Creative Dance Lesson Plan on Fractions
Grade: 2nd Length: 45 minutes Written by: Chelsea Alley
Student Learning Outcome: The students will demonstrate an understanding of how Tempo and Accent affect movement and be able to physically demonstrate the difference in length of movement when represented by fractions.
Equipment Needed: Hand Drum; CD player; CD with creative dance music; Fraction magnets
Behavioral Expectations/Warmup: (5 minutes)
Head, Shoulders, Knees, Toes
Move each part to warm-up, then do the whole sequence five times as fast as you can!
Head: Think
Shoulders: Don’t bump other people
Knees: Have fun!
Toes: Foot away from the objects/walls, good shoes or barefoot
Eyes: Watch
Ears: Listen
Mouth: No Talking
Nose: Take a deep breath . . . Here we go!
Warmup:
Anne Green Gilbert’s Brain Dance to Creative Dance music
Experience/Identify: (10 minutes)
Begin movement directly after finishing Brain Dance. Have the students spread out through the room and close their eyes. “Pay attention to your breathing. You don’t have to change it, just notice it. When you breathe in, can you feel your lungs fill up? Can you feel your tummy fill up? Notice how your body moves to breathe. It expands and contracts with each breath. Let your arms follow that pattern. As your body moves out and breathes in, let your arms float up, then let them fall as you breathe out. Begin to sway with your breaths. You can open your eyes, but don’t stop paying attention to your breath. How can it move you around the room? Imagine an ocean now. Think of the waves coming into the beach and then leaving. In and out. How would you move if you were these waves? Pretend you are the waves and let them move you around the room with ebb and flow. Now imagine wind. Wind has a different feel than your breath and the waves. Is it more constant? More sustained? What does wind-like movement look like?
Alright, we’ve been dancing with rhythm! Did you know that? It’s a special kind of rhythm called Non Metric. That means that it doesn’t have a steady beat; I can’t count it out. Now let’s begin to explore Metric Rhythm – the rhythm that you can count.”
Explore/Investigate: (15 minutes)
Explore/Investigate: (15 minutes)
“Rhythm means pattern of sound. There are lots of parts that go into rhythm. The first is BEAT. A beat is each part of the pattern. I will use my drum to make beats while you see if you can walk on the beat. A step for every beat. (Speed up, slow down – change TEMPO) Alright, so you can walk pretty well on the beat. What if I ask you to explore new and creative movement on the beat? It’s different – you’re not just walking. You could jump, you could slide, you could hop, you could spin, but it will all be on the beat . . .” Discuss ACCENT. “It’s a beat that gets special attention or special emphasis. I will drum four beats. How can you accent the first one of every set with movement? Now try putting the accent on the second beat. What different body parts can you use to make the accent?”
NOTE VALUE
“Now, another important part of rhythm is the note value, which means how many counts (or silent beats) one note gets. Note value is a lot like fractions, so we’ll use those to help us understand. For our dance movement, we will say that a whole = 8 counts. Think back to the beginning of class when we were walking and dancing on the beat – one move for every beat. We will say that each one of those beats is 1/8 for note value. What fraction would we use for two beats? For four beats?” Use board magnets to demonstrate. “Let’s try this with movement. First, we go back to the 1/8 beat. You move once for every beat. Next, we will move with 1/4 notes. That means that your movement has to last for two beats, not just one. What comes next? 1/2 notes. How long does your movement last? 4 beats! And last, our movement will last for a whole note – 8 counts! Don’t give up half way through, use all your time!”
“Let’s try some other combinations. What would 2/8’s, 1/2, and 1/4 look like in movement?” Try other combinations as well, using magnets for visuals and counting rhythm with actual music, not just beating on the drum.
Create/Perform: (10 minutes)
Create/Perform: (10 minutes)
Set up a combination of fractions on the whiteboard with the magnets, as well as the movement that will go with them. (Whole = falling to the ground for the full 8 counts; 1/8 = jumping, etc.) Divide the class in half. One half watches (using good audience rules) for interesting movement and correct interpretation of the note value/fractions. The other half finds a place on the floor and freezes in an interesting body shape. Call the performing group through a mini-performance. “Begin in your frozen shape. Don’t move yet, just think about how you will start. You have a whole note first (i.e.), use all 8 of the beats. Ready, begin. Move all the way through the beats, don’t stop. 1, 2, 3, 4, ½ note for 4 counts, etc. We’re coming to the end, freeze in a new and creative shape!” Switch groups.
Connect/Analyze: (5 minutes)
Connect/Analyze: (5 minutes)
Did you like moving with non-metric rhythm or metric rhythm better? Why? Are there other things in our lives that use non-metric or metric rhythm? What other fractions could we use to move to?
