Catalina O'Connor has 3+ years of experience teaching Modern, Ballet, and Creative Movement. She also has experience working in literacy intervention through AmeriCorps' Reading Partners. Through this program, she learned different strategies and activities to support literacy growth, as well as the importance of social emotional skills and learning in k-5 students. Through teaching and instruction, her goal is to let students learn about a subject or form through exploration, whether it be vocal or physical.

HeART with LINES - Assistant Teaching Artist [January 2022-Present]

HeART with LINES partners with elementary and middle schools in the Bay Area to connect dance to classroom instruction. LINES teaching artists create lessons geared towards an academic subject--such as math, a specific book, PreK essentials--and the core elements of dance and choreography--such as levels, directions, qualities, timing. As an Assistant Teaching Artist, Catalina worked with several Lead Teaching Artists and classroom instructors ranging from PreK through 7th grade. Her work focuses on giving students games and tasked based opportunities to explore dance concepts through academic lenses. She also emphasizes collaboration and teamwork in her lessons.

Shawl-Anderson Dance Center - Youth Instructor [January 2022-Present]

Catalina is currently teaching Creative Movement: Modern 5-7 and Modern for Pre-Teens at Shawl-Anderson Dance Center. She anchors her instruction in functional and safe technique as well as artistic exploration. For both age ranges, she is interested in what students are feeling emotionally and physically and incorporating that knowledge into the classroom. She often utilizes games and improvisation to explore concepts. She hopes that through play, listening, and self reflection her students can add more tools to their dance education and grow as artists.

Ace Dance Academy - Youth Instructor [August 2019-March 2022]

At Ace Dance Academy, Catalina taught students from 3 years old to 18 years old in a range of Creative Movement, Modern, Ballet, and Pointe. In her classes, she focused on somatic awareness, dynamic alignment, and textures of movement. Within her regular classes, she also incorporated special lessons such as anatomy, modern dance and ballet history, choreography, and improvisation. She also led Creative Movement summer camps and Technique & Variations summer camps each year on staff as well as choreograph for the Ensemble performance group.

American Alliance of International Arts, Culture, and Education (AAIACE) - Assistant Teacher [June 2019]

Created by Saint Mary's College of California professor Jia Wu, AAIACE spent two weeks teaching students at the American Musical Summer Camp at Suzhou Science & Technology Town Foreign Language School in Suzhou, China. As an Assistant Teacher, Catalina collaborated with an American theater instructor, an interpreter, and a Chinese music instructor. This teaching team worked with 25 7-10 year olds to guide campers in creating their own musical show. Through guided exploration, students designed their own costumes, a variety of set pieces, and choreographed sections of the musical. The purpose of the camp was to help foster creativity in these young children. Each day the kids had theater, music, and dance classes along with their rehearsals and a master class from each instructor.

AmeriCorps Reading Partners - Site Coordinator [August 2019-May 2020] & Distance Tutoring Coordinator [August 2020-June 2021]

Description coming soon