Check out this creative movement lesson plan you can use with your littlest dancers! Fun, educational and tons of ways to adapt it to make it your own!
LEARNING OBJECTIVE: By the end of this lesson, students will be able to differentiate between straight, angular, circular and curvy space patterns.
ASSESSMENT:
· Students verbally identify pathways and locomotor movements from a variety of video clips
· Teacher or volunteer demonstrates various pathways and students draw the pathways as they are observing
· Use of Matchbox cars to demonstrate or “drive” the pathway
MATERIALS:
· Music
· Matchbox Cars
· Video Clips
· Large sheets of paper and crayons
· Map
WARM-UP: Create a warm-up with “Under the Sea” theme. Emphasis on Mermaid/Sea Urchin characters to include:
· “Submarine” start of warm-up to include follow the leader (i.e. teacher) and travel around the room in different pathways before settling into beginning spot on the floor.
· Progression of “swimming” through space in different pathways
· “Floating” series will include space patterns
· All stretches will include transfer into slow, locomotor stretches through pathways
MOTIVATION:
· Students will identify pathways from short, video clips (i.e. The Road Runner running straight, ballerina performing piques turns in a circular pathway, race cars making angular sharp turns, etc.)
· Ask students, “Do all people walk in a straight line all the time?”
· Pull out map and ask students the pathway from A to B? How do we get there? What is the pathway pattern?
LESSON INTRODUCTION:
Prompt for prior knowledge: Do you walk in a straight line all the time?
Teacher’s Goal: By the end of this lesson, students will be able to differentiate between straight, angular, circular and curvy space patterns
EXPLORATION:
· Walk, run, skip, jump, march, slide, gallop, crawl, slither, hop, etc in a straight pathway
· Perform them forward, sideways and backwards
· Change tempos to slow, medium and fast
· Perform solo, then with partner, then in groups
*Repeat this with use of circular, angular and curvy space patterns
DEVELOPMENT:
· “Race Car” Follow the Leader- Students now become the race cars. Teacher calls verbal cues of the pathway to be followed (i.e. straight, angular, curvy, circular.) Begin with follow the leader as one volunteer leads that pathway to be followed. Progress into freeze dance. One person (or “race car”) travels alone while other “cars” are frozen.
CREATING/SHARING:
· Drawing Center: Partners draw their “pathways map” together and then dance through the pattern they create.
CONCLUSION: Students reconvene in the class “Submarine” in the center of the room and slowly stretch (with no leader this time) and travel through space. Dancers wind down and decrease their tempo until they are in stillness and lined up to exit the class.
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