Time: 6-8 weeks
Ideas for dance expressions come from many different sources such as the imagination, the environment, other dances, and personal experiences.
Sample Topic: "Music and Motion"
Suggested Resources:
1. Introductory Activities
Use music examples to discuss the concept of warm-ups. Warm-ups need to start off slow and soft, and can gradually get faster and stronger.
Play music louder and softer. When the music is loud, have the students be as big as possible. When it is soft, have them be as small as possible.
Ask students to close their eyes and create symmetrical shapes (i.e., the same on both sides) when the teacher plays a musical note, using a recorder for example. When the teacher plays a percussive note, using a drum for example, students are to create asymmetrical shapes (i.e., not matching on both sides).
Play various selections of music and decide if it would take a lot of energy to dance to it or just a little amount of energy.
Play music and have students walk throughout the room. When the music is fast, have them try to stay as far away from people as possible. When the music is slow, have students try to get as close as possible without touching one another.
Discuss with students that some choreographers get their ideas for dances from music.
Listen to various musical selections. Engage the students in a brainstorming activity to list the images, feelings, and ideas associated with the music; for example, a waterfall (image), eerie (feeling), or loud and quiet (idea).
Discuss the images, feelings, and ideas in terms of the students' understanding of the dance elements. Encourage the students to use correct dance terminology in the discussions when appropriate. For example, a crashing cymbal might make students think of punching or stabbing movements. An eerie musical selection might make students think of slow, floating movements.
Play various types of music and let students move freely to the music. Select music that demonstrates soft versus strong, slow versus fast, and/or short versus long. After students have experimented with various types of music, discuss why students moved the way they did and what feelings were evoked.
Play music with a strong rhythm and have students clap in time to the music. Select different rhythms and encourage students to try different ways of tapping out the rhythms. For example, students could tap with their feet or with their hands on either their legs or the floor.
Have the students practise making different sounds with the body. Students may start by breathing in and out using “ssss” or “shhh”. Words could be used as inspiration (e.g., prickly, bubbly, or exploding). Explore moving to the different sounds that students make.
2. Main Activities
Play some soft, flowing music and have the students practise making curved pathways in the air and on the floor. Then ask students to create some strong and sharp movements to add to the curved pathways. Discuss the contrast between the movements and the music.
Divide students into pairs and have each pair create a body sound composition to use in a dance they will create. Next, ask them to create a short dance to go with their composition. Students could include the directions of forward, backward, sideways, up, and/or down. Students could also accompany each other's dances with the body sound compositions.
Use sticks or another percussive instrument to tap out eight beats. This will be how long the students have to assume a shape. Tap out another eight beats as students assume a second shape and then another eight beats for a third. Have students repeat the three-shape sequence. Gradually, decrease the number of counts so that the shapes flow together. For example, do the same sequence to four beats instead of eight. Then, try it with two beats per shape. Remind students to make both symmetrical and asymmetrical, shapes, and to have smooth transitions between shapes.
Create a shape dance inspired by music. Play a few music examples and let the students vote on one selection that they will use as inspiration for their own dance composition. Divide the students into small groups. Have students choose a few shapes and vary how students get in and out of the shapes to begin making sequences for the dances.
After brainstorming a list of feelings that go with certain pieces of music, explore movements that match the feelings. Discuss the elements of dance as demonstrated in the movements. See the Grade 3 Appendix for ideas to use when exploring dance elements. Have students choose three or four movement ideas inspired by the music. Refine them and make a dance. Encourage students to use a clear beginning, middle, and end as well as all of the levels.
Have small groups of students show their dance creations, or record the dance creations on video for later viewing.
3. Concluding Activities
Have students describe and discuss their dance creations focusing on the elements of dance as demonstrated in each group's work. Discuss how the movements of each group match the feelings and images evoked by the music.
Choreographers are often inspired by music. Use a process such as one described in Responding to Arts Expressions to guide the students as they discuss the way music enriches the dance. Turn the sound on and off as the students view various dance video excerpts. How does the presence of the music affect the work? Watch a dance in which music is not used.
Have the students teach their shape dances to each other. They could put two dances together as one dance or perform each other's compositions at the same time.
As a reflective activity, have students write in their journals how students felt as they danced their dances. How did the music affect the movement? Could students do the same dance to different music? They could try to do the dance to a different piece of music to see how the dance elements have to change.
Watch two examples of dance that use the same type of music (e.g., jazz) with very different forms or elements of dance. Note the elements of dance in each. Discuss where there are similarities and differences in the elements, even though the music is quite similar. Why would a choreographer want to put very soft movements with very sharp music or vice versa?
Watch different dances from the Multicultural Folk Dance Treasure Chest kit and compare and contrast the elements of music to the elements of dance that go with them.
Invite a First Nations dancer to visit the class to:
Watch a live dance production and discuss how the music fits with the dance.
Use music notation symbols and pictures of instruments to create art works that could represent the dances in visual form. In other words, what would the dance look like if it were a painting?
Look at various pieces of art and decide what kind of music would be playing in that picture. From there, create a response to the art work through dance. Refer to Responding to Arts Expressions: The Creative Approach for further information.
Sample Topic: "Wishes and Dreams"
Suggested Resources:
Teacher Note:
This topic can be explored in the sense that a dream can be defined as either a hope for the future or a dream that people have while sleeping. Note that some students may not want to talk about their own dreams, in which case teachers can use the first definition.
1. Introductory Activities
Discuss dreams for the future. Ask students what they would like to do when they are older. They could write what they know about that occupation or recreational activity, and why it appeals to them. They might also include questions about that work or activity.
Guide students' dance explorations and improvisations with questions such as: What kinds of movement do students associate with this activity/work? What are the types of equipment students would need in this activity? What kind of pathways would students take? Would they be up in a building, outdoors, down in the sea, or working in space? Repeat the same movement faster or slower. Have students choose three movement ideas to string together into a dance phrase. Guide students to move from miming actions to a more abstracted (e.g., exaggerated) form of movement to help develop expression of dance ideas.
Challenge the students to picture themselves in their dream activity or profession. What kinds of movements would students be doing? Very slowly, experiment with these movements in the body. Students are likely to mime, so they may need to be encouraged to find the essential quality of the movement. For example, an extreme sport bike racer travels, jumps, and swerves, so students could practise different ways of travelling, jumping, and swerving. Have the students do similar movements with the upper or lower body, or the right or left side. Students could also experiment with individual body parts. Gradually speed up the movements, warming up the body.
Ask if anyone would like to tell about their dreams. They could complete the stem “I had a dream about ….”
Categorize the kinds of dreams that people have based on the students' own experiences.
Have students respond with facial expressions to statements like: “I have just accomplished my dream!” or “I don't know how to achieve my dream”.
2. Main Activities
Read the story of the “Nutcracker” in Tales from the Ballet . Divide the dream section into parts and brainstorm a variety of movement elements for each part. Using those sections and elements as a structure, have students create a structured improvisation to represent the dream. Music could be used as a cue for scene changes. For example:
Read poems about dreams such as those in Night Garden: Poems from the World of Dreams by Janet S. Wong. In the title poem, the bed in which dreams happen is compared to the tangled roots and blooms of a garden bed. The 14 poems are about the people who appear in dreams as they are eating, swimming, flying, running, and falling. The poems use sound qualities such as repetition, alliteration, and rhyming, to capture each dream. Use a poem from the book as inspiration for students' dance making. Refer to Planning for Students' Dance Making of this curriculum guide to guide students in their work.
Pretend that each of the students has a magic lantern with a genie that can grant them three wishes. Use these wishes as inspiration for a three section wish dance.
Have students answer the question, “If you could have anything you want, what would it be?” Have students make a dance that answers this question. Include a clear beginning and end shape, exploring locomotor and non-locomotor movement. Refer to Planning for Students' Dance Making to guide the students.
Read an imaginary dream story to the class while they are relaxed and focused. Select a story that has the potential to encourage different kinds of movement. During the first reading, have students visualize the movement in the dream as they listen to it. Read the story again while the students actually move along with the narration. Encourage them to explore speed and levels with the movement. Next, have students choose a part of the dream on which they would like to focus and select movements that go with that part. Read the dream again and have the different groups of students present their section of the dream story.
Use a story book about dreams to create a dance in response to the story. Refer to Responding to Arts Expressions.
Brainstorm a list of words connected to the elements of dance (i.e., actions, body, dynamics, relationships, and space). In small groups, create dance phrases based on an art work inspired by a dream such as Rousseau's painting “The Dream”.
Incorporate some text or narration into the dances. For example, accompany the dances with dream poetry or use the text and narration as inspiration for the dance.
3. Concluding Activities
Have students draw or write about about some wishes and dreams that students would like to accomplish by the end of the school year. They could attach a brief action plan to their journal entries or drawings and refer to them regularly, or look at them again at the end of the year to see if the dreams have been accomplished.
Create dream paintings in response to the poetry and dances.
Display the paintings and/or poetry along with photographs of still images or tableaux taken from the dream dances.
Watch the dream sequence of Nutcracker . Discuss using an approach from Responding to Arts Expressions.
Have students pick a section of one of their dances to teach to another student. This activity provides an opportunity for students to talk about their wishes and dreams together.
Have students write about what they liked most/least about the wishes and dreams dance and why.