be, “When the new dancer has the confidence and desire to learn more!” Until that time, any pressure we put on them to move forward and live up to the expectations we have of them, will only drive them away as we have so amply proven in the past. An integral part of the West Coast system is that we provide our new dancers with regular dances at their level after about 10 weeks of lessons to allow their confidence to grow and their interest to blossom before pushing onward.

 

The West Coast curriculum is compact enough that it enables us to fit in two to three classes in the year. Once a new dancer has taken the course, we need to provide them with regular dances at that level and encourage them to come back to class as helpers. Non-standard positions and new calls can be gradually integrated into West Coast level dances at the caller’s discretion. Helping with the class helps to consolidate the new dancers understanding of the calls and build confidence. Once the calls and concepts in the West Coast program have been mastered and the new dancers have a good understanding of the various formations and how to move from one to another, it is expected that learning the balance of the Mainstream program should be much less onerous. But before progressing,

 

In choosing which calls to include in the West Coast curriculum and which to defer until later, the following criteria were used: Priority was given to calls which are most commonly found in Mainstream singing call figures with the exception of calls which possessed too many combined elements (Spin Chain Thru, 8 CH Thru), calls which require dancers to make accurate turns in excess of 180° (Spin the Top, Cast off ¾) and calls which were self-explanatory and can be introduced with little or no explanation. (Separate @ one to a line, Wheel @)

 

Other calls which are not specifically listed on the teaching program are expected to come up naturally as the new dancers get a better understanding of what various terms mean. Example: Men Run is listed, Women Run isn’t. But once a new dancer understands what is required of the active and passive dancer when the command to Run is given, it doesn’t require much of a leap to have Women, Ends, Centres, Out-facers, etc execute the command to Run.