Looking Back

Wow.  What a journey this has been.  Looking back now brings a smile to my face every time.  I learned so much this semester!  And from so many different sources.  I learned enthusiasm, resilience, and simple joy from my students.  They also taught me how to look through new eyes.  I learned management, love, and patience from Mrs. Findlay.  I learned organization, preparation, and self-correction from my mentors.  And I learned from myself what I can do, what I love to do, and what I want to do.  I have gained a lot more confidence in myself as a teacher through this process.  I believe that I can now trust myself in a multitude of situations across the elementary experience. 

In all honesty, there were both ups and downs.  Sometimes I was really frustrated with myself or the way the class was getting away from me, but there were also times that I came away with a huge smile on my face.  It was a crazy ride, but it was all worth it.  Both situations led to growth and I'm glad it went the way it did.  I learned some things the hard way, but I've learned them well and will never forget them.

As a teacher, I have become more fluid and connected, more confident, and more flexible.  As a student, I have gained an awareness of what it means to be the teacher and how much they just want their students to connect and have amazing moments - it's making me try harder and invest more.  As an artist, I have discovered more facets to this art form that I love.  As an individual, I have been happier and become more confident.  I loved those students and they loved me - walking into the classroom and seeing their reactions every Wednesday was so fulfilling.  

As I've said many times this semester, "Dance is true!"  I've seen students grow and develop in ways I didn't think they would.  I've seen them slide past reluctance into enthusiasm, and I've seen them make incredibly meaningful connections for relevancy.  This art form truly has the power to develop and unite their bodies, minds, and spirits.  I believe that through the interdisciplinary foci this semester, those students were strengthened in other aspects of their lives as well.

For me, this experience was successful, wholesome, and worthwhile.  I am so glad I got the opportunity to participate as an ArtsBridge scholar this year and especially the chance to work with Mrs. Findlay and her beautiful class.  I hope they'll be able to implement what we've learned together and let it enrich their lives, because they have enriched mine!  And, as I've come to believe this semester:

“. . . A great teacher is a great artist and . . . there are as few as there are any other great artists. Teaching might even be the greatest of the arts since the medium is the human mind and spirit.” -John Steinbeck

My sincerest thanks to all those who have made this experience possible for me this semester.  You are doing amazing things for those of us in your circle of influence, as well as for all those we have been able to touch, teach, and love!

Performance

Today was our LecDem Performance as a capstone project for our semester together.  Three other second grade classes came in to be our audience.  The students were so excited to perform for their peers! 

We set it up so that each group would perform their piece, then stay on stage while I sidecoached them through some familiar dance activities and explorations.  The 15 minute "show order" looked like this:

Welcome: Me

Introduction of Communication dance: Mrs. Findlay

Mad Libs: Me (ask for adverbs and verbs from the audience, students show movement)

Introduction of Diseases dance: Mrs. Findlay

Everyday Objects: Me (ask for everyday things that students abstract into movement)

Introduction of Telling Time dance: Mrs. Findlay

Statue Garden: Me (Dancers partner up, shape each other into frozen shapes)

Finale: Entire class comes up onstage and forms negative and positive space connections

See? Simple enough, but it was fun.  Having an audience there watching them really brought out the best in the students.  They really stepped it up from our regular during class rehearsals.  They fully invested in the interesting aspects we had talked about and I was so proud of them!  They really grew a lot this semester and it was very rewarding for me to see it!  Head on over to the Pictures/Videos page to see some clips of the performance. :)

Review/Prep Day

Today was great!  Instead of doing an interdisciplinary lesson, we had a day to review all of the interesting elements we have learned about dance this year, in order to prepare them to put together a mini lecture demonstration (or LecDem as we like to call them) to show what they have learned and can now do. 

First off, Mrs. Findlay led the warmup today!  She did a fantastic job with the Brain Dance.  She was confident and clear and the students followed her well.   They were also (pleasantly!) surprised to see that she could teach “dance,” too.  I was proud of her and proud of the students. J  It will be important to continue to allow her to build rapport with her students as a dance teacher so she can do this all on her own once I’m gone.  We’ll continue to have her teach parts of the lesson in the next few weeks. 

Another great thing about today was I had a chance to see that the students really have been learning what I’ve been trying to teach them.  It was a good assessment of all my previous behavioral objectives – whether the students have been internalizing the things we’ve been talking about and exploring.  We made a word wall on the board with the dance elements we have learned about and the other concepts we have integrated.  Even though some of the words are long and cumbersome, once they remembered them, they were able to show me with their bodies and respond to my side-coaching to explore them more deeply.  They’ve got it!  They now have a dance toolbox filled with floor pathways, levels, body shapes, spatial relationships, energy qualities, locomotor and axial movements, and the creative problem solving to figure challenges out in interesting ways.  It was very rewarding to see them remembering not only a concept we had been talking about during that hour, but concepts we have covered since the beginning of the year.  I’m excited to see how we put together their three mini pieces and the snippets of narration in order to show an overview of what they’ve learned.

My faculty advisor, Kathleen Sheffield, came to observe today.  It was so good to have here there!  She jumped right in and helped Mrs. Findlay and I when we split the class into three groups and worked on group shapes, and she had a lot of good feedback when the class was over.  I will greatly appreciate her affirmations and suggestions for continued development.

Favorite Moments:

·  Watching the students THINK so hard to remember the words we’ve talked about.  Even if they didn’t get the right word right away, their guesses were still related concepts like “symmetry” and “non-communicable.”  I gave her a high five for that last one.  I can’t even say that word very well. 

·  Seeing them access all the elements we’ve talked about.  I didn’t realize how well they were learning them, but they are all there!

Telling Time

Today, we talked about telling time and the differences between A.M. and P.M.  I went a slightly different route than I have in the past few months and used an already written lesson plan by the brilliant Erika Cravath (for more information on her thesis project and wonderful work, see the Resources tab.)  It was a little tricky using someone else’s lesson plan because I wasn’t as familiar with it, but I have used her lesson plans before and they are always amazing.  

The students did a great job right from the very start of distinguishing growing, expanding movements and shrinking, collapsing movements and connecting them with A.M. and P.M. times respectively.  Things got a little pantomimic when I asked for shapes that represented things you do in the A.M. or in the P.M., but I knew they would.  With an older class I would have gone on to talk about abstraction and really require more creative representations, but I think they did well enough with what I asked. 

The amazing thing about today was how well behaved they were.  They came in, we began the brain dance and they were so quiet and concentrated . . . it was beautiful.  I talked to Mrs. Findlay about it afterwards and she said they had quite the discussion prior to coming in about how to act in dance class – it is so nice to have her fully involved and supportive.  She is going to do very well when she begins teaching these classes herself.

Today during the create/perform section, I performed a dance with one of the groups.  I think maybe this would be a good thing to keep doing so they can see an example of what I want to see and how to really use the elements of dance to make an interesting piece.  A few students are really beginning to explore the movement during their little performances, which is nice to see.  I’ll keep reinforcing the exciting use of dance elements to create aesthetic dances.

Favorite Moments:

•  When I performed my dance and asked them what interesting things they saw in the group, one boy raised his hand and said, “I don’t know, I was only watching you.  But I saw levels.”  It was so sweet.
•  The class got really excited about figuring out what time I was representing with my arms as a clock.  Because it was a very different medium, it was tricky, but they were so excited when they figured out 3:45.

Diseases

I'm really starting to see some progress in students' understanding of basic dance elements.  The cross-curricular elements are never a problem - they seem to grasp those easily and are able to apply them to the activities and explorations we do during class.  We used Positive and Negative Space, Shapes, and Spatial Relationships today to explore the differences between infectious and non-infectious diseases.  They are really exhibiting some amazing and creative shapes!  That was exciting to see.

There was a high school intern with the class today which turned out to be really distracting.  I kept having to pull back attention from entire groups of students who were gathered around her, talking to her or playing with her necklace or other interactions that were taking them away from the class.  It made me realize the importance of maintaining the somewhat tricky balance between being an authority figure and kind and understanding figure.  Sometimes, teachers just want to be their students' "friend."  While this can be fun for the students, I think it ends up hindering them in the long run.  In that position, a teacher can't push for progression as much, can't discipline or manage when they need to and can't be a trusted mentor.  It was frustrating for me as a teacher to fight for their attention, but at the same time feel like I couldn't do much to reduce the distractions.  I just had to deal with it and move on.  It was definitely an interesting situation.  On the other hand, the intern did help me with the class by dancing and helping her group really create a nice piece.  It was the most "dancing movement" I've seen in their creative pieces next.  It made me think on how I approach the Create/Perform sections of my lessons.  Maybe, if I demonstrate what a dance I would create could look like, they would understand better when I ask them to dance in the middle of their dances, rather than just make a beginning shape, move a little bit, then find an ending shape.  It might help them see how to make their dances more substantial and meaty.  

Mrs. Findlay was a valuable help today; she answered questions at the end about what she was seeing in the performances and why it made them interesting.  Her encouragement and feedback really validates the experience for the students.  Mrs. Findlay is going to begin teaching sections of the lessons so that once I finish this ArtsBridge program, she'll be ready to teach her own creative dance classes!  I'm excited to see her in action. :)          

Favorite Moments:

• There is a new girl in the class who has some special needs.  Today was her first dance class with me.  While she seemed a little lost at times during the lesson and was sometimes reluctant to participate, she had a wonderful partner who kept encouraging her.  I was so proud of the student she was working with for being patient and helping her.  At the end of class, this little girl asked, "Can we do it again?!"  Don't worry, I'm coming back next week!
• We discovered today that it is possible to work together and create shapes and movement without necessarily touching each other (this was in connection to non-infectious diseases.  We can still work together and have fun together without being worried about catching a non-communicable disease.)  At the end of class, I asked the students to talk about other places in the world that we see shapes that connect without touching or things working together by sharing negative space.  A little boy was literally so excited about his answer that he was bouncing up and down and whispering, "this is a good one!"  His answer?  A flock of birds flying and moving together in the air, making shapes without touching each other.  Holla!  They totally got it. :)

Communication

I love this class!  I love those students and I am loving this experience!

Okay, I’m really hitting my stride now.  I was starting to think that every class would be okay, but I that maybe I would still leave thinking I could have done better or that the students could have understood better the concepts.  But today was one of those days that is just a step beyond.  It was amazing!  We went back into cross-curricular connections today, linking energy qualities with forms of communication.  Smoke signals with sustained energy, letters with swing energy (see lesson plan if you’re confused), Morse code with percussive energy, phones with vibratory energy, and the internet with explosive energy. 

While the words were really big and kind of tricky to remember for the students, they knew exactly which one they were talking about and were able to recognize it when they saw it, demonstrate with their body which one they were talking about and say most of the word.  (But come on, vibratory? What kind of word is that?  We used “shaking” sometimes instead.)  I think they had it. :)  

We also did connecting shapes today.  Wow.  It was so fulfilling to see them really grasp the concept.  They have come so far!!!  I remember the first few weeks, I would say shape and they would just stand there and look at me - a few brave souls would attempt to make a triangle or a square, my first clue that I may have jumped a little too far right off the top.  Well, after talking about body shapes last week and moving into relationships this week, there have been huge changes!  We talked about how "connecting" doesn't have to mean "touching."  We talked about sharing self-space to make one interesting shape together, using the negative space around each body to connect the two shapes.  I'll post pictures.  I was amazed and very impressed by the shapes I saw coming together.  It thrilled me!  They're really beginning to explore creatively.  There were some really beautiful moments today.  We'll keep building from here! 

Favorite Moments:

• A girl whispered "This is fun!" while we were exploring how we would move like a phone ring to the actual sounds of a phone ringing.  They really enjoyed that one. Vibratory may be hard to say, but it's definitely fun to do!
• When I ask the question, "Where else in our world do we see explosive energy?"  I got some answers like "a volcano!" (Great answer.  Volcanoes are explosive.)  Then a girl raised her hand and said, "War."  I was really taken aback.  It was one of those moments when you get slammed by the realization that they kind of know a lot more than you do.  It was so sweet, and yet very deep.  It was a good moment as a teacher.
•  A boy who was really reluctant to join today was getting very involved by the end of the lesson.  But he became very shy again when he was in the first group to perform, so I switched him and his partner to the second group.  After seeing the first group perform he jumped right up and did his whole dance.  I hope that by giving him the opportunity to wait and watch he kept the excitement and joy rather than feeling pressured and scared.
• Last, but certainly not least . . . the class kept begging me not to go.  "Miss Alley, will you come back tomorrow?" they asked, several times.  I was very sad to say that I couldn't come until next week, but it pleased me that they want me back! YAY!

Dance Elements

Course Correct!

After talking with some wonderfully supportive and knowledgeable advisors – thank you Marilyn Berrett and Kathleen Sheffield! – I went with my gut and took a significant step back.  I’ve been having this growing idea the past few weeks that I’ve been sequencing my curriculum plan in a less than efficient way.  I discussed my concerns and frustrations with myself with my mentors and felt good about going back to square one.  So today, our lesson was basically a crash course in creative dance.  I should have done this at the very beginning, but better slightly late than never! 

The class was SO successful today!  I truly enjoyed it.  Management has become better and better as the class has gotten to know me, tested me, and now are beginning to respect me without encouragement from someone else.  So I worry less about keeping them in control and now have more freedom to truly see them and take them to new levels. 

We covered Space, Shape, Size, Levels, and Energy today.  (I figured that I had already addressed pathways and Time elements in previous lessons, and we begin every class with the Brain Dance now, which covers the Patterns of Total Body Connectivity and Body elements.)  The class really grasped the concepts today and I saw more creativity than I have previously.  I guess it’s true that having some limitations or guidelines really does make you more free.  

I feel much better about where I’m going now.  I feel like I’ve taken some time to allow them to build a foundation that will enable them to understand me and what I expect.  They have a better idea about what creative movement can be built on and will be able to explore further in the future.

I also tried a lesson plan reminder trick.  I made a large font, bulleted list of the main activities and points I would hit throughout the class (it was a very wide-spread lesson) so I wouldn't be so glued to the detailed, full paragraph-ed lesson plan.  I put  my list by the board and I could glance at it every time I walked by.  Miraculous!  It totally worked.  I was able to keep myself on track, fill in the gaps from the prompts, and still be present and aware for the class.  New favorite aid, right there.  That's definitely happening again next week. :)

Mrs. Findlay and I are going to begin moving towards our culminating project.  We’ve decided on an Arts Gallery type showcase.  There is another ArtsBridge scholar at the school teaching Visual Arts.  We think it will be a really fun experience to have the two classes show what they’ve learned throughout the semester.  Mrs. Shipp’s class can show their art projects and Mrs. Findlay’s class can showcase a dance.  I’m excited to move forward and feel much less lost!

Favorite Moments:  

•  Smoothland and Sharpland was definitely a favorite with the students.  It made me happy to watch their excitement.
• Talking about where else in the world we see far reach and near reach kinds of objects - there were some great responses.  One boy raised his hand and for small-reach said, "Midgets! I mean . . . minions!"  Wow, I really had to choke back a laugh.  We clarified that he meant the little yellow guys from "Despicable Me," then talked about why they were small-reach in their shapes and movement.  But he was so excited when he blurted out the first name he could remember.  It was a somewhat shocking and then humorous moment.

Fractions

I think I'm finally starting to get the hang of this. :)  Now I want to go back and start over from the very beginning with a better scope and sequence.  But you definitely learn best while doing, right?  I'm learning tons!

Today was so great!  The class was so invested!  They worked hard and were very respectful.  We had the gym for the first half hour and that was a nice space to move in.  There was room to move and a lot less distractions like extra desks and shelves.  It's nice to have the extra classroom to work in, but I think I prefer the gym for a movement class.  I think it helped us focus a lot better.

The concept was tricky today - tying together fractions from math and time elements from the B.E.S.T. model.  Because I was trying a different approach in really concentrating on dance elements, I feel that I succeeded in my objective more than the past few lessons.  It seemed to me that the students got confused about the fraction element, and I'm not sure they entirely grasped it, but they really understood the Time elements I was having them explore.

I feel much better about having established some solid dance curriculum.  I used Time because I could relate it to fractions; something I would really like to go into more in depth with an older class - there's a lot of potential in those connections.  Next week, I would like to relate the cross-curricular factors with either Body or Space and really establish dance movement basics in order to give them more exposure and understanding as well as more vocabulary for me to work with.

The behavior of the class today was just stellar.  We were able to do a lot because they were so well-behaved and engaged the whole time.  I'm really beginning to wish I had more time with them - I would like to have the time to take five or six full lessons on the elements of creative dance alone, then be able to move into more cross-curricular subjects.  This is probably something I should have done from the beginning, but I didn't realize how important that would be.  I have now learned that lesson quite well.  I was subconsciously expecting them to have some sort of foundation that they didn't have (and really had no reason to already have) and it threw me for a loop when they didn't.  So I just had to discover it for myself. :)  This week, I plan on taking a look at the rest of my lesson plans to see what should be shifted around in order to give place for some dance-element-only lessons.  We'll see how that works!

Favorite Moments of the Day:

1. Seeing the class invest from the beginning.  Starting the class without me talking really helped.  I turned on the music and we began the Brain Dance right away.  It helped them focus and it was rewarding to see!
2. The cute boys who kept offering to help me carry stuff because I always tend to run around with a billion items spilling out of my arms.  They were so excited to help me carry my materials down the hall or help me clean up when we were done.  They are truly wonderful little people. :)

Adverbs

Third Week!  

Today’s lesson was our first one for adverbs.  It went well!  The students already had exposure to adverbs so it was an easy jumping off point.  I also introduced the Brain Dance today and began class with those connectivity patterns – something I will do for the rest of my time there.  It helped us focus on movement and get ready to dance.      

The class was very well-behaved today.  They were very excited about picking the verbs and adverbs out of my bags and pairing them together to try interesting combinations like adventurously slicing, or quietly crawling or skipping upside-down (definitely a challenge for creative problem-solving!)  We all enjoyed the lesson, and they really grasped the concepts.

Things got a little hairy again during the time to create their own pieces.  I’ve come to the realization that I need to spend some real time on basic dance elements because they just don’t understand what I mean when I ask them to create a dance with their own movement.  Today their chosen movement was a lot clearer than last week, but they still weren’t sure about what they were doing and I called a lot of groups through the formula.  The students really just don’t have real exposure to “creative dance.”  I should have realized that before and been prepared for it, but this is my first experience starting at square one.  It would help the class understand where I am coming from and trying to guide them towards if they understood more vocabulary and more dance concepts.  Maybe one of these times I’ll bring in a video of some creative dance I’ve seen in other elementary schools to show them as well as tell them.  For the next few weeks, I will definitely concentrate on dance basics, maybe moving one at a time through the B.E.S.T. chart.  This will give them the tools they need to fully invest and explore.

Management went well this week, and I’m already thinking of things to do next week to help the class concentrate from the very beginning.  I’m excited about trying a class start in silence.  Stay tuned. :)

Favorite Moment of the Day:

·      Seeing students fully invest in adverbs like adventurously and scarily.  They loved them!  I saw a lot of creative choices – something I will continue to encourage!

Inference

Today, our lesson was on inference.  Since it still falls under the Language Arts category, I again used a children’s book.  “Animals Should Definitely Not Wearing Clothing” by Judi Barrett.  The students learned the new word well and were able to recall it at the end of class, although I think the actual process behind that concept is still a little fuzzy (but to be honest, it’s still fuzzy for me, too – even after all these years; it’s just a tricky concept.)  We made inferences about the book and inferences about each other’s movement.  I’d give the success of the experience a five out of ten.  The concepts were there and pretty well-received, but the class was a little off the wall.

Mrs. Findlay was at a meeting today, so the class had a substitute that didn't come along.  The class was so noisy today – talking, screaming, running around.  There are a few that try so hard and I just love them for it, but it's hard to acknowledge that when so much else is going on.  I worked hard to get them focused and bring them back in, but then as soon as I let them go back out or return to movement, they’re right back off again.  I couldn't get basic directions across, let alone the concepts of the day.  I don’t know what I’m doing wrong, or how to fix what I’m doing so that I can help them in classroom behavior.  My expectations are very clear, but I’m having a hard time enforcing them, since it’s not just one or two students.  It’s a high percentage of the class – maybe I just need to get up the guts to cancel the class and walk them all back to the room if they aren’t handling it well. 

I talked to Mrs. Findlay and we discussed the management skills she uses in the classroom and the signals the students are used to responding to, like hand claps, attention signals, and consequences for disobedience.  I will work to incorporate those into my own management so that it’s familiar for them.  I think this will be important for the students.  I also think it will be important to authenticate these weekly experiences for them so that they’re not just free reign play time.  It really helps to have Mrs. Findlay in the room, involved in what’s happening.  Having the teacher even sit in the room makes a world of difference. 

I think I’ve just been used to having dream classes that are thrilled to be having a lesson after having seen the company Kinnect perform in the morning.  They’re always excited and well-behaved.  I’m starting to see what it’s like to have a class get used to me as a regular teacher and have them really push me to see what they’ll get away with. 

I was much more familiar with my lesson plan today, so I was able to alter it as we went along when I could tell something just wasn’t going to work.  Unfortunately, I’ve gotten a little rusty and am using too much of my regular speech (mostly “guys” instead of “boys and girls” or “dancers”), so I’ll need to really be conscious about using better terms next week. 

We also started creating and performing today, which was an interesting experience.  We managed to get each group up and performing their own movement within the formula of ABA, but next week, we will certainly concentrate on dance concepts and work on creative movement and being comfortable with “dancing,” since there was a lot of unsure standing around, or disengaged running around in the process.  

Good thing there's next week to try again! :)

Favorite moment of the Day:

1.     “This is better than P.E!” whispered behind me on the way in.  Well, I sure hope so!  Dance is way better than P.E!  I’ve been saying that for years . . .

Creative Problem Solving

I just got back from my first real day of teaching Mrs. Findlay's second grade class!  You'll have to excuse me, I'm on a bit of a teaching high.  After a good class, I come back excited and loving life.  And . . . today was a great class! :) 

Today, I used the book "The Fool and the Phoenix" by Deborah Nourse Lattimore as a foundation for a lesson on creative problem solving.   Behavioral Objective: "The students will understand how literature is often built around problems characters face and the subsequent solutions/resolutions.  Students will also demonstrate creative problem-solving and apply these themes to reality." (See CDLP Problem Solving)

I thought this was a great lesson to begin with in order to introduce the idea of creativity - we will use it constantly throughout the rest of my visits and it will be important to have a common understanding on what that actually means to me as the teacher and to each student as an individual responsible for investing in self-expression.  The lesson went well and the students were really concentrating on what was happening.  We had a great discussion to end the lesson about the problems we each face in our own lives.   They shared ideas on how to creatively solve those problems and decided that sometimes, that simply means "keep trying" or "try it in a different way."  They really seemed to grasp the concepts we were discussing and of course, we had lots of fun.

This class tends to be a little chatty - Mrs. Findlay tells me that they've all grown up together and are a really close-knit group.  They are all great friends; it's actually really sweet to see them interact.  (One student accidentally ran into another while hopping enthusiastically; he walked her up to me, told me it was his fault and stayed while I made sure she was okay.)  I love to see them get excited though - most of it was squeals of excitement or grunts of concentration (climbing over huge invisible logs is really hard.)  However, dance is first and foremost a language of the body.  I will work on helping them learn that it is okay to communicate in ways other than vocalizing and increase the range of kinesthetic communication.  There is already a good foundation there - when I asked if it's possible to communicate in ways other than using our voices, the entire class immediately nodded and showed me some sign language.  It was wonderful! 

Something I want to personally work on is familiarizing myself even more fully with the lesson plan in advance so I don't feel like I need to keep checking it to keep myself on track.  It's a personal trait of mine as a teacher that I like to really stick with my lesson plans since I tend to find flow better while writing than speaking.  This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but if I haven't taught the lesson a few times before, this means that I want to keep it close and check it often.  I don't want that to hinder the momentum of the classroom or my perception as a teacher, so I'll practice the lessons beforehand.  Yay, Me!

Favorite moment(s) of the day:

1. Several of the comments students gave during discussions we had were very insightful and exactly what I was hoping they would understand.  It was so fulfilling to really see them grasp the ideas and apply them in different fields.
2. After we had finished up the lesson and headed back to the classroom, the students were moving on to the next activity, busily getting games they had brought from home to be able to play for a reading goal reward.  One girl came up to Mrs. Findlay and asked if she should do something one way or another and Mrs. Findlay looked back at her and said, "I don't know.  That's a problem you can solve on your own."  The girl smiled and nodded and I would daresay that she just went ahead and solved it. :)

 All in all, it was a great start to a great experience and I can't wait to go back next week!