Dance and Science

I collaborated with my peers to create this dance lesson that integrated Dance and Science. The curriculum connections include:

Grade 5 Science and Technology: Understanding Structures and Mechanism

Overall Expectation:

1. analyse social and environmental impacts of forces acting on structures and mechanisms;

Specific Expectations:

1.1 analyse the effects of forces from natural phenomena (e.g., tornadoes, hurricanes, earthquakes, tsunamis) on the natural and built environment

1.2 evaluate the impact of society and the environment on structures and mechanisms, taking different perspectives into account (e.g., the perspectives of golfers, local bird-watching groups, families, a school board), and suggest ways in which structures and mechanisms can be modified to best achieve social and environmental objectives

Grade 5 Dance

Overall Expectation:

A1. Creating and Presenting: apply the creative process to the composition of movement sequences and short dance pieces, using the elements of dance to communicate feelings and ideas

Specific Expectations:

A1.1 translate into movement sequences a variety of images and ideas from other classroom subjects, including the arts

A1.3 use movement in the choreographic form call and response in a variety of ways when creating dance pieces

Minds On 10 min.

Use the Action Pak dance cards and select cards based on themes (i.e. fire, water, wind... ) focus on words related to storms/natural disasters such as “wind, rain, sway”

• Have students stand up and interpret some of the selected words with no inferencing. (3 Minutes total)
• Stop and ask students to think about these words in relation to weather
• How does the word “fall” or “sway” change when you are using it to describe/represent a tsunami/tornado/flood?
• Have students choose a partner and face each other. Each pair will choose a leader, who will interpret “wind” using mirroring.
• Mirroring is when: partners face each other and decide who will be the first leader. The leader will begin to perform slow movements with different body parts while his/her partner follows along. The goal is to have both partners moving at (almost) the same time. Have students switch leaders, and interpret thunder and lightning using mirroring.

Action (20 mins)

• Show students a video in which a building or city infrastructure is changes because of the weather conditions. (5 mins)
• Kobe Earthquake (30-1:30)
• High Winds in Buffalo (up until 30 seconds)
• As a class, brainstorm different storms and types of weather conditions or instances that can be or were so severe that they change the way something looks: (3-5 mins)
• Tsunami
• Hurricane
• Tornado
• Wind
• Rain
• Thunder
• Lightning
• Snow
• Have students join in small groups (3-4) that will be chosen by birthday month.  
• Have groups choose one weather condition or weather instance, and show, using dance, how the weather condition has changed the way the infrastructure looked before. Keep the weather condition a secret. (5 mins)
• Students have access to the word cards
• Groups will dances will include Canon as a dance strategy:
• Cannon is when: a dance phrase is performed by more than one soloist/group and begins at different times so that the phrases overlap.
• Each dance will begin in a still pose, and will end in a different still pose.
• Music optional:
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mIrt5MkGpy0
• Present their dances to the class, who will guess the weather condition and dance strategy used.  (5-7 mins)

Consolidation: (10-15 mins)  

• As a class, discuss storms and their effect on cities and people:
• How do these storms and bad weather conditions affect cities?
• How do the people deal with it? In serious conditions, people will lose all of their possessions. How do they protect themselves against the weather?
• How can cities prevent damage? Is it possible?
• How can people prevent damage?
• How can we help?

• Each group will be assigned a question/topic to show in a dance
• I.e group one will show how storms affect cities, group two will show how people recover from storms)
• Groups will present their work using call and response:
• Call and response is when: an individual or group performs followed by another individual or group whose performance responds to the first.

I.e call (storm) - response (how does it affect people and buildings) - response (how do people recover from natural disasters/how do people guard themselves against natural disasters).


The strategies that we incorporated in this lesson include:

Mirroring - partners face each other and decide who will be the first leader. The leader will begin to perform slow movements with different body parts while his/her partner follows along. The goal is to have both partners moving at (almost) the same time.

Modification:

• Use a rope or silks to hold onto to make the mirroring easier.

Extension:

• Integrate more people making it a group effort.

Call and Response - an individual or group performs followed by another individual or group whose performance responds to the first

Interaction of different elements/opposites ( wind vs. rain) (thunder vs. lightning)  (rain v. sunlight) (Storm vs. Calm)

Modification:

• This activity can be adapted for science and you can use the call and response to show the interactions of elements in science such as magnets, ions, protons, and different forms of matter.

Extension:

• Once the students have an idea how the different forces work together have them focus on different forces and how all the different forces would interact with each other.
• Have each individual take on one specific force and create a series of movements that represent that force and have them face off with different forces(students) in the class.

Canon - a dance phrase is performed by more than one soloist/group and begins at different times so that the phrases overlap

Extreme weather event (hurricane, tsunami, tornadoes, thunder and lightening storm)

Modification:

• You could adapt this lesson to be done while being seated in a circle arms length apart so the actions are limited to the upper body and allows the students to really focus on their bodies and relationships. (great for younger students, or those with various gate issues).

Extension:

• Divide the class into smaller groups of 4 or 5 and have each person create a sequence within that group. Choose one person to begin their sequence and have the rest of the group follow the sequence. Once the first persons sequence has come to an end have the next person in the group perform their sequence and repeat that until everyone has had a chance to lead the group through their.
• Challenge each student in the class to come up with a 5-10 second sequence and attempt to run the canon sequence through the entire class allowing every student to perform their sequence.