Integrating Dance & Movement into Science
Objectives: Students will be able to:
Curriculum Standards:
Materials:
Building Background Knowledge/Activate Prior Knowledge:
Comprehensible Input:
Independent Practice:
Closing:
- comprehend instructions
- use their sense of sight
- remember previously seen images
Curriculum Standards:
- Standard 9.1: Production, performance and exhibition of dance, music, theater and visual arts
Materials:
- Leaves from outdoors
- Tree Observation Sheet
- Crayons
- Pencils
- Seed To Forest Activity
Building Background Knowledge/Activate Prior Knowledge:
- The students will be asked if they have ever gone on a nature walk
- The students will be asked to volunteer information about nature walks
- The students will be informed the class will be going on a nature walk around the school
- The students will be asked to look for leaves on the grass and pick up two different looking leaves
Comprehensible Input:
- The students will be asked to line up with their coats on ready to go outside
- As the class walks outside we will be looking for leaves
- The students will be encouraged to help their classmates find leaves
- The students will be asked to notice the trees and use their observation skills
- When the students return to the classroom they will be asked to put their leaves they have found on their desks and come to the back rug
- The students will be doing a yoga movement activity (this activity will explain the cycle of a tree)
- Start off in seed, or child’s pose, sitting on your knees, folding over them from the hips and resting your forehead on the mat or the earth. Take deep breaths and try to imagine what it would feel like to be a tiny seed - warm and cozy and waiting to grow.
2. From seed pose, slowly take a deep breath in and begin floating your arms up over your body. Then gently look up and strech your upper body to the sky to become a seedling. Close your eyes and feel the sun helping you to grow tall and the wind swaying you from side to side.
3. Take a few deep breaths as a seedling, and then come all the way up to stand. Stand tall with your feet slightly apart. Ground down through all four corners of your feet so you feel rooted to the floor.
4. Find a steady point to rest your gaze, out in front of you or on the floor a few feet ahead of you. (This is called drishti, or gaze point.) This will help you build concentration and find and maintain your balance.
5. Now put some extra weight into your left foot as you slowly lift your right foot off the floor and place it inside your left leg, bending your knee away from your body.
You can start by balancing with your right toes still touching the ground, and work towards bringing your foot as high as you can. Press your foot into your leg and let your leg push back to find the center line of your body. Bring your hands together in front of your heart, pushing evenly between both of your palms, or reach your arms up to the sky growing your “branches” towards the sun.
6. Take a few moments to return to your breath here, focusing on slow, even inhales and exhales, and keeping your gaze steady.
7. If you are with a group, try standing in tree pose in a circle, and slowly bring your hands out to the sides and join your palms to support one another, and become a forest of tree.
Independent Practice:
- The students will be asked to return to their seats
- The students will be asked to complete the Tree Observation Sheet independently (they will use their leaves for this activity)
- Once the students have completed this activity I will take volunteers to share their leaves they have found
- The students will be given a tree map to fill in facts they have learned about trees
- After the students finish I will collect their papers
Closing:
- The students will be asked to turn to their neighbors and tell them one fact they have learned from todays lesson