BERLIN 2025:
FUSION
TEACHER
TRAINING
with
Flouer Evelyn &
Mark Carpenter
2024 CREW:
BERLIN
WHAT ARE WE OFFERING THIS SPRING?
Join us this May 2025 in Berlin for a Fusion Dance Teacher Training focused on skill-building and growth. After the success of our first program, we’re returning with an even more refined, hands-on approach designed to help you deepen your understanding of partner dance and teach it at a higher level. Experienced instructors and pioneers in the Fusion world, Flouer Evelyn (Turin, Italy) and Mark Carpenter (SF, USA), will guide you through a multi-week course tailored to take your teaching and dancing further.
The entire program is meant to work through a range of skills covering everything from foundational movements to effective teaching techniques, with direct feedback on your own material. It’s a unique opportunity to learn in Berlin from two instructors who’ve helped shape Fusion dance from the beginning.
Overview:
- Week One
- May 11-15: Sunday-Thursday
- Module 1: Refining Fundamentals (40 students max)
- Module 4: Mentoring on your Personal Teaching (4 couples max)
- May 11-15: Sunday-Thursday
- Fusionauts’ Quest Festival
- May 16-18: Friday-Sunday
- taught by Flouer, Mark, and students of Module 4
- May 16-18: Friday-Sunday
- Week Two
- May 20-24: Tuesday-Saturday
- Module 2: Teaching Weekly Classes, Teaching to Beginners (20 students max)
- May 20-24: Tuesday-Saturday
Questions about the full FTT program?
Flouer and Mark are deeply knowledgeable – both in theory and embodied practice – and they love to share their expertise. Their frameworks for understanding fusion and breaking down pedagogy are both accessible and inspiring, and will change the way you think about your dance forever (in the best ways possible!)! It is clear that they deeply love what they do, and their passion for teaching is infections.
— Bea Martino, Portland, OR
Can I take the Modules separately?
Yes! Here's a Guide to Choosing Your Adventure...
There are four ways that you can participate in these two weeks to upskill your teaching skills.
- Track A: Participate in both weeks. Module 1 & Module 2
- You want to spend some extra time in Berlin and really dive into this teaching thing. You’ll level up your dancing skills as well as learn the skills to host solid local beginner classes.
- Track B: Participate in week one only. Module 1
- Level up your dancing skills alongside learning how to talk about important fundamental partner dance concepts.
- Track C: Participate in week two only. Module 2
- You want to focus on the teaching and scene leading skills.
- You are free to take modules 1 & 2 in any order, but they are both necessary to move on to module 3 or 4 in the future.
- Track D: Participate in week one, Module 1 & Module 4
- You have attended our training in 2024, or the equivalent, and are ready to do more.
DESCRIPTIONS OF THE MODULES
MODULE ONE:
Refining Fundamentals
MAY 11-15, 2025 (Before Fusionauts’ Quest)
This week-long immersive teacher training is designed to help you build a strong foundation in fusion partner dance, focusing on developing both your physical dance technique and your intellectual understanding of theory. This training is ideal for those who want to refine their dancing to the level of a teacher or are looking to enhance their mastery of foundational dance skills.
You can expect a vibrant, hands-on environment filled with personal discovery, shared insights, and, of course, plenty of dancing. This experience will help you elevate your skills, dance with confidence, and communicate your knowledge clearly to others.
Why bother to learn theory?
At some point in our journey to become better dancers we cross a threshold between physically learning and exploring dance concepts to needing to intellectually understand them on a deep level so we can use them more creatively. For some learners it helps to have this theory right away, and for others it’s much later on, usually when they start wanting to share their embodied knowledge with others.
Why should I care about fundamentals?
If you are asking this question, it’s possible you are not actually ready for this course! A phenomenon we notice all the time is intermediate level dancers trying to take advanced classes, and advanced dancers trying to take fundamental classes. This workshop is filling that gap of working on deep fundamentals for experienced dancers.
If you are becoming a teacher, working on your fundamentals will allow you to be clear and consistent when demonstrating material to your students. This is a skill that will make it much easier for your students to learn from you, wanting them to continue to invest in your classes.
What will we actually do?
Each day, you’ll participate in six hours of classes, learning directly from Flouer & Mark, as well as working closely with your peers. Session topics will include concepts such as momentum, walking, tone matching, frame, and the essence of leading and following. Alongside these core elements, you’ll also explore sub-themes such as balance and body awareness, designed to make you a more well-rounded and skilled dancer.
Proposed Schedule:
Who is this for?
- You want to become a more knowledgeable and embodied instructor in fusion dance.
- You are an experienced dancer who wants to level up your dancing from a physical and mental perspective.
- You understand the importance of foundational level concepts in partner dance.
- You like to work smart & hard. You are looking for an intense deep dive into A LOT of material, much of which will require you to practice after the week is over to obtain mastery. This is a higher education level training camp. We’ll be treating you as researchers and discoverers.
Who is it not for?*
- You’re a beginner who has only a year or two of experience with partner dance. It will be far too much information at once!
- You just want to work on your physical dance skills. This course will be both intellectual and embodied.
- You want to only work on flashy moves and advanced tricks. This course will help you achieve the skills to be able to do some of those, but we won’t be working directly on that this week.
- Your learning style is working with little material and lots of time to integrate, such as a few hours a day + social dancing. That learning style is great! But this is an intensive week. We have nine sessions together of 2 or 3 hours each, and will be covering eight topics on a very deep level. We’ll be taking you through our material in a higher education-level training style.
*If you feel like the second category is more your style, you might want to check out Camp Kaleidoscope in Bristol or Exhale Fusion Retreat in New York instead.
Apply for Module One:
MODULE TWO:
Teaching Weekly Classes, Teaching to Beginners
MAY 20-24, 2025 (After Fusionauts’ Quest)
This module is all about working with beginners and creating great weekly fusion dance classes. It’s designed for instructors who want to make their lessons fun and accessible while building confidence in their teaching style. You’ll get hands-on experience leading classes and exploring practical teaching techniques with the support of a group going through the same journey.
Why bother to learn to teach?
There are a lot of skills beyond just being a good dancer that go into making balanced, effective classes that are both engaging and feel good. Some of these are how to present in front of a crowd, how to structure your classes, and knowing what material is the most effective for your students to learn next. These are all skills that you need to work on as well as your dance skills.
What will we actually do?
Each day, you’ll participate in six hours of classes, learning directly from Flouer & Mark, as well as working closely with a small group of peers. There will be online orientation and theory workshops prior to us meeting up together, so that when we are in person we can get right down to the nitty gritty. Session topics will include learning and being able to teach both Mark & Flouer’s intro to fusion classes, comparing and contrasting our styles so you can use ours or make your own. We’ll talk about building a curriculum for local classes, some scene building tips, as well as how to communicate clearly in your classes and make them structurally sound.
Who is this for?
You want to start teaching local classes, hosting local practice groups and/or build a local fusion dance community.
You have spent at least a couple years consistently partner dancing.
You want to learn more about the skills that go into being a great teacher, rather than just how to dance better.
You are willing to commit and invest in a week-long intensive with like-minded folks that
You want to plug-in to the greater European fusion scene by meeting other folks who are building local classes.
Who is it not for?
You’re a beginner who has only a year or two of experience with partner dance. Keep sticking with it, and when you are ready we’d love to work with you!
You just want to work on your physical dance skills. This course will be about learning the skills around being a teacher, not level up your dancing. Consider attending Module 1 if you want to work on leveling up your dancing.
Your learning style is working with little material and lots of time to integrate, such as a few hours a day + social dancing. That learning style is great! But this is an intensive week. We have nine sessions together of 2 or 3 hours each, and will be covering a lot of material.
Apply for Module Two:
MODULE FOUR:
Mentoring on your Personal Teaching
MAY 11-15, 2025 (Before Fusionauts’ Quest)
Are you ready to develop your personal teaching style at a high level and get mentored in an in-depth way? Module 4 is created to get personal attention from Mark and Flouer and teach at a large festival.
Participants will have the option to bring their own partner to develop their classes with, or be paired with someone before the week begins. The cohorts will be small, a total of four couples, to guarantee as much time mentoring with Mark and Flouer as possible. Each couple will teach either one or two classes during the weekend festival, depending on the festival organization.
This provides an invaluable opportunity to apply your skills in a real-world setting and receive constructive feedback.
This year it is mandatory that Module 4 be taken alongside Module 1, as we believe that in order to be excellent instructors we need to be well versed in both our physical partnering skills and be able to talk about them in depth.
This module will give you the personal practice and tools to create immersive workshop experiences, structure classes effectively, and manage diverse groups of students. Whether you’re preparing to teach locally or expand to regional events, this training will sharpen your ability to design and deliver high-quality workshop classes.
Proposed Schedule:
Who should apply for Module 4?
- You have either participated in the FTT 2024, or you have the equivalent in training or experience.
- Relevant group teaching experience outside of the fusion community can be taken into consideration, such as in other dance styles or arts.
- You have a partner with whom you want to deepen your teaching style and partnership dynamics.
- If you don’t have a partner you are applying with, you can apply singly and we can pair you with someone appropriate if another solo teacher registers.
- You have been exposed to the concepts presented in Module 1 before- such as tone matching, frame, momentum movement, and the significance of posture shifting for different partner dances.
- Though you will be deepening and expanding your knowledge significantly, we want you to be in a position where you are not totally overwhelmed by taking both modules at once. Online private lessons are available leading up to the week if you think you are a good candidate but there are a couple of terms that are not familiar to you.
- Though you will be deepening and expanding your knowledge significantly, we want you to be in a position where you are not totally overwhelmed by taking both modules at once. Online private lessons are available leading up to the week if you think you are a good candidate but there are a couple of terms that are not familiar to you.
Apply for Module 1 & 4:
Woah. just, f*cken great. Incredibly informative, inspirational. I’ve come away with so many ideas for ways I can run classes and events. Challenging, sometimes very challenging, balanced by being supportive and safe.
— Rowan Queerly, UK
MORE DETAILS ABOUT YOUR EXPERIENCE
Where will we be?
The beautiful studio we have reserved for our two weeks of classes is called Spreefeld. It has well maintained wooden floors and a wall of windows for natural light during the day. We’ll be here during the weekdays. On the weekend we will be at the venues for Fusionats’ Quest.
The address is: WEG Spreefeld Wilhelmine-Gemberg-Weg 14, 10179 Berlin
**Upon your acceptance we will enquire about your interest in a group housing situation.
What is Fusionauts' Quest?
Fusionauts’ Quest – A fusion dance festival
An adventure in outer space – exploring the dance floors of Berlin and bringing you deeper into your dance connections with workshops and soaring soundscapes.
Three nights of parties in some of Berlin’s finest venues, and weekend workshops with Flouer Evelyn and Mark Carpenter + Special Guests from the teacher training program.
What is the application process? The deadlines?
🎟️ Applications are an important part of this experience. Because this is such a tailored program, we want to get to know you a little before we spend a whole week with you.
🎟️ A video of your dancing is required, even for Module One! If a picture is worth a thousand words, then a video is worth an entire novel. It is so helpful for us to see you dance, so thanks for grabbing your friend at the social and having them take a video of you.
🎟️ Deadlines: First round of applications close on January 13th, 2025.
🎟️ If we are not full after the Jan 13th deadline we will do rolling monthly admissions, you will get notified of acceptance at the end of each month, until we are full.
“Wow, this course was great! Very intense training in a warmhearted space. Flouer and Mark managed incredibly well how to switch between the dance practice and the meta/ teaching realms. To see their tactics and applied insights* at work straight away was very inspiring. (*I guess that’s called experience!).”
— Jeanine Ebnöther Trott, Switzerland
How much does the training cost?
The cost of one week training is €450, and €700 to take both weeks. **
If you were a participant of last year’s FTT 2024, there is an automatic €100 discount for you to attend any of the trainings this year.
What’s included?
🚀 Four and a half days of intensive small group training. And we mean intensive!
🚀 A party pass to the weekend festival, Fusionauts’ Quest, and an option to purchase a weekend class pass at €80 outside of the lottery.
(Module 4 participants have a full pass, since they will be teaching.)
🚀 Evening activities including social dancing and class previews.
🚀 Ability to ask the teaching staff for individualized support during the whole week.
🚀 Social time and rest built in so we don’t burn out together.
** In our effort to make this training accessible to as many people as possible, we’re offering a sliding scale option. If you’re able to pay a bit more than the standard tuition, your contribution will directly support those who may not be able to pay the full price. If you need financial assistance, once accepted, we’ll do our best to work with you to find an amount that works within your means.
Do you still have questions?
If you have positively read through this website as well as the main FTT site here, please feel free to reach out to one of these contacts:
Logistical Questions – Fusionauts’ Quest
Training Content Questions – Flouer Evelyn