Have you ever heard of the self-fulfilling prophecy? It's the phenomenon where an individual's or a group's expectation for the behavior of another individual or group serves actually to bring the expected behavior. As a dance educator, it means that your expectation of your dancer's behavior and ability can actually bring about that expected behavior… good or bad.

Here's one example where it plays out as a dance educator… There are so many decisions I wrestle with when I'm preparing a competition routine. I seem to spend a lot of time deciding which skills to include, and once I've decided, I then struggle to choose who should perform those skills. What should be a team trick? What should we do as a highlight trick? Who can I COUNT ON to perform that trick when the pressure is on? It's one of the bigger coaching decisions we all have to make.

What I didn't always realize is that my expectation of who could do the skill (and who couldn't) would actually influence the end result. That's the self-fulfilling prophecy and as coaches and teachers, it's a scary but important reality. Our expectations can become an athlete's reality.

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