A MOVEMENT WAVE

I teach a creative ballet class at several early education schools.  I only see them for 30 minutes each week, and so learning, practicing and retaining any 'formal' ballet vocabulary can be challenging.  So the other day I came up with the idea of a movement wave.


After warm-ups, while we are all standing in the welcome circle, we take turns practicing and saying a ballet movement.  Once everyone in the circle has performed that movement we move to the next step. Plié, tendu, pique, retiré, sauté and echappé are only a few of the movements we have practiced.  As each student gets a turn, the sequence of movements creates something similar to a mexican wave.  I have a stuffed red dinosaur that I use to help keep a rhythm to the exercise.  I start off by holding him and performing the movement, then I hand him over to the student next to me and they get their turn to perform the movement, and so on.  Each student is so focused on waiting for their turn, handling 'dino' and performing their movement, that they do not even realize how much practice they are getting out of the movement wave.

Not only does this give me an opportunity to improve their movement skills, but also dynamics in movement.  I may demonstrate a slow plié, or a quick tendu.  I can also use levels and size to describe each movement.  This exercise also gives them an opportunity to practice and improve on some social skills.  They also have to share 'dino', and wait patiently for their turn.  I have thought of expanding this to include a movement sequence (like the 'telephone' game) and/or other teaching styles.  I want to see if I can use this in a guided discovery process.  Perhaps instead of demonstrating the step, I give verbals cues to each student and they have to figure out the step.  This may be challenging for the 2 year olds though!

Have you tried anything similar in your dance or movement classes?