Contakids - Jitsa Konstantoudaki

Contakids - physical play for parents and children 2-4 years old

 

 

What is Contakids

Contakids is a method that brings parent and child together in the most playful way! 

Using physical contact as a key tool, and through play and dance, it fosters a deeper non-verbal form of communication between parent and child. 

Through specific physical exercises, parents and children build self-confidence, strengthen their connection and understanding with each other, and cultivate a different kind of trusting relationship.

Children expand their motor skills, learn to use their bodies in a safe and enjoyable way, and activate their own physical survival mechanisms. Through practice they become aware of their own limits and learn to function as independent and self-reliant beings.

 

History - Evolution

The inspirer of the method is the Israeli dancer and teacher, Itay Yatuv, who naturally and spontaneously started dancing Contact Improvisation with his daughter, who is only 2 years old. Since then, he has worked and developed the method, which he calls Contakids, based on several fundamental techniques of Contact Improvisation, which he has been practicing for 10 years. This new method involves combined interactive games and physical exercises for parents and children 2-5 years old.

 

What we do

In this class, we work in the most playful and enjoyable way for the parent and child, with the sense of weight, with movement principles of pull and push, rolling and falling, as well as with kinesthetic instructions that allow us to free dance eventually, and with how parent and child can interact in a more physically active way.

 

Who it's for

Contakids is aimed at children from 2 to 5 years old and their parents, or other caregivers and relatives with whom they are comfortable physically interacting. It is open to participation for both parents or one parent with two children.

 

How it works - Basic principles

At Contakids we allow the child to learn through experience and failure. Through fall-inducing exercises, creating non-stationary physical surface bases, children learn to fall. They learn how to be responsible for their own physical survival, as well as how to use their bodies functionally and effectively. At the same time, the goal for the parent is to notice when to intervene, and when the child is really at risk of getting hurt, thus exploring the boundaries of both parent and child.

Through the exercises we also encourage the child to learn to hold on to the parent, thus making the child more active and sensorially present. This develops the child's ability to feel physical stimuli and derive information through touch. Thus, by avoiding using their hands and holding the child, parents are also better able to perceive and sense what position or situation the child is in and can respond accordingly.

 

Finally, through free dance between parent and child we develop an equal relationship by proposing a kinetic dialogue where both are physically conversing, proposing, choosing and listening to each other together.

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Jitsa Konstantoudaki was born and raised in Chania. She has studied Civil Engineering at

National Technical University of Athens and has been trained in contemporary dance, physical theatre, dance and theatre.

She works as a teacher of Contact Improvisation and regularly organizes events in the field of Contact Improvisation,

Contact Jam meetings and seminars in Athens, while also conducting personal sessions

with the therapeutic method Bowen Technique.

Through her love for children and her interest in creative physical engagement with them,

she conducts Contakids and free dance classes for children and parents. Her goal is for this

method to develop and spread in Greece, complementing the network of teachers that exists

in 35 countries around the world.