Matt Harding, the YouTube sensation, turns his world travels into a unique book.

This rhythmic showcase of dances from all over the world features children of diverse backgrounds and abilities tapping, spinning, and boogying away! Tap, twirl, twist, spin! With musical, rhyming text, author Valerie Bolling shines a spotlight on dances from across the globe, while energetic art from Maine Diaz shows off all the moves and the diverse people who do them. From the cha cha of Cuba to the stepping of Ireland, kids will want to leap, dip, and zip along with the dances on the page!

From Buenos Aires to Paris to New Orleans, Mike and Barbara Bivona have traveled and danced throughout the world. And in this memoir and travelogue, these two dance aficionados share their adventures and experiences. Ballroom dancers for more than twenty years, the Bivonas have traveled extensively while honing their dancing skills and meeting fellow dancers. Dancing Around the World with Mike and Barbara Bivona provides detailed accounts of their experiences in Argentina, Paris, Hawaii, Italy, the Catskill Mountains of New York, the Caribbean, and South Florida, as well as other destinations. This account not only includes dancing details, but also shares the history and flavor of the exciting locales they have visited. Augmented with photographs, Dancing Around the World with Mike and Barbara Bivona also includes background information on the art of ballroom dancing, a few dance lessons, biographies of select dancers who have performed on the television show Dancing with the Stars, current ballroom dancing philosophy, and information about the intellectual benefits gained from dancing.

In these essays, dancers and scholars from around the world carefully consider the transformation of an improvised folk form from North Africa and the Middle East into a popular global dance practice. They explore the differences between the solo improvisational forms of North Africa and the Middle East, often referred to as raqs sharki, which are part of family celebrations, and the numerous globalized versions of this dance form, belly dance, derived from the movement vocabulary of North Africa and the Middle East but with a variety of performance styles distinct from its site of origin. Local versions of belly dance have grown and changed along with the role that dance plays in the community. The global evolution of belly dance is an inspiring example of the interplay of imagination, the internet and the social forces of local communities. All royalties are being donated to Women for Women International, an organization dedicated to supporting women survivors of war through economic, health, and social education programs. The contributors are proud to provide continuing sponsorship to such a worthwhile and necessary cause.

"Textbook for undergrad general education and dance courses on the topic of dance around the world. It serves as a gateway into studying world cultures through dance"--

Dance has the power to change the lives of young people. It is a force in shaping identity, affirming culture and exploring heritage in an increasingly borderless world. Creative and empowering pedagogies are driving curriculum development worldwide where the movement of peoples and cultures generates new challenges and possibilities for dance education in multiple contexts. In Dance Education around the World: Perspectives on Dance, Young People and Change, writers across the globe come together to reflect, comment on and share their expertise and experiences. The settings are drawn from a spectrum of countries with contributions from Europe, the Americas, the Middle East, Asia, the Pacific and Africa giving insights and fresh perspectives into contrasting ideas, philosophies and approaches to dance education from Egypt to Ghana, Brazil to Finland, Jamaica to the Netherlands, the UK, USA, Australia, New Zealand and more. This volume offers chapters and narratives on: Curriculum developments worldwide Empowering communities through dance Embodiment and creativity in dance teaching Exploring and assessing learning in dance as artistic practice Imagined futures for dance education Reflection, evaluation, analysis and documentation are key to the evolving ecology of dance education and research involving individuals, communities and nations. Dance Education around the World: Perspectives on Dance, Young People and Change provides a great resource for dance educators, practitioners and researchers, and pushes for the furtherance of dance education around the world. Charlotte Svendler Nielsen is Assistant professor and head of educational studies at the Department of Nutrition, Exercise and Sports, research group Body, Learning and Identity, University of Copenhagen, Denmark. Stephanie Burridge lectures at Lasalle College of the Arts and Singapore Management University, and is the series editor for Routledge Celebrating Dance in Asia and the Pacific.

Mike and Barbara Bivona have danced their way around the world, embracing the colorful rhythms of each country and culture in their travels. Now, Mike, the author of Dancing Around the World with Mike and Barbara Bivona, returns to share more of their globe-trotting adventures in part one of a new travel memoir series. While cruising the islands, they witnessed lava flowing into the surf off the shores of Hawaii and danced on a nightclub floor that once saw the white-uniformed officers of the warships anchored at the naval station in Pearl Harbor. Mike describes the thrill and challenge of learning the intricate steps of the Argentine tango in Buenos Aires and, more importantly, absorbing its proper attitude from master dancers. The brimstone fumes wreathing the slopes of Mt. Vesuvius transported them back in time, as the frozen bodies of the unlucky residents of Pompeii and Herculaneumas well as the evidence of Romans lively erotic imagination left on walls and sculptured into clayinspired numerous colorful conversations. Mike and Barbaras shared passion for art and history has led them to seek out the haunts of other lovers of adventureColumbus, Ponce de Leon, General Custer, circus impresario John Ringling, and the elderly jazz musicians in New Orleans. Part memoir and part travelogue, this volume offers you a trip around the world with the Bivonaswithout ever leaving your chair. Traveling Around the World with Mike and Barbara Bivona by Michael Bivona CPA, published by IUniverse, was a winner in the Annual Eric Hoffer Awards for Short Prose and Independent Books 2014 for eBooks nonfiction The US Review of Books reviewed by Barbara Bamberger Scott.