In Bewegung – über die Bewegungsarbeit von Elfriede Hengstenberg (1892 – 1992)

In 1910. E. Hengstenberg began her training in rhythmic gymnastics in Dresden Hellerau, continued with Rudolf Bode in Munich and returned to Berlin in 1915. There she began to work with schoolchildren as a gymnastics teacher in her apartment, in schools and later with adults. Elsa Gindler, the pioneer of a new movement education and the talented researcher and conductor Heinrich Jacoby inspired her to rethink her way of working. Heinrich Jacoby took over the teacher training at the successor school of Dalcroze in Hellerau in 1913. Hengstenberg practiced until old age and, together with Gindler and Jacoby, is regarded as a pioneer of modern and holistic movement pedagogy.

Today the impulses of her movement work live on in more than 5000 day-care centres in Germany. In addition to Elfriede Hengstenberg’s life and work, the film also describes practical movement work in day nurseries and day-care centres.