Research Priorities for Dance Education: A Report to the Nation

The Research in Dance Education (RDE) project grew out of a long-term national need to know what researchers in dance and allied fields have studied over 80 years, what they learned, and how existing research impacted teaching and learning. The project set out to answer the following questions: (1) What research exists in dance education?; (2) What patterns, trends, and gaps may be identified by analysis of these data?; (3) What are the implications for understanding the scope of this information for dance, arts education, and U.S. education?; and (4) What recommendations for the future of dance arts education may grow out of this project? By illustrating research productivity in dance/movement education from i1926 to 2002 the report provides recommendations for dance education research in the twenty-first century. An additional important outcome of the Research in Dance Education project was the online Research in Dance Education database (RDEdb). (Contains five appendices and 25 tables.)