Dance – UWS BA ePDPs

Drama and Dance 21/11/2017

Similar to every week of the Integrated Arts module I have been able to improve, develop and acquire new skills, this weeks focuses where dance and drama.
This week’s inputs started off with a lecture formed on dance in education, from the lecture I was able to gather why dance is important in education, implementation of dance and the role the class teacher. Within the Expressive Arts dance should always underpin creativity, creative dance is the idea of allowing the children to use their imagination to chorography and create a dance, in essences creative dance should not be teacher led in fact a child led activity (Cone, 2009). Creative dance should always be enjoyable, engaging and empowering for all children regardless of dancing ability (Pain et.al 2014). Paine, et.al ( 2014 p.1) elucidates dance as “means of human expressions” hence dance is a form of communication. “It (dance) requires no equipment apart from the body itself (the instrument) and a space in which to move (the medium)” (Paine et.al, p.1). The class teacher plays a fundamental role in children creative development through dance, first and foremost it is imperative that the teacher equally consider ideas and innovations of all children. Likewise, it is important that the teacher provides a safe, engaging and supportive learning environment, teachers should have knowledge in regards to the 10 basic dance skills, this will ensure that all children have a starting level and are able to build upon these 10-basic movement and is a beginning of their creative dance (Cone, 2009). Many would allude that dance is solely concerning physical development, however creative dance develops children social skills which is aspects of the creative skills definition and the creative process (Scottish Government, 2013). Creative dance enables children to make enlightened and analytic judgement, work in partnership with peers, develop thought processes, empowers confident individuals and improves children’s aesthetics awareness (Paine et.al , 2014 ).
During this the dance workshop we were focusing on developing our group routines from the previous week, however the class decided to use the theme of Christmas instead of Halloween, we used the foundation of the previous routines to develop new dance. Student took leadership of the warm-up, cool-down, starter game, 10 basic movements and visual stimulus relating all to the theme of Christmas, this enabled for us to understand what we have acquired over the weeks in regards to dance and our confidence and teaching ability in leading a creative dance lesson. The group I was working with were given visual stimulus we created five pictures as our stimulus of:
• An elf
• A present
• Christmas tree
• Fire place
• Santa

We then proceeded in supplying the picture stimuli to groups and the groups were tasked in developing a 4-count movement to express their stimuli. We continue to build onto our routines by starting off with a whole class dance and then separating into our groups to perform our initial dances. I thoroughly enjoyed this week’s dance inputs as we were all given the opportunity to create our own dance under the guidance of the lecture. Relating this week’s dance inputs with Tallis Habits Pedagogy Wheel I believe I was able to be imaginative due to understanding the 10 basic movements, using this understanding to create a routine and then evaluating what improvement were need.
The drama input was centre around micro-teaching, in which my group presenting our drama lesson. The group I was working with we decided to plan our lesson based on the Children’s story ‘The Three Little Pigs’. We thought it was appropriate to use a video as visual stimulus for our audience, we had serval video options to choose from and our final decision was to go with a video that contained subtitles this meant within a diverse class all children would be able to follow the story along and be included regardless of needs. Throughout the micro-teaching lesson, we used skills and teaching methods that we had acquired throughout the module in order to develop the story as well as the skills of the audience. It was great to see all the audience engaging with our lesson and drama conventions. Considering this experience to the Tallis Habit Pedagogy Wheel I would say I was within the ‘collaborative’ segment as I had to work and co-operate with my group to develop and produce the micro-teaching lesson, likewise I had to present the lesson peer audience and use peer feedback to reflect upon the lesson.
During this week’s inputs I have been able to enlarge my understanding in regards to performing both within drama and dance. Dance is based on communicating through movement where drama is communicating verbally, however linking both drama and dance messages and themes can be conveyed through non-verbal movements and expressions.

References
Tallis, T. (2013) Tallis Habits Pedagogy Wheel. [Online] Available: http://www.thomastallisschool.com/tallis-pedagogy-wheel-guide.html. [ Accessed on 30 November 2017]
Cone (2009). Following their Lead: Supporting Children’s Ideas for Creating Dance. [online] Available: http://moodle.uws.ac.uk/pluginfile.php/109357/mod_resource/content/1/Purcell%20Cone%20%282011%29.pdf. [Accessed: 30 November 2017]
Education Scotland. (2013) Creativity Across Learning 3-18. [Online] Available: https://education.gov.scot/improvement/Documents/cre39-impact-report.pdf. [Accessed 1 December 2017]
Paine, L and National Dance Teachers Association. (2014) Complete Guide to Primary Dance. 1st ed. Not Stated: Human Kinetics

Integrated Arts Week 12 – 28th November 2017

Today we finalised our section dance. Due to low attendance, both sections were asked to come together to create a dance to be filmed. This meant that students from both sections had to learn the various steps of each other’s dance; this was an effective way to build our tolerance for ambiguity. Once recorded, we …

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Dance and Drama 24/10/2017

During this week’s integrated arts inputs, we focus on dance and drama. I found both inputs to be enjoyable and extremely engaging. Similarly, to the visual arts and music I feel that each input within this module is enhancing my self-esteem, capacity and knowledge within all aspect that underpin the integrated arts education.
The initial input was dance, this was our second dance input, during the previous week we produced a group dance using the ten principles of creative dance. According to Cone (2009) creative dance for children should be fun, safe, meaningful and most salient creative dance should be a child led activity. It is paramount when teaching children dance to demonstrate the movements, that the children are to incorporate within their routines (making reference to ten principles of creative dance), likewise ensuring that their creative ideas are kept within reason of the learning intention and success criteria. Over the past two weeks of dance I have been able to reflect upon why I should embrace dance as a perspective teacher. Creative dancing provides children with a wealth of opportunities;
• A sense of empowerment and achieving
• Improves physical and mental wellbeing
• Acquiring communication skills and cooperative working with peers
• Increases self-assurance which can be transferable across the curriculum
• Creative dancing enables children to bring their ideas to life and express themselves in a diverse way, rather than the usual teaching conventions.
The principle objective of the dance input was to consolidate and build upon our dance routines from the previous week by using a variety of dance related techniques, we initially practise our routines in order to refresh our minds. Bloomfield (2000, p.49) denotes this method of creative dance as “pure dance”. “Pure dance” emerges solely from the “rhythmic, spatial and dynamic structures of movement” (Bloomfield, 2000, p,49). They are notional in essence and the children’s knowledge of their routine is constructed on their individual capacity to acquire the basic movements of dance (Bloomfield, 2000). Once we improved the fluency of our group dance, we came together with the rest of the class and together we created a further 10 movements (0-9), after we established these movements we went back to our original groups and used one of our phone numbers to create additional sequence to our routine, within the primary setting an interdisciplinary approach can be deployed, for instance I could give each group 11 maths question that they children have to answer in order to find their 11 movements. Again, we refined our routines with the additional movements, also furthering the routines with adding effects such as cannonball, changing place and a beginning/ end. Similarly, the lecture gave each group a different picture (relating to Halloween) when then created a movement for our pictures and can together as a class. We then combined each movement that where inspired from the pictures, this is the beginning sequence of every groups routine. Bloomfield (2000, p57) sums up what we have learnt during the dance inputs nicely; “preparatory experiences when children experiment and build upon their short sequences and phases from which they gain their experience from creating a complete dance. So far, I have found the dance input to be rather stimulating, before the input I did not particular like dancing, but I have gained self-confidence and empowerment by creating dances and performing in front of peers. I feel I have acquired enough understanding to implement creative dance within a primary setting.
The second input was drama, the nucleus was ‘Falling into Stories’. This method of drama is employed by the teacher using a story as stimuli and is when the children think about the story by using drama to create a response to the scenes that occur within in the story. This is language in action using drama. Bloomfield (2000, p.39) establishes the important of the written text “is the representation of a performed work and may be a detailed published text specially written for children, an overview scenario put together by the teacher or children”. When teaching drama, it is vital to bear in mind the subject of drama is fluid and there is no complete lesson plan, as a teacher it is rightly to create a beginning and an end, the middle part of the drama is unknown, there is where the children have the freedom to create their own drama. What I gathered from this input is drama can be anything, as long as the teacher follows the drama convention to lead the learning. During the input we explored the children’s story ‘The Tunnel’ by Anthony Browne, which is about an unfriendly relationship between a brother and sister with very different characters, but a significant event happens and at the end the brother and sister appreciate their relationship. We looked at different drama convention we can use;
• Freeze frame
• Though tunnel
• Improvisation
• Hot seat
• Teacher in Role
• Vox pop
• Role on the wall
• Thought track
• Voice in head
• Mine
Initially the lecturer read the first few pages of the story, we then paused and in groups we considered the two main characters, by using the role on the wall convention of drama teaching. Booth (2005) denotes the role on the wall as the use of a human outline on paper to allow individuals to write and respond to the qualities of the character, during the workshop we use the outer line to record initial thoughts on the character, and at the end the inner outline to record thoughts on the characters at the end of the story/ drama. Booth (2005, p.43) establishes role on the wall as a representation of “collective understanding of the character life and attitude as it develops through the drama”. Likewise, we were introduced to voice in the head, Mason (2008) implies this convention is when characters speak aloud their thoughts and feeling, while the drama scene is a freeze frame. The group in which I was working with we focused on the scene when the brother is about to enter the tunnel the with his friends and he bothering and badgering his sister to join in the fun. During the workshop we only explored a few examples of drama convention and the relation drama can have with stories, it is important as a perspective teacher also as a student teacher to be engaging with children literature, as there are many advantages to this as the children have the ability to explore the story more fully and is a great method of understanding the views of the children in relation to the story and principle characters. Similarly, there are many opportunities to use drama and literacy to create a cross- curricular approaches to learning.
Like any week throughout this module I believe I am developing in confidence, self-esteem but also resilience. I am doing activities I never thought I was cable of completing, for instance acting and dancing in front of peers. This module is building me up to be a more confident individual overall, the confidence and self-assurance I have gained is transferrable to all module and my teaching practise. At times throughout this module I have been definitely been pushed out and beyond my comfort zone, it is a feeling I have never experienced before, but is placing in the perspective of some pupils I will be teaching who may not have the confidence to perform in front of an audience, it is important to be understanding and empathises with pupils, and make adaption to the lessons in order for all pupils to be included in some way.
References
Bloomfield, A. (2000) Teaching Integrated Arts in the Primary School. Oxon: David Fulton
Booth, D (2005) Story Drama: Creating Stories Through Role Play, Improvising, Reading aloud, 2nd ed. Canada: Stenhouse Publishers
Mason, J (2008) Practical Drama for Schools (Level 2- Upper Primary). NS: PACE Theater Company

Cone (2009). Following their Lead: Supporting Children’s Ideas for Creating Dance. [online] Available: http://moodle.uws.ac.uk/pluginfile.php/109357/mod_resource/content/1/Purcell%20Cone%20%282011%29.pdf. [Accessed: 15 October 2017]

Integrated Arts Week 7

Drama Looking at another children’s story this time, using the book The Tunnel. Based around a single event involving a brother and sister who didn’t get on, we were introduced to a further five drama conventions: Role on the wall, VoxPop, Mime, Thought tracking and Voice in head. This topic felt much more prescribed, and …

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Integrated Arts- Music and Dance 17/10/2017

The focal points of this week’s integrated arts inputs where music and dance. Again, after these inputs I believe I have developed further knowledge and confidence within the integrated arts education.
During the lecture we explored why music matters within education and how music can complement other subject areas, in particularly literacy. The skills of music are encircled by the skills of literacy primarily transpiring as reading, writing, listening and speaking, Hansen et al (2014, p.1) connotes “children are learning valuable skills of music that are an integral part of becoming a literate person”. Likewise, Patricia Stock cited by Hansen et al (2014, p.3) denotes literacy as “the ability to use available symbol systems that are fundamental to learning and teaching- for the purpose of comprehending and composing- for the purpose of making and communicating meaning and knowledge”. Music empowers children to acquire additional skills of creative, perspective, comprehending and rhythm. Even at a young age when children are engaging in play, children are making emblematic connections to the real word. From early stage children should be encourage to listen to music and create their own music too, researchers have proven that music can enhance children’s language and literacy acquisitions. Decoding is a fundamental skill of learning to read and making the connections between the phoneme and grapheme (Hansen et al, 2014). Teachers are able to use music in literacy and maths for instance “using songs as a way to learn the content of reading or mathematics such as memorising grammatical structure or multiplication tables” (Hansen et al, 2014, p. 42). Similarly, music can also raise attainment in the primary school, children may become more engaged in learning and behaviour may improve due to the involvement of music. As a perspective teacher it is important that I find a way of implement music in the classroom, allowing the children to be engaged within all of the arts and give them the opportunity to create their own authentic pieces of integrated art work, whether it is an individual or with peers. There are many options that engendered children’s involvement in music, this can be through learning to play an instrument or learning to sing, learning to compose, using ICT to develop music, learning to produce a performance. What I gathered from lecture is music is a powerful subject which can help teachers to develop learning and teaching, and also aid the cognitive development of children, as a perspective teacher it is important that within my practise I express enthusiasm and energy in order to make learning engaging and enjoyable. Bloomfield (2000, p.67) highlights the importance of music in the curriculum “some children will find an opportunity to excel in musical communication while others will be highly motivated by musical activities. It is important to acknowledge that such music is such a powerful musical tool”.
The music workshop focused on the theory aspect of music and the advantages of music in other subject areas. In groups we were assigned a curricular area within the ‘International Journal of Music Education’ by Susan Hallam, my group was assigned physical development, below is the mind-map of information we abstracted.

Also within the input we consider lesson planning in music, using an interdisciplinary approach, below is our lesson plan

This week we were introduce to the dance aspect of the integrated arts. Before the input I felt rather apprehensive and uneased by the prospect of teaching dance, but throughout the input I acquired valuable techniques that has increased my empowerment and confidence in dance. Dance is made up of movements which are used to illustrate emotions and meaning, dance is part of cultural across the world, and dance is considering a means of social interaction (Bloomfield, 2000). Children are first exposed to dance “through singing games and spontaneous rhythmical play actions, acquired through family, nursery, and media resources (Bloomfield, 2000, p,45). Bloomfield likewise states dance is “experienced through awareness of kinaesthetic flow patterns, the awakening and development of skills through coordination… meaning of movement in a creative and expressive way (2000. P.45). Throughout the input we were shown a variety of ways to implement dance in an engaging way for instance dance whisper- the class form two equal straight lines and the two children at top is show a short sequence dance and must pass it along line to the end of the lines. Another approach is getting the children to form a conga line and different music plays and each child gets the opportunity to create a unique response to the music. Also in groups we consider bones and muscles that we use when we exercise, when teaching dance especially through Physical Education it is important to do a warm-up and ensure the children are ready to dance, likewise a cool- down is important too. Movements of the left side of the body are dominated by the fundamental motor and sensory sector of the brains right hemisphere, (Bloomfield, 2000). When teaching dance, it foremost to be aware that individual have one side of their body more presiding than the other, it is therefore principle to practise the movement on both sides of body, being resilient if one side of body is more challenged by the movement (Bloomfield, 2000).

Nonetheless this week we were able to establish the principle TEN words of any dance routine being:
• Twist
• Reach
• Roll
• Slide
• Gesture
• Hop
• Jump
• Kick
• Turn
• Balance
Utilising the ten words above in groups we create our own movement for each and next week we hope to incorporate into constructed dance routine.
I found this week inputs to be overall insightful, I have been able to consider the power, the influence and theory of music not only to the curriculum, but the significance that music can have on children’s development and attainment within learning. Likewise, in dance I have be able to acknowledge the importance of movement within dance and the thought behind creative dance routines.

References
Bloomfield, A. (2000) Teaching Integrated Arts in the Primary School. Oxon: David Fulton
Hansen, D, Bernstorf, E, Stuber, G. (2014) The Music and Literacy Connection .(2nd ed). London: Rowan and Littlefield

Integrated Arts Week 6

Integrated Arts Week 6 Dance This week, we experienced the first of the dance inputs in the module. We began with some fun, engaging activities that would be an ideal way to introduce the topic of dance in the classroom: an adaptation of Chinese whispers, using a sequence of dance moves which were passed along …

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Session 6 – 25/10/16

Today our lecture was on how creative partnerships can work to improve the delivery of the arts in education. We were looking at different projects that have been ran in schools with other partnerships and how beneficial they can be, particularly a parkour project. This was good to see the type of projects which can […]

Dance

In todays Dance class we continued to practice our dance routine and considered what we needed to do to make it look better and how to improve on it. It was quite difficult to remember the order of all the steps which I’m sure children would see as a challenge but still find enjoyable. We then videoed the final routine. From doing this we were able to watch the performance and evaluate it. This was very beneficial as when seeing how the routine actually looked we were then able to truly identify what could be done to allow us to properly improve. I think this would be useful to do with a class as the children would love to se themselves and how the finished routine looked.

I have experienced the energy and excitement of presenting/performing for audiences and being part of an audience for other peoples presentations/performances. – EXA 0-01a / EXA 1-01a / EXA 2-01a

In order to effectively evaluate ourselves and our peers we were given an evaluation sheet highlighting various aspects to consider such as rhythm, timing, energy, memory etc. We gave ourselves and one of our peers 2 stars and 1 wish. This is good as it encourages children to give constructive criticism and also encourage their peers by highlighting what they do well.

I can analyse technical aspects of dance, make informed judgements and express personal opinions on my own and others work. EXA 4-11a

It was very satisfying going through the process of creating our own dance moves, putting them together in a routine and watching it back and i think it is definitely something children would enjoy.

We finished off the session by having some fun doing social dancing and being shown how to make it more relevant and enjoyable for children by dancing to current songs rather than the traditional Scottish style musical pieces.

Music

This weeks music input was focussed on pulse and rhythm. We began to learn how to read sheet music and discussed the names of different music notes and what they mean. We participated in an activity whereby we used shapes to represent different musical notes therefore making it easier to understand. We used drum sticks / beaters to keep the rhythm, this was a useful activity as it allowed us to understand rhythm at a very basic level and begin to get the hang of it.

We then had the opportunity to transfer the basic skills we had learnt onto the instruments. Using xylophones we were to form a piece for 32 beats using the notes C, D, E, G and A to the backing track ‘hit the road jack’ which was played on the piano. We went round the class and individually played our own 32 beats. This was beneficial as it showed how easy it is to create your own piece of music when your musical ability is limited, this would be great to do with children as it would boost their self confidence with music.

“I can use my voice, musical instruments and music technology to discover and enjoy playing with sound, rhythm, pitch and dynamics.” EXA 1-17a

Session 4 – 11/10/16

Today our lecture was focussing on using stimulus as inspiration for creation-child centred approach. We had Art and Dance inputs. Art In todays art input we were painting with primary colours using unconventional paintbrushes. At first, I thought that painting using paintbrushes that weren’t the type I was used to would not turn out well. […]

Today our lecture was focussing on using stimulus as inspiration for creation-child centred approach. We had Art and Dance inputs.

Art

In todays art input we were painting with primary colours using unconventional paintbrushes. At first, I thought that painting using paintbrushes that weren’t the type I was used to would not turn out well. However, i could clearly see the benefit of doing this with a class of children as everyones brush was different which meant that it was understandable when each piece of work looked a different way. This would result in children not feeling under as much pressure to produce a piece of work that they felt was as good as their peers. It teaches children that they can paint with anything, if they do not have a traditional paintbrush they can make one out of materials they do have. It also made the lesson more unique and interesting which promoted enjoyment.

Using only the primary colours yellow, blue and red was also beneficial as it meant that you were forced to create your own colours by mixing them together which encourages creativity.

Our lecturer read us a story detailing a scene with various different attributes. We then interpreted this story into our own painting. This was a very good method as each painting was different by each individual imagining the scene differently. It means that each piece of work is on the same topic yet has its own individual creative touch.

Dance

Today in our dance input we were progressing from our work last week. Each group presented the dance moves they came up with relating to the different halloween themed pictures and they were then all put together to form a part of the dance routine. We also put together our group routines that were formed from the 10 skills of dance and added on new moves. These new moves were made up as we were given a list of dance terms which we had to guess the meaning of. This was good as we weren’t confined to doing the proper dance moves and were allowed to be create and make up our own versions of what we thought they were. All of this was put together into a class routine to the song ‘Ghostbusters’. This highlighted how the pupils can be the ones to come up with the routine instead of the teacher which would make the experience more enjoyable for them as they would feel more control and creativity.

“One of the most powerful experiences dance educators can offer is the opportunity to create a dance that reflects their ideas.” (Cone, 2009).

Session 3 – 4/10/16

In todays lecture we were learning about Interdisciplinary learning – dance in the context of topics. This was beneficial as it showed how dance can be integrated. We thought about what creative dance is, what the role of the teacher is in regards to create dance and why we should embrace it and most importantly […]

Dance

This week we expanded on ideas from the previous session. We started by doing warm up games, each group came up with their own games and taught it to the rest of the class to play, this was good as it gave an insight into what it would be like to teach the games and provided an opportunity to reflect on what went well and how to improve in the future.

Continuing on from the 10 skills of dance each skill was given a number, we were then given sums using these numbers with the answers representing a different skill/dance move which could be put together to create a routine. This showed how you can incorporate numeracy into dance.

Due to the time of year with it being halloween, each group was given a different picture in relation to this e.g. spiders, witches, zombies etc. We had to come up with a dance move to represent the picture. This showed how you can link dance sessions to relevant topics and would really engage children.

Drama

This week was our first input of drama, to begin we discussed what drama is and looked at the experiences and outcomes for it.

“Through drama, learners have rich opportunities to be creative and to experience inspiration and enjoyment.” (LTS, 2009).

At this point I would not feel comfortable teaching drama as I would not know how to. We were shown that there are many different drama conventions such as hot seating, teacher in role, thought tunnels, still images etc. It is important that drama is not all about script reading & simply only being taught by school plays, nativity’s etc as this limits pupils imagination and creativity.

“Drama is the act of crossing into world of story… storying provides students with a natural human process for finding essential meanings in the experiences of themselves and others.” (Booth, 1995).

Our lecturer explained and demonstrated the convention of teacher in role through a story about a dragon which gave us the opportunity to brainstorm and narrate the story. It showed how various themes can be addressed through drama, in particular this story of the dragon highlighted loneliness and isolation.

This is important as it can put these themes in a different context and address them alternatively. As a student teacher it was very useful to experience this convention in action to see how it would work. Again, it was enjoyable and beneficial to be on the pupils side of the situation and I already feel slightly more confidence with teaching drama.

References:

LTS (2009) Expressive arts: Experiences and outcomes. Available at: http://www.educationscotland.gov.uk/Images/expressive_arts_experiences_outcomes_tcm4-539863.pdf (Accessed: 4th October 2016).