Moving Memory

Lead service provider/commissioner

Name:

Moving Memory Dance Theatre Company

Type of knowledge

Type of knowledge:

Project evaluation

Type of evaluation:

Outcome evaluation; Survey; Focus group; Interviews

Prevention service description

What’s distinctive about Moving Memory’s approach is that they use peer-led and creative practice to enable people to tell the stories they want to tell and express their individual identity. Moving Memory use movement, music, spoken word and digital projection to celebrate the vitality of participants, and to draw out each person’s individual identity. One of the key aims of the Moving Memory approach is to help challenge assumptions about ageing and to improve the health and wellbeing of participants. A specific example of this, is the Start Stomping project that involved an intergenerational (n=12, mean age=21 younger people and n=9, mean age=65 older people) group taking part in workshops and making a show together that sought to change participants’ attitudes to ageing – both in themselves and towards others by celebrating age in an intergeneration dance theatre context. Further information about impact of this project can be found under the ‘outcomes’ heading below. The Moving Well workshops can be delivered in community settings or in care homes. Moving Memory have developed a digital toolkit, they call Doris, which can be used to help facilitate a workshop. The digital toolkit allows sounds and images to be interwoven with the live dance and helps to create an atmosphere and the right environment to help participants relax and unleash their creativity. Furthermore, Doris supports dance activities including warm up-exercises, improvisation and choreographic composition. It encourages creative engagement and enables learning and feedback by playback of dances. Moving Memory have devised a training programme for people who would like to run their own Moving Well-style workshop, wherever they are located. This involves being taken through the key aspects of delivering Moving Well, including how to use the digital toolkit, Doris to help facilitate the session.

One example, of a Moving Memory project that has been evaluated is Moving Minds. This project was aimed at addressing stigma and discrimination of people living with mental health problems. The first phase of the project was to explore with a group of people with mental health problems, how they felt about living with mental health problems, over a ten week period and to produce a video that incorporated each of their individual experiences, expressed in their own way. The second phase of the project involved embedding the group in a local community interest company and the third phase has been to support the group to run itself. Further information about the outcomes experienced by this group is included under the ‘outcomes’ heading below.

Intervention/service type:

Community services; Social prescribing; Self-care

Target client group(s):

Older people; Adults with long-term health conditions; Adults with learning disabilities; Adults with mental health problems; Adults with physical disabilities; Vulnerable adults