25/10/16 – Week 6

This week was our final dance lesson. Again, as a continuation from the previous weeks, we finished the  dance which we had been creating as a class, which I have previously mentioned in week four’s reflection. This was done by joining each group’s dances together with the dance we created as a class. I feel this would allow children to take great pride in their work once they had created their finished dance piece, in the same way that it certainly gave my class a feeling of achievement as we had created this piece ourselves. Our final performance of the dance was videoed and we were able to watch ourselves back and reflect on our own performances. We were given out two sheets, one ‘thee stars and a wish’ sheet and one sheet containing aspects of our performance which we had to evaluate (both sheets found below). One of the boxes on the three stars and a wish sheet had to be filled in on our own performance and then the other had to be the performance of another person in our group so that everyone was able to self evaluate and also receive peer feedback on their performances.

            

From a teachers’ perspective, this is a project which could be completed within three or four sessions and is flexible, as it can be linked with any topic that is the focus in the classroom. The work is done by the the class with some assistance from their teacher who sorts issues such as spacing, timing and performance. ‘When children create dances using their ideas, they are empowered to explore their thoughts, feelings, and perspectives’ (Cone, 2011).

I feel that the dance sessions have really encouraged my thoughts and made me more open to integrating it into the classroom and has made me more confident in actually leading and teaching it.

References

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11/10/16 – Week 4

This week in dance was a continuation from last weeks dance class. We began with a game which involved making up a different dance move for the numbers between zero to nine. We played this game in a large circle, with our lecturer recalling the different moves every now and again to ensure we remembered them. This task was beneficial, as it allowed us to work together and come up with our own moves which we might not have felt as confident doing prior to the module. 

Then, we began joining the ‘maths dance’ moves, that we had made up the week before, with the halloween moves, which each group had come up with for the full class ‘halloween dance’. The halloween moves, as previously mentioned, were created through the images shown on the left. Each group had been allocated an image and had to create a move related in some way to this image. These two dances combined, began to form one large dance which was much more effective when put together. Below is a video of the maths dance which our group put together.

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04/10/16 – Week 3

In week 3, we looked again at the the ten basic dance moves from the week before. We also looked at how to incorporate maths into dance, making it cross-curricular, by working out ten sums given to us by our lecturer, each of which came to an answer between one and ten. This gave each group their own sequence for their dance.

Also, as it is October, we began putting together a Halloween dance as a class. Each group was given a Halloween themed picture and each had to create a dance move related to the picture. We used pictures as a visual stimulus, they were things like a cat or a skeleton. This could also be done within a primary school environment as part of a PE dance lesson or could be shown to the rest of the school during an assembly or in a Halloween show for parents/guardians. Dance allows children to ‘bring their inner self to the surface where they can express their dreams, fears, needs, and joys’ (Cone, 2011).

Also, we took part in a game called The Bean Game. We had to move around the room and our lecturer would call out a type of bean and we had to perform an action to represent this type of bean. For example, a chilli bean would have been demonstrated by acting cold and shivering. This game could be effective for a warm up game prior to a PE lesson.

References

Theresa Purcell Cone. (2009) Following Their Lead: Supporting Children’s Ideas for Creating Dances, Journal of Dance Education. [Online] Available: http://moodle.uws.ac.uk/pluginfile.php/846498/mod_resource/content/1/Purcell%20Cone%20%282011%29.pdf [Accessed: 6 January 2017].

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27/09/16 – week 2

In week two, we looked at the way our bodies move and the ten basic dance moves. During the class we played some ice breaker games. In one of the games we all sat in a circle, then each student took a turn going into the middle to perform an action and say their name. This can be a good exercise, especially in a primary school setting to give new classes a chance to learn each others names or to introduce a new pupil. Another game we played was called ‘Scottish Salmon’. In this game a range of traditional Scottish themes or objects represented different numbers. When these numbers are called we had to act out the thing said. This combines a possible history topic with dance/PE, making a subject more fun and allowing for a different type of learning on a very relevant topic. We then got a large sheet of paper on which we drew the outline of the body and had to label it with different bones, muscles and other body parts. The image below is my groups completed sheet:

We also learned the 10 basic dance skills:

Twist
Gesture
Kick
Jump
Turn
Hop
Reach
Slide
Roll
Balance

In groups, after a demonstration by our lecturer, we made up our own move out of each of the ten basic skills and put them together to form a dance. The video below shows the moves which our group came up with in a sequence.