WebQuest
Dance in Early Childhood Education (Pre-K - 3rd Grade)
Process
- Remind yourself of your goals of facilitating dance education in Pre-K through 3rd grade. Examples of this according to Anne Dunkin are 1. expressing dance as an expressive and creative art form 2. Understanding the value of physical fitness 3. Developing an appreciation for dance 3. Linking academic subject matter with arts education and physical education 4. Developing communication and collaborative skills 5. Reinforcing spatial and temporal relationships 6. Connecting with cognitive learning through physical movement 7. Developing creative thinking and problem-solving skills 8. Fostering understanding of historical and cultural contexts
- Incorporate the four elements of dance into your classroom. These four elements are body, space, time, and energy. Anne Dunkin discusses each element in detail. Think about each of these yourself, and then learn them with your students. The first one is body. When dealing with body you should remember that the body is the moving instrument. Think about if the entire body is moving, or just specific parts. What is the body's shape when doing different movements - is it curved? Straight? Presenting? Closed-off? Think about the contour. The second is space. This can be the space that is your personal space, however think of the ways your body can move through space. There are many directions that can be reached from moving yourself or simply reaching and stretching. Think about shared space which is the area you are in with your students, this can be what they make of the area - ex. if there are poles in the middle of your space and you have to always think about where they are in relation to you and work that in then they become part of your space. Shape is another aspect of space. This can be the shapes you make or the shape of the space. It can also be the formations you make with your students, or the students make within themselves. Level is another aspect of shape - this means whether you are low, middle, or high. If you are crouched down, that would be an example of low; if you are on your tippy-toes and reaching upwards, that would be an example of high. Another aspect is direction - whether you are moving forwards, backwards, sideways, diagonally. The last aspect of space is pathways. This can refer to parts of the body, or the body as a whole. Are you moving straight? curved? zig-zagged? The third element is time. The first aspect of time is duration which is of course the length of the movement. The second is the pulse which is the underlying beat of the movement. There is also the rhythm which is the beats of the movement. Next there is tempo which is the speed of the movement. And finally there is syncopation which is an unexpected accent in the movement. The last element is energy. The first aspect is light vs. heavy. An example of a heavy movement would be pushing a big block around. A small movement would be scratching your nose. The next aspect is if it is a direct or indirect movement. If you have a path do you go straight there? Or do you go all around the space before arriving there? Finally there is bound vs. free flow. This is if your movement is tight or if it is more flowy and smooth.
- Use different basic activities that correspond directly with the age group you teach. These are easy to find in different books, such as the ones I have listed as Resources throughout this webquest, and on many websites. I will list a few examples. The first is aimed towards Preschool-Kindergarden students and has to deal with weight shifting. Start out by having your students stand on one leg, and then the other. Practice walking and shifting their weight. Once they master this, have them march in place, making sure they lift their knees high. Have them them march around. Once they accomplish this have them move around with weight shifting and change tempos. Another example is aimed towards 3rd graders. Start out with them in their own space. Give them words such as 'falling', 'rising', 'pulling', 'pushing', 'bending', 'straightening', etc and tell them to act these out without traveling. Then try giving them a specific body part to use these words - ex. right arm, fingertips, foot, torso, etc. Then have them change levels and other attributes of space, they can now move throughout the room. After that change the tempo. And finally have them use the different attributes of energy. There are so many different activities to do - you can even use activities such as the Hokey Pokey.
- Incorporate dance into your lesson plans. This is the most vital point. There are many ways to do this, so I will use some examples. Look at the examples and then your lesson plans and see how dance can be involved in your lesson. The first example is with reading. The lower grades would be you reading to them, and the higher would be them reading. I find this most helpful with the middle grades - around 1st grade because they are just learning to read. Once the story is finished being read, have your students get in groups and act out the story by dancing - not speaking. This will help them think critically of what happened in the story and how to express it which will help them to retain what they learned from it. At the same time they will not be stuck in their seats and get antsy because they will be moving which is proven to be very beneficial for students - especially at these young grades. It's basically a fun way to review. Another example of incorporating dance into your classroom would be with math. At this grade level students are learning the basis such as '2+2=4' and '10-10=0". Incorporating dance will especially help visual learners. You can do this either by bringing students up to the front of the classroom, or put them into groups. Dance the problem out. Have two children hold hands and then ask the class how many students are holding hands. Once they say 'two!' point to two more children who are holding hands and ask them how many they are. When they answer 'two!' again, put the four students together, still each group of two holding hands, and ask the children what happens when the two groups of two join. They should answer 'four!'. Repeat with other students doing other problems. This may not seem like dance, but movement is dance and this is choreographed movement. Depending on the grade you could make the movement more than what I just described because, for example, 3rd graders could handle more of a task than a pre-school student. You can even incorporate silly movements to make the children laugh because that can help them focus. Another example of incorporating dance into the classroom is with foreign language. Some schools have languages in the low grades, and some do not, so of course this may not apply to everyone. For example, if they are learning the body parts in Spanish, you can do the 'Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes' dance while listing the body parts in Spanish. If they are learning directions, you can incorporate moving different directions and say aloud the direction they are moving. You could even make a dance, or have them make a dance, using different terms that they have learned and saying them aloud while doing the dance. There are many ways to intertwine foreign language and dance. An example of incorporating dance into a science lesson is if the class is learning about the planets, for example, you can have somebody be the sun. Then assign other students to be each of the planets and teach them how they orbit the sun. They will all move in their orbit patterns around the sun. Incorporating dance into social studies is another example. If your students are learning about where the states are, you can make a big floor map of the states and have them 'hop to Arizona' or 'skip to New York' etc. This is a good way for them to learn the names of the states, where they are, and where they are in relation to each other. Put some extra thought into whatever your lesson is, and surely there is a way to work in dance. The extra time you spend will be worth every moment for your students. *See video below in the Resources section of this page for an awesome example of a teacher using dance in a grammar lesson.
- The final step I have for you is to reflect. There are so many examples of how, when properly incorporated, dance will make a drastic change in helping a student (simply look at my resources, or google articles and you will be amazed at how passionate teachers are that this works!). First sit down and make a list. Think about problems you were having before incorporating dance into your classroom. Did these problems change? How did they change? Think about what did and did not work in your classroom. Did it ever get out of hand so they lost sight of the lesson? Did it help to make a lightbulb go off in a student's head about a particular topic? Really truly have an honest reflection with yourself and write it all down. Go back and review it. If you see improvement then keep doing what you are doing. If you don't - or don't see enough, come back and take another look at this webquest. Do some of your own research. Discuss what happened with other teachers, friends, etc. They may see something that you didn't even realize you were overlooking. Then come up with some new lesson plans and ways of incorporating dance.
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