Georgia Standards

South Carolina Standards

Key Vocabulary

Materials

• Sound source and music with a steady beat
• Geometric shape cards
• Pape and pencil

Instructional Design

Opening/Activating Strategy

• Begin by engaging students in movement that introduces students to the Elements of Dance.

• • Have students arrange themselves in the classroom with enough personal space to move freely without touching a neighbor.
  • Turn on instrumental music with a steady beat.
  • Element of Body: First, have students bring awareness to their bodies by leading them through gentle stretches starting from the head and moving to the toes (e.g., head circles, shoulder shrugs, toe touches, etc.). Then, ask them to make different shapes with their bodies, such as circles, triangles, etc.
  • Element of Action - Locomotor/non-locomotor: Tell students that these movements they just performed were non-locomotor, meaning that they didn’t move to a new location. Direct students to perform a movement that requires moving from one place to another, such as step-together, step-together moving side to side.
  • Have students practice what they just learned by saying words such as “locomotor” and have students create a spontaneous locomotor movement.
  • Have students return to their seats.

Work Session

• Review types of angles with students: Right, acute and obtuse.
  • Demonstrate how to make angles using different parts of your body, such as arms, legs, torso, etc.
  • Call out different types of angles, such as right, acute, and obtuse; ask students to explore different ways they can make the angles with their bodies.
• View different geometric figures and model how to find the perimeter.
  • Display a polygon and illustrate the perimeter by doing a locomotor movement for the distance of each side, and a non-locomotor movement for each angle.
  • Model the perimeter of several figures and ask students to copy your movements.
• Tell students that they will now create their own choreography to demonstrate the perimeter and angles of a polygon.
• Divide students into small groups.
  • First, students will solve the perimeter of six basic geometric figures on the shape cards provided.
  • Assign one geometric figure to each group to represent using movement.
  • After calculating the perimeter of each figure, the groups will decide how to represent the perimeter of their assigned figure with movement.
    • Tell students that the distance should be shown through locomotor movement and the types of angle at the vertices should be shown through nonlocomotor movement.

• Allow time for students to choreograph and practice. Circulate to work with students and check for understanding.

Closing Reflection

• Students will perform their choreography for their classmates. Discuss appropriate audience participation and etiquette prior to performances.
• After each performance, the audience will determine which shape matches the performance. Students should refer to the movements and shapes the dancers made with their bodies when justifying their answers.

Assessments

Formative

Teachers will assess students’ understanding of the content throughout the lesson by observing students’ participation in the activator, review of types of angles and how to calculate perimeter, movement responses to types of angles, and collaboration with groupmates to choreograph their movement phrase.

Summative

CHECKLIST

• Students can correctly calculate the perimeter of each geometric figure.
• Students can accurately represent the perimeter of a geometric figure using locomotor movements.
• Students can identify a geometric figure by watching a perimeter movement phrase performance.
• Students can use their bodies to represent different types of angles accurately.

DIFFERENTIATION 

*This integrated lesson provides differentiated ideas and activities for educators that are aligned to a sampling of standards. Standards referenced at the time of publishing may differ based on each state’s adoption of new standards.

Ideas contributed by: Whitney Jones. Updated by Katy Betts.

Revised and copyright:  July 2024 @ ArtsNOW

Georgia Standards

South Carolina Standards

Key Vocabulary

Materials

• Sound source and music with a steady beat
• Paper and pencils
• Written word problems on cards

Instructional Design

Opening/Activating Strategy

Classroom Tips: Allow for some open space to create and perform. Review audience etiquette expectations before students perform for their peers.

• Tell students that they will be playing the Name Game.
  • Have students stand in a circle. 
  • Demonstrate the Name Game by stating your name while making a movement or gesture to accompany your name. 
  • The circle then collectively repeats your name and gesture. Continue with the next person stating his/her name and making a gesture. The circle repeats the new person's name and gesture. Then, starting with the person of origin, repeat all the names and gestures shared to that point. Continue until everyone in the circle is included.

Work Session

• • Tell students that they will be using the Elements of Dance to enact the solution to a word problem.

• Begin by engaging students in movement that introduces students to the Elements of Dance: Body, action, space, time and energy.

• • Have students arrange themselves in the classroom with enough personal space to move freely without touching a neighbor.
  • Turn on instrumental music with a steady beat.
  • Element of Body: First, have students bring awareness to their bodies by leading them through gentle stretches starting from the head and moving to the toes (e.g., head circles, shoulder shrugs, toe touches, etc.). Then, ask them to make different shapes with their bodies.
  • Element of Time: Next, bring students’ awareness to the rhythm of the music by having them march in place to the beat, gently swinging their arms by their sides. 
  • Element of Energy: Now, direct students to explore energy variations with different movement qualities such as sharp movements–quick, precise actions like punches or snaps, and smooth movements–slow, flowing actions like waves or circles with arms.
  • Element of Space - Levels: Bring students’ attention to levels (high, middle, low) with movements such as stretching up high and moving on tiptoes, crouching in a small ball close to the floor, and bouncing in place at a middle level.
  • Element of Action - Locomotor/non-locomotor: Tell students that these movements they just performed were non-locomotor, meaning that they didn’t move to a new location. Direct students to perform a movement that requires moving from one place to another, such as step-together, step-together moving side to side.
  • Have students practice what they just learned by saying words such as “locomotor” and have students create a spontaneous locomotor movement.
  • Have students return to their seats.
• Next, divide the class into small groups. Assign each group a word problem (it can be the same word problem or different word problems depending on students’ levels).
  • For example, “You must choreograph a dance combination that is 4 counts of 8 in length. The dance must have an equal number of locomotor and non-locomotor movements.”
  • Students should solve the word problem mathematically. For example, “What is the total number of counts in the dance (32)? How many locomotor movements will you have (16)? How many non-locomotor movements will you have (16)?”
  • Next, students will create choreography to answer the word problems. Students can arrange their choreography as they would like as long as it meets the criteria of the word problem.
    • Example 1: First 4 counts - locomotor movement, second 4 counts - non-locomotor, third 4 counts - locomotor, fourth 4 counts - non-locomotor, fifth 4 counts - locomotor movement, sixth 4 counts - non-locomotor, seventh 4 counts - locomotor, eighth 4 counts - non-locomotor.
    • Example 2: First 4 counts - non-locomotor, second 4 counts - locomotor, third 4 counts - locomotor, fourth 4 counts - non-locomotor, fifth 4 counts - locomotor, sixth 4 counts - locomotor, seventh 4 counts - non-locomotor, eighth 4 counts - non-locomotor.
    • Both dances have 32 counts total, 16 of which are locomotor and 16 of which are non-locomotor.

Closing Reflection

• The students will perform their movement phrases for their classmates. Discuss appropriate audience participation and etiquette prior to performances.
• After students perform, groups will read their word problem to the class, show their solution and how it went with their performed choreography.
• If all groups used the same word problem, discuss how different groups created different choreography based on the same criteria.

Assessments

Formative

Teachers will assess students’ understanding of the content throughout the lesson by observing students’ participation in the activator, ability to make different types of movements using the Elements of Dance, ability to understand and correctly solve the word problem, and collaboration in group choreography.

Summative

CHECKLIST

• Students can identify and perform the Elements of Dance.
• Students can decipher the given word problem.
• Students can solve the given word problem.
• Students can create and perform choreography that correctly demonstrates the solution to the given word problem.

DIFFERENTIATION 

*This integrated lesson provides differentiated ideas and activities for educators that are aligned to a sampling of standards. Standards referenced at the time of publishing may differ based on each state’s adoption of new standards.

Ideas contributed by: Melissa Dittmar-Joy. Updated by Katy Betts.

Revised and copyright: June 2024 @ ArtsNOW