Learning Goals

By the end of this lesson, students will be able to …

  • talk about dance and dances that they already know.
  • tell and show a variety of on-the-spot (non-locomotor) and traveling (locomotor) movements.
  • perform a short dance phrase in a large group with limited help from the teacher.
  • Understand Expectations for Safety in the Dance Classroom
Materials
  • Music player
  • Classical, instrumental, or percussion music that has differing tempi  (e.g., New Age music by Ray Lynch, Dave Grusin or Shadowfax or Penguin Cafe Orchestra is great background music. Geoff Bennet’s Music for BiPedal Movement and Next of Skin are also good options)
  • A bell or drum to use as a signal
  • Appendix 2 Anchor Chart: Non-Locomotor Movements
  • Appendix 3 Anchor Chart: Locomotor Movements 
  • PDF #1 Dance Checklist
  • PDF #2 Dance Self-Assessment
Terminology

Minds On

Whole Class > Welcome to the Dance Room

When students enter the room, invite them to form a circle (sitting on the floor, or on a chair if needed). Ask the class: why do you think we sit in a circle? Record and display responses.

Prompt: sitting in a circle makes us all equal; everyone is facing in and on the same level. Everyone is welcome in the circle.

Whole Class > Establishing Behaviour Expectations

Invite students to share what they think the behaviour expectations will be in dance class. 

Sample responses:

  • be brave 
  • be safe 
  • be kind
  • be helpful
  • be patient
  • listen
  • be curious
  • have the right to pass
  • try new things
  • laugh with others, but never at others

Whole Class > Name Games

Ask students to form a circle.  In Round 1, go around the circle and invite each student to share their name one at a time. In Round 2, invite each student to share their name and gesture. In Round 3, go around the circle again and ask students to no longer say their name, but instead assign a sound effect to go with their gesture and share these when it is their turn.

Extension: Assign students a number between 1-5. Step into the middle of the circle and hold up 1-5 fingers on your hand. The students with that number will do their sound effect and action. Repeat this holding up different numbers, or multiple numbers (e.g., 1 on the right hand, 3 on the left). Invite students to choose 2 different numbers and they now do their gesture for one number and their sound for another. 

Action

Whole Class > Introducing Dance

Introduce the word dance to the students. Ask them to turn to a partner and do the “knee to knee, eye to eye” strategy and talk about dances they have seen at family parties, live performances, on television, social media or in movies.  

Prompt: What is dance? Where have you seen dancing? What did you see?

After students have discussed with their partner, ask them to share. Record their responses on chart paper. You may, for instance, end up with a list of different dance styles or genres that students are already aware of (e.g. ballet, jazz, ballroom, Chinese ribbon dance, cultural dances, free movement, silly dancing, etc). Discuss with students what all of these dances have in common? 

Prompt: They all involve moving our bodies through space!

Individual > Exploring Personal Space

In order to ensure their safety, students need to understand how to move throughout the room (General Space) while maintaining a cushion of space around their bodies (called Personal Space). Ask students to engage a variety of non-locomotor movements (see Appendix 2 Non-Locomotor Movements) to explore the size of their personal space bubble while remaining in one spot (you may want to designate spots using pieces of tape or small mats). Ask students to glue their feet to the floor and reach their hands way out into the space.

Prompt: How far can your hands go? What happens if you bend your knees? Try it on a low level, close to the floor. This space you've just explored is called your bubble space; it's going to travel with you wherever you dance. 

Next, ask students to move throughout the general space (in silence), using a variety of locomotor (traveling) movements (see Appendix 3 Locomotor Movements), and without touching anyone or anything else. 

Prompt: Take the bubble with you!  

Using a bell or a drum, instruct the students to practice freezing when they hear that particular sound.

Individual > Exploring Non-Locomotor

Now that students have been reminded how to move safely in both personal and general space, ask them to return to their bubble spot. Use your bell or your drum to signal transitions to the students (when they should move back to their spot, when they should freeze). Ask students what movements can we do right here, without moving from our spots?  Make a list of all of the on-the-spot movements that we can do. Explain to students that in dance, we call these non-locomotor movements.  

Individual > Locomotor Movements

Ask students what movements can we do that will move us all around the room? Tell students that after we try each movement, we're going to dance back to our special bubble spot and that you will add the word to a different list, one of traveling movements. Explain that in dance we call these locomotor movements.   

Prompt: Don't forget to take your bubble space with you while you're moving so that everyone can stay safe.

Whole Class > Creating a Movement Phrase

Now that students are aware of the movement possibilities in both self and general space, explain that they will, with your help, co-create a movement phrase that alternates between locomotor (traveling) and non-locomotor movements (on-the-spot). 

Record the order of the movements on chart paper (you may also want to include pictograms that symbolize the movements or simple pictures) so that students can refer to them as they dance. 

Prompt: 

  • We're going to choose three movements from each of the lists we've made so that we have six movements all together.
  • Which on-the spot movement should we start with?
  • Then which traveling movement?
  • Then what?
  • Let's switch back and forth between the lists so that we make a pattern.
  • Can you freeze in a shape at the end?
  • Let's practice our dance a few times so that we know what comes next.
  • You can look at the list if you forget.

Consolidation

Whole Class > Sharing Movement Phrases

Ask half of the class to sit while the other half dances. You may want to call out the movements if you see that the students are forgetting. Switch roles and the students who watched can dance. After each performance, ask the students to reflect on what they saw and how they felt both as performers and as observers. Assess students using PDF #1 Dance Checklist.

Optional: You may wish to add music in the background. See the materials section for suggestions.  

Prompt: What movements did they enjoy doing? Which movements did they find difficult or challenging? Which movements did they find most interesting when they were watching? Were those different from the ones that they preferred to dance themselves?

Individual > Self Assessment

Hand out copies of PDF #2 Dance Self-Assessment and ask students to reflect on their learning.

Assessment for Learning (AfL)
  • PDF #1 Dance Checklist for anecdotal notes 
Assessment as Learning (AaL)
  • Provide feedback and suggestions while the students are dancing
  • Peer and self assessment based on established success criteria
  • PDF #2 Dance Self-Assessment