Off/Balance Dance Company’s Impropankki project has been successfully completed. As a result of the project, carried out between 2025 and 2026, an open-access resource bank called Impropankki was created. It contains 30 video-based dance and theatre improvisation exercises, complete with instructions, for use in schools and other group settings.
Impropankki was not developed behind a desk, but together with pupils and teachers. The development process began in two schools in Central Finland, where the exercises were tested, adapted and refined through a series of workshops. The final open-access resource bank was curated from more than one hundred exercise ideas.
In spring 2026, the completed Impropankki was piloted in ten schools across Central Finland. During the project, a total of 30 workshops, Hutiklubi performance visits and teacher training sessions were delivered. Approximately 2,600 pupils and nearly 100 teachers from across the region took part in the activities.
The project aimed to improve access to the arts in everyday school life and to provide teachers with easy-to-use methods for creative learning and participation. Feedback from participants was overwhelmingly positive, and the project steering group concluded that the objectives had been achieved exceptionally well.
Teachers especially appreciated that the exercises are easy to implement and fit naturally into different situations throughout the school day. Many also highlighted that the materials require no special expertise in dance or theatre, making them accessible to teachers of all subjects.
“There is a real need for exercises like these among today’s young people.”
— Feedback from a participating teacher
Although the project has come to an end, the work continues. Off/Balance will further develop the use of Impropankki and aims to make the materials available to an even wider network of schools, teachers and educational professionals.
Explore Impropankki: Impropankki (At the moment Impropankki is only available in Finnish.)
The project was funded by the Regional Council of Central Finland.
