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Teaching Happiness With Every Leap

Stacey Pepper Schwartz — Mon, 25 Jul 2011 13:45:40 +0000

I saw my first back to school commercial the other day. Last month I wrote about wrapping up the year and now here I am preparing for a new year of teaching!

I am reading a wonderful and informative book entitled Raising Happiness: 10 Simple Steps for More Joyful Kids and Happier Parents by Christine Carter.

It is not about giving children what they want or lavishing them with praise. It is about teaching them how to deal with disappointment, resolve conflict, and focus on effort as well as achievement. As a parent, I am finding the book useful to teach my child how to adapt to new situations, be optimistic and resourceful. If I find this helpful as a parent, I know the concepts can be a helpful tool for teachers as well.

Here are some of the valuable ideas I have taken from the book:

Focus on the effort involved in the achievement versus the achievement alone.

Praising a child’s commitment to achieving a goal (like a leap or turn) will pave they way for more achievement.

For example, if you say “Jamie, you have been working hard keeping your legs straight when you leap. That was a beautiful leap! Your hard work paid off,” you are complimenting your student not only on his success but the effort, time and energy it took for him to obtain his goal. This will encourage your student to put effort into mastering other skills.

If you say “that was a beautiful leap,” then the end product (the leap) is praised but the feedback does not include other aspects of the child’s accomplishment and will not impact the learning process.

Model optimistic behavior

I undoubtedly have technical difficulties with my music player, be it a CD, tape player or iPod.

I used to say things like “this CD player never likes me,” or “I can never get this to work right!” I am usually frustrated and feeling rushed when the CD player is eating my discs.

What I learned from the book is that fostering optimism starts with the adult. I am being pessimistic if I blame myself for the music stalling, even if I say it in a silly way. Instead I can reframe it and say “This CD player is falling asleep, let me see if I can wake it up!” The CD player is responsible for the action instead of me.

Convey positive messages

There are other ways teachers can instill positive messages in class.(...)

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Creative Holiday Activities & Choreography (Nutcrackers Not Included)

Nichelle (admin) — Mon, 13 Dec 2010 16:04:21 +0000

Today, I have guest posted over at the Maria’s Movers blog, Move.Create.Educate. Maria is a NYC dance educator who specializes in working with young children. She teaches in public elementary schools for New York City Ballet, is a movement and yoga specialist at York Avenue Preschool, and a creative movement and tap teacher at Mark Morris Dance Group. You can also find Maria teaching at the Jewish Community Center in Manhattan and Dancewave Center in Brooklyn. A New York University Master’s graduate in dance education with an undergrad degree from Slippery Rock University (my alma mater – yay!), Maria has been selected to serve on the Dance/NYC Youth Advisory Committee for the 2010/2011 academic year.

In other words, girl knows her stuff!

And she blogs about it – lucky you!

But today, I’m honored to be hanging over there to share some holiday movement activities for both preschool and older children. These include a special dance I call The Toymaker, an exercise that introduces contact improvisation, a creative exploration that encourages different qualities of movement, and some simple ways to spice up what you already do with your little ones. Nutcrackers Not Included.

Here’s the link:

The Toymaker and Other Holiday Activities For Young Dancers

Need some holiday choreography in a hurry?

I currently have THREE Christmas-y routines available at DancesToGo.com

A Little Angel - Parents will appreciate this silly holiday number for young children, age 3-5. It does feature Santa and mentions prayer in the lyrics, but is mostly about all of the naughty stuff little ones TRY to resist in anticipation of Christmas. It’s fantastically fun with plenty of repetition.

The Little Christmas Tree – This touching and elegant number for 5-8 year-olds could be used for holiday celebrations or informal performances. It works best for classes which can be split evenly into two groups as the dance features two roles, Christmas Trees and Angels. The suggested accompaniment is One Little Christmas Tree by Stevie Wonder.

The Christmas Tree Rock – Set to a Beatles-esque version of Rockin’ Around The Christmas Tree, this jazz/rock routine could work for kids between the ages of 8 and 13, maybe older. It depends on the students. The steps are not at all difficult and could easily be adapted. What keeps this one interesting are changing formations in space.

Click here to download one or more of these routines.

You’ll also find a few more Nutcracker-related routines at Liz Calabria’s choreographer page.

Speaking of The Nutcracker, you saw Stacey Pepper Schwartz’s guest post here on DA today, right? If not, check out her post on exploring the themes and characters of The Nutcracker with young dancers.

© Nichelle Strzepek for Dance Advantage, 2010. | Permalink | Category: Blog, For Classroom, Teaching | Who's talking about this article?

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Halloween: Costumes, Props and Makeup Inspiration

Stacey Pepper Schwartz — Thu, 21 Oct 2010 13:20:26 +0000

I love Halloween but not because of the candy. Just driving around town watching ghosts hanging from trees spinning and swinging in the wind makes me giddy. The flow of a vampire’s cape, the flop of big clown feet and the sheer beauty of a green faced witch makes me want to jump and shout! There is no better time to explore costumes, props and make-up with children then during the Halloween season. Since we all learn from our experiences, Halloween can be a great jumping off point because most kids will be experiencing some form of dress-up and your job as a teacher is to take their budding experience and run with it!

Materials are endless, and examples are everywhere. Creating a mood or feeling can always be accentuated with the addition of props, costumes and make-up. Young kids love this and they are never too young to explore these elements. Focusing the Halloween energy on the art of dance is a great way to harness Halloween hyperness! And you might see your students demonstrate new ways of moving and creating as well.

Exploring Fabric

Bring in some old sheets, or buy some inexpensive fabric at your local fabric store. Leave it in the center of the room and when the students come in see what they discover about the material. Let this be a child directed activity so instead of you telling them what to do see what they discover.

Some questions to prompt them:

How can you make the fabric move?

Is it heavy or light?

How many children can make the material move? Can it move with just one child? Can the entire class work together to make it move?

Is it easier to make it move fast or slow?

Can you make it move around the room?

What else can you do with the fabric?

How can it cover you? Can you stick different body parts out of the fabric?

Can you move the material with different body parts?

If you have the availability of a video camera take some video of them so they can watch the fabric “come to life” and have a dance of its own. (If not, pictures would be great.)

Make-Up

This time of year, kid’s make-up is readily available. It comes in sticks (almost like crayons) or in little plastic containers with a brush (very similar to a paint brush.) When doing make-up on students make sure you get the permission of the parents beforehand and that the students are not wearing their favorite outfits! Cold cream, tissues, and water are a must. And a mirror for the kids to see the final results! Maybe you will find that a parent is a talented face painter and will help out with the transformations. You do not need to be an artist to create masterpieces on the children – just a few well placed whiskers or wrinkles will do the trick! You might want to keep to a theme like animals or have the children pick what they want. Then have them create a dance based on the movements of their characters.

Before the dance ask the students:

What is your character?

How does your character get around? Walk, crawl, fly, slither, leap, etc.

Do they move quickly or slowly?

Do they take up a lot of space or a little space?

Do they like to be near other animals or creatures?

What is there mood? Happy, sad, scared, angry?

Pick out different pieces of music and have the class vote on which music they want to dance to. Maybe all similar creatures should dance together or it might be interesting to have opposites dance together!

Pull out that video camera or camera again. You will be amazed at how the children’s movements will change when they are creating a character and are not being themselves. It definitely helps for children who are inhibited.

These activities might take more than one class to complete. There is no rule that each lesson should take one class period. You might do the make-up one day (taking pictures of each child at the end) and the next week explore the movements with the pictures as a reminder of the wonderful characters that were developed. You might see that the class wants more than one day to explore that fabric or that they want to revisit the lesson after seeing the video of themselves. Lessons can be repeated and should be because kids learn from repetition.

Halloween time is exciting for children and with a little focus and extra preparation it can open up creative possibilities. It can a starting off point for your students to let their imaginations fly like a magic broomstick soaring around the moon!

More Kid Concepts...

What kinds of activities do you do with your classes on Halloween?

What are other ways you can encourage acting and character exploration?

What are some other kinds of Halloween props that you’ve used or would like to try?

© Stacey Pepper Schwartz for Dance Advantage, 2010. | Permalink | Category: Blog, For Classroom, Other Dance Forms, Teaching | Who's talking about this article?

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Month by Month: March

Nichelle (admin) — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 13:20:54 +0000

In the midst of competition season and as the push toward recital time begins, you may be feeling your classes could use a bit of fun to break up the “blahs.”

March offers some opportunities to try something a little different. Here are some ideas:

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

A Night at the Oscars

Sometimes new accompaniment is all that is needed. Use movie soundtracks and classic cinema songs to spice up your classes one evening this month.

For fun, you might host an awards ceremony during the last 15 minutes of class – this could be your own version of “paper bag” awards… the presentation of silly or gently teasing award categories with low-budget trophies (like paper bags). The point is not to hurt anyone’s feelings, though, so create your awards with care. Encourage your students to dance their acceptance speech, and be sure to cut them off before they are finished!

St. Patrick’s Day

This holiday is coming up soon! You might use any music connected with Ireland (Riverdance, U2, Clannad) or the color green during your classes on or during the week of March 17th.

Why not try some Irish dancing? You can find an introduction to the basics at E-how. Or, better still, hire an Irish dance teacher to conduct a class.

World Meteorological Day

My husband is a meteorologist so this March 23 day of recognition (spearheaded by the World Meteorological Organization) stood out for me. You can do a lot with a weather theme, including everything from song choices (Singin’ in the Rain, It’s Raining Men, Here Comes the Sun…) to dancing about weather, water cycles, and more.

I own and have used these two books by Thomas Locker with dance classes to build choreography as a group. They feature poetic reenactments of the water cycle (Water Dance) and an introduction to cloud-types (Cloud Dance) accompanied by beautiful illustrations. With clouds that march, drift, and burst, and statements like “I grow ever wider, broader and deeper. I am the river.” The descriptive language lends itself to movement.

You may also want to check out this Weather & Wind Dance lesson plan (click Instruction Tab) from the Kennedy Center’s Arts Edge website.

Women’s History Month

March is also Women’s History Month so this is a great opportunity to educate your students with a little history lesson. Introduce through books, film, photos, or words, dance visionaries and groundbreakers like Isadora Duncan, Loie Fuller, Martha Graham, Maria Tallchief, Anna Pavlova, Janet Collins, Eleanor Powell… and so so so many others! In my post 9 Biographies for Students, some of these women are covered in books for juvenile readers.

Print or photocopy photos of a few legendary women in dance to informally post on the walls of your studio with small index cards highlighting their life and contribution to dance. Allow students to peruse the gallery and encourage them to practice spotting pirouettes with Pavlova’s picture or chassé toward Eleanor Powell. At the end of the class, week, or month quiz your dancers on these dance luminaries.

© Nichelle Strzepek for Dance Advantage, 2010. | Permalink | Category: Blog, For Classroom, Teaching | Who's talking about this article?

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