Reflection 7: Dance

What has changed in your understanding of what creative children’s dance is, and why and how to use it in the classroom? 

Last weeks class was so much fun. I loved seeing everyone's ideas and activities to get our students moving.

My understanding of dance in the classroom before we did this unit is that there was no way to apply it to the other cores. But now that i have seen all of my cohorts presentations and ideas I am so excited to incorporate dance into my classroom. I think that dance is a great way to help concrete information into student's minds.

So what will you be taking with you from your experience with creating, teaching and participating in creative dance lessons in class?

I think that using dance in the classroom is a creative, FUN, and easy way to incorporate the arts into the other cores. I've learned that is important to maintain good classroom management while doing these activities because if you do not they will not be effective in helping the students learn the material.

 Now what do you plan to teach your future students and how will you prepare for that?

I am going to strongly incorporate dance in my future classroom. I am going to try and use it once or twice a week. I think it helps students to remember the information they learn in multiple parts of the brain. I will prepare to teach dance by purchasing the book Dr. Escalante mentioned in class. It is full of great lesson plans. I will also be sure to keep myself in good physical conditions so I can move along with the class.