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Entries Tagged as 'why dance matters'

A backstage story

June 15th, 2011 · 1 Comment · why dance matters

A story unfolded during the lead-up to our End-of-Year Performance this year, which is hanging with me, wanting to be pulled together. It’s about two 5th grade boys in particular. Adiel is a 5th grader in one of our regular classrooms. I’ve been working with him since kindergarten & he’s always been a bit of […]

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Why Dance Matters to me

May 3rd, 2010 · 3 Comments · why dance matters

I teach dance, the least understood and least represented of Washington State’s legislated content areas.  I teach dance because it engages children physically, mentally, emotionally, and socially, providing them with visible and felt experiences of learning.  Dance has the power to touch and change all students: boys and girls, children from English-speaking and non-English-speaking families, […]

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Why Dance Matters: more voices from the dance classroom

May 2nd, 2010 · Comments Off · Guest Voices, why dance matters

by Randy Barron, a dance educator who is putting his own classroom experiences into the blog Classroom Choreography… At the end of a short Classroom Choreography residency in Arizona, I asked students to reflect in writing on their experiences making dances about poetry. One of my 5th grade students (a boy!) said on his closing […]

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Why Dance Matters: it’s playful

April 30th, 2010 · Comments Off · why dance matters

Each day at 2:10, as I bid farewell to my 6th class of the day, students who are out for recess start knocking on my outside door. The knocks keep coming all the way through recess, and the questions are always the same: “Can we dance today?” “Can we come in?” “Can we show you […]

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Why Dance Matters: it builds self & community

April 25th, 2010 · 5 Comments · why dance matters

Each year my 5th graders build a dance together before graduating.  It’s a process fraught with difficulties , but the end result is a real high:  they come together to share their work. One year, my 5th graders performed a medley of dances, which included a dance from every continent.  Most were dances I taught […]

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Why Dance Matters: it’s a respite for body & mind

April 21st, 2010 · Comments Off · why dance matters

Third graders are learning dances about clapping for their end-of-year performance now.  Their first dance is d’hammerschmiedsgselln (that’s duh-ham-mair-shmeets-guh-seln, I’m told), which has a great clapping pattern for a quartet.  I dragged them through learning it last week, and now that they finally have it, they love it.  The second is the Virginia Reel, which […]

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Why Dance Matters: it’s fun!

April 21st, 2010 · 8 Comments · why dance matters

Ely arrived mid-year, straight from the bilingual orientation center, which meant he was barely beginning to understand English.  He agreed to step inside the dance classroom on two conditions: his shoes & socks would stay on his feet & he would watch from 6″ inside the door. The intervention specialist stayed with him, in case […]

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Why Dance Matters: it’s for yourself alone

April 19th, 2010 · 2 Comments · why dance matters

When Rosedah and Rita started dancing in kindergarten, in their hijab, they were both lively & enthusiastic. But as time passed, they internalized the disapproval of their particular community, a fundamentalist faith which discourages music, dancing & the artistic representation of the human form. They always participated, but in a reserved way — gestural instead […]

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Why Dance Matters: it nurtures our better selves

April 18th, 2010 · 4 Comments · why dance matters

David was another reluctant dancer.  A fifth grader, new to the school, he was pretty hostile to both teachers and students.  A loner, he swore, picked fights, and lashed out at whoever was nearby.  David blossomed late in the year as a dancer — inside a full-length stretchy bag. From the safe anonymity of the […]

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Why Dance Matters: it’s contagious — in a good way

April 17th, 2010 · Comments Off · why dance matters

Fifth graders at my school, who have danced since kindergarten, generally accept dance — like recess or PE or math — or the air they breathe. But when transfer students make their first trip to the dance classroom, they often look like they’ve landed on Mars without oxygen. Geo was one such 5th grader, clearly […]

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