One of the biggest time consumers in teaching young children is allocating and maintaining space. SPACE in dance class is essential for safety and organization. When I came across these affordable round, flat, washable, orange bath mats at Ikea I knew I had found 'gold' for my toddler and preschool classes.
I have so many uses for them and am still discovering more ways to incorporate them into class. I use them to mark self-space areas in circles and lines. They are useful when we play musical mats. With the help of our imaginations they can turn into the most fantastical things. For straddle stretches they become ponds between our legs; we can put our faces in to see who is underwater...maybe Ariel or Nemo? For grand jetes they are mud puddles that we want to leap over so not to dirty our beautiful pink ballet shoes. They are also useful as lily pads when we are pretending to be frogs. Do you use similar props? What other ideas do you have for these amazing mats?
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