Arizona Educator Proficiency Assessments Practice Tests and PDFs

The music in Figure A, a waltz, would be most appropriate for balancés across the floor. Unlike the other choices, balancés are a movement in three beats, making the time signature of a waltz particularly appropriate for this exercise.

Katherine Dunham's style incorporated elements of African and Caribbean movement into modern dance. While her movement style is certainly less structured than ballet it is typically choreographed ahead of time and not improvised during the performance like free dance, so choice A is incorrect. Dunham's technique pre-dated postmodernism and the dance technology' movement (B and D).

Tap dance is known for making heavy use of syncopation, or a rhythmic style that deviates from the expected pattern of strong and weak beats. One of the expected patterns is simple meter (B). Polymeter (C) is incorrect because it is characterized by two unrelated rhythms playing simultaneously. Additive rhythm (D) is incorrect because it refers to a longer meter that is used in many non-Western styles of music.

Modern dance technique does not require that legs always be turned out (A), that movement quality always remain light (C), or that arms always remain forward of the torso (D). However, proper execution does require that core muscles always be engaged.

The meter, or time signature, is always shown at the beginning of the musical score, usually following the key signature or the clef. It describes the number of beats per measure, and it is read from top to bottom, which means that choice A is incorrect because the numbers are reversed. If C were correct, the meter would show a six at the top and an eight at the bottom.

A cramp roll involves stepping first onto one metatarsal and then onto the other (two taps), and then dropping the first and then the second heel to the floor. The other steps in choices B, C, and D all involve only one or audible sounds.

In jazz dance, bending backward from the knees while maintaining a straight torso is called a hinge. A contraction (B) involves a strong forward curvature of the torso and hips, an isolation (C) involves moving only one body part at a time, and a back bend (D) involves arching the back, as opposed to keeping it straight.

All of these statements are true of modern dance technique except that it does not have a set of numbered positions for arms and feet like ballet does.

A dancer is "en pointe" when she is balancing on the tip of her toe, using special pointe shoes. When a dancer balances on the metatarsal of her foot (B), this is called demi-pointe, and choices A (balancing on only one foot) and C (dancing without the support of the barre) can be done en pointe or demi-pointe.

Isadora Duncan is associated with free dance, which was the earliest manifestation of modern dance. Free dance rejected the rigidity of classical ballet, and served as a precursor to the other types of modern dance listed here.