Inspired by the Summer Institute at LDI, I am beginning to experiment with creative dance! I’ve broached the area before with an activity called “Making Dances” that I usually do with grades 3 and up, in which students choreograph their own dances. And all of my dance classes end with a Hip Hop circle or dance circle of some kind, in which students have the opportunity to express themselves….but I’ve never really lead activities that encourage students to conduct their own explorations / investigations of the elements of dance: time, space, and energy.

I tried one activity on Friday with a 3rd grade class at Cesar Chavez. We played with 2 elements of space: shape and pathway. For me, one of the most difficult things about facilitating these activities is NOT modeling what you want students to do. It’s especially difficult for me when I am working with English Language Learners whose primary language I don’t speak - I’m so used to modeling, modeling, modeling, everything - all the time! But for these activities modeling would be counterproductive, I think. So instead of relying on words alone, I wrote up some cue cards that I could hold up in addition to saying the prompts out loud. What I did find myself interjecting with often was “There is no wrong answer! No wrong way to move!” :)