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"Who can tell me something about ________?" This simple phrase is one of my favorite ways to help my students be a part of their own learning process. When they're a part of the process, they're more engaged with their minds and bodies. When they're more engaged, they're more likely to remember what they've learned. When they remember what they've learned, that leads to progress! In short, being part of the process in dance class leads to progress in the student's dance education. Bonus? Excited and engaged students make teaching so enjoyable for the teacher too! In a 30-minute class, I usually spend only a couple of minutes with a "Who Can Tell Me" type question. Too much talking can lead to a loss of focus (as I'm sure you have experienced too), but I've found that just the right amount of conversation and student involvement can have the opposite effect - an increase in focus! Valentine's Day is coming up soon, and over the next two weeks, I like to do a Love & Friendship theme in my classes. I wanted to share some examples of Love & Friendship themed ways I use "Who can tell me" to ignite the imaginations in class, in case you wanted to give them a try too! The Who Can Tell Me Conversations often look something like this: In a tap class: Who can tell me how many sounds are in the words "I Love You!"? Yes, 3! Now, can you think of a tap step that has 3 sounds? Right, shuffle step has 3 sounds! Great, let's all do 8 shuffle steps changing feet, and our toe taps will say "I Love You!" each time. Here we go! In a ballet or creative movement class: Who can tell me something about a heart shape? (Hold up an image for them to see). Yes, this one is red - I love red too! Ah, yes it is round on each side of the top and pointy at the bottom! Hmmmmm...I wonder if we have a dance position that is pointy.......what about first position? Yes!! Now, keeping your heels together and toes apart, can you draw the rest of the heart shape with your finger on the floor? In a jazz or modern class: Who can think of a motion or gesture that would show that you care for someone? Giving a hug? Blowing a kiss? Cool! Great ideas! Now, do you think you could take that gesture and add it to a step we know? What would a turn with a hug look like? If you have ever purchased one of my games or lesson resources before, then you may have seen that they're all designed with making students part of the process - elements of this are already built in! Use a game in the last 5 minutes of your class to get their creativity rolling, and as a way to connect even more deeply with them! What's your favorite way to connect with your dancers? Reply in the comments and share!  Visit my shop for more dance resources that support a creative, positive, and imaginative dance classroom. Keep in touch by signing up for my weekly newsletter, and join me on Facebook at dance dance HOORAY!
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 Dance teachers are amazing humans! We connect physical concepts with intellectual learning, and we teach our students to feel the emotion inherent in movement. We break down complex patterns into simple elements. We demonstrate, we count, and we explain. We listen, we comfort, and we encourage. But even with all of that, one of those days can happen -- do you know the kind I mean? One where you're ready to pull your hair out because no one seems to be able to focus and the concept or choreography you are trying to share is just not working? On days like that, my natural teacher instincts just are not enough. (and it is so frustrating!!) On days like that, I first have to remember to cut myself some slack......then, I take a step back, and figure out what I'm missing.  Think about it -- It's always easier to grab something that is out of reach if you use a step stool or a ladder, right? When I think about teaching in this same way, I'm often able to come up with a new strategy. What can I do to give my students the step up they need? When I provide a "step stool", or a new strategy for learning, it:
After years of experimenting, there are 5 questions that help me most. I start by asking myself, can they SAY IT, SEE IT, HEAR IT, FEEL IT? Did I get SLOW & SILLY with it? Creating (or adjusting) a lesson plan with this filter helps me to think outside of the box and to make new connections too. How do I mean? Let's take a basic jazz square as an example -- imagine that you demonstrate the foot pattern and say "front, cross, back, open". For some kids, that is enough! They can pick up this new step, just like that (snap!). But for others, they might need more -- they need a few "step stools" in place before they can climb the jazz square ladder. When I think about those 5 questions, or a Step Up Strategy, I come up with these other ways to teach a jazz square: SAY IT/HEAR IT -- do 4 marches in place, shifting weight, and saying RIGHT, LEFT, RIGHT, LEFT (or opposite!) so they really feel how each step changes feet FEEL IT/BE A PART OF IT -- draw a square in the air with their fingers and trace a square shape on the floor, then explain how each step touches a corner of the square SLOW & SILLY - step forward, then step cross & freeze! Can you pick up your back foot and balance? Whoaa!! Now step back with that one. Yes! Now open with the other foot! We did it! SEE IT -- using footprint mats or pages, have the dancers physically step on the footprints to get the pattern Once the dancers begin to master it, I can then expand on the step or concept, by varying the speed, adding arms, changing facings & more, which feeds the needs of the quick-learners too. Every teacher is unique -- we all have creative and clever ways that we use to break down information for our dancers! Want a free downloadable worksheet that you can use to the 5 questions to brainstorm and troubleshoot your own teaching challenges? Click here! All of the dance dance HOORAY resources have one or more of these elements built in! The print-and-play tools use the step-up style of learning, through play....and play keeps them involved and excited! I'd love to hear your ideas! How do YOU give your students a STEP UP in the dance classroom? Visit my shop for more dance resources that support a creative, positive, and imaginative dance classroom. Keep in touch by signing up for my weekly newsletter, and join me on Facebook at dance dance HOORAY!
 Whenever I see a penguin, my mind automatically goes to Mumble, the tap dancing penguin from the animated movie, Happy Feet! Using penguins as a theme in my preschool & early elementary age tap classes is something I look forward to every year. I usually do this theme in the winter, but it could easily be used at any time of year. When I am able to, I show my students a quick clip from the movie at the top of class -- this is my favorite one to show since it is short, sweet, and features tap dance as the hero: Happy Feet Trailer If you would like to show your dancers a little bit of behind-the-scenes footage of how the animators created Mumble, based on Savion Glover, these two clips are great! Happy Feet Behind The Scenes Savion Glover & Mumble After that, we're inspired and ready to start tapping like a penguin! In the link below, I've listed some of the tap activities that I use for my preschool age tappers as well as for my early elementary age tap dancers. I hope that these are a launching point for all of the penguin ideas that you can come up with! Click here to get a printable version of my full Penguin tap lesson plan for ages 4-5 and 6-8, with activity sheets & personal penguins too! Adding a fun theme, like penguins, to my classes helps my students to happily review and reframe steps they already know as well as make connections on new steps. You can start your class with a simple question -- "Who can tell me something about a penguin?". Your students' hands will quickly shoot into the air! By adding their ideas, they will feel included and a part of the lesson! Here's some additional tap resources you will like! Crack The Ice Tap Game for ages 6-9 Snowflake Tap Terms & Choreography Game for ages 10 & up Tap Dance Chocolates, a tap sound & step matching game Tap Spell-A-Dance Game for review & warm-up for ages 8 & up Audio Haunted House Halloween Tap Game for ages 8 & up BOO! Rhythm Activity for preschool & early elementary Tap Tally Checklist for Tap Skills for ages 2-7 Join my TAP LIST to receive personalized tap tricks & tips direct to your email inbox. Visit my shop for more dance resources that support a creative, positive, and imaginative dance classroom. Keep in touch by signing up for my weekly newsletter, and join me on Facebook at dance dance HOORAY!
Tap. It's my favorite -- to do and to teach! But even if it is not your favorite, did you know that tap dance has so many *amazing* benefits for your dancers, which they can apply to all styles? Here's just a few! Tap dance:
All dancers can benefit from tap dance training, even starting with students as young as preschool age. Are you interested in getting tap dance teaching tips & tricks, straight to your inbox? Just click HERE to see Tip #1, waking up our tap shoes! Join my Tap List! You'll get tap teaching tips, ideas & tricks delivered straight to your email inbox, as well as the first chance to get in on my tap products & games to support your dance classroom. Just click the icon below!  Here's some additional tap resources you will like! Crack The Ice Tap Game for ages 6-9 Snowflake Tap Terms & Choreography Game for ages 10 & up Tap Dance Chocolates, a tap sound & step matching game Tap Spell-A-Dance Game for review & warm-up for ages 8 & up Audio Haunted House Halloween Tap Game for ages 8 & up BOO! Rhythm Activity for preschool & early elementary Tap Tally Checklist for Tap Skills for ages 2-7 Cookie Choreography Dance game for ages 7-12 Visit my shop for more dance resources that support a creative, positive, and imaginative dance classroom. Keep in touch by signing up for my weekly newsletter, and join me on Facebook at dance dance HOORAY!
 Have you ever heard of the book, A Moving Child is a Learning Child, by Gill Connell and Cheryl McCarthy? If you are a dance & movement teacher of students under the age of 6, I highly recommend it. This book has helped me to give words to what I have seen in the development of my own dancers over the years. As I create activities and exercises for my dance lesson plans, I like to refer to their research and methodology, to see how I can directly apply their ideas about child development to my dance classroom. Prior to reading this book, I had always heard child-development specialists refer to gross motor skills (large muscle) and fine motor skills (small muscle) as two separate things. Connell and McCarthy instead have coined their own helpful term -- MOTOR TOOLS -- to describe them as something that cannot be separated. They say this, on page 99 of their book: "In early childhood development, nothing happens in isolation. All muscles of any size are brought to bear in learning, formally or informally, indoors or out. You cannot separate the two. Motor tools describe the years-long process towards full realized physical development as children slowly, naturally acquire power coordination, and control." So how does this relate to dance? (stay with me here......) They say that motor tools are: The power to move muscles with an appropriate amount of force and energy for a length of time; the coordination to move different muscles in different ways simultaneously to achieve complex movement patterns; and the control to refine and adapt movements with precision for accuracy. For me, that is a textbook definition of what I try to achieve in dance classes, all the way from parent-tot movement classes and up! I love this definition, and I love this point of view because it reminds me that there is more to dance class than just dance steps. By working on motor tools, with the fun of an imaginative theme and through play, and with music, we are likely to help our dancers develop in ALL the ways they need. Because it is a years-long process, it reminds me of the benefit of repeating skills and concepts. Here are some ways that I like to help my dancers develop their motor tools!
I'd love to hear from you, about the ways in which you use motor tools in your classes! Would you like more done-for-you ways to include these development based ideas in your dance classes? Check out my Hooray for Dance Notebooks, which are themed dance lesson supplements for teachers of students ages 4-5; my First Step Frameworks, which are themed dance lesson supplements for teachers of parent-tot dance classes and ages 2-3; or my bite-size supplements, like Little Snowflakes, Little Turkeys, & Nutcracker In A Nutshell! Visit my shop for more dance resources that support a creative, positive, and imaginative dance classroom. Keep in touch by signing up for my weekly newsletter, and join me on Facebook at dance dance HOORAY!
 .Boundaries. I've been thinking a lot about these lately. Sometimes, boundaries are needed with our clients -- as in, "please call the studio number for questions, rather than my personal cell phone", or with our family members -- as in, "I'll be happy to help you once I finish what I'm doing". But other times -- and I've been realizing this more and more -- the BIGGEST boundaries I need to set are with MYSELF. I'm the queen of talking myself into more work, and I'm also the queen of minimizing how much time I think that "just one little extra" task will take. So, in these first days of 2022, I'm deciding to try to turn this around. And you are my accountability partners, if you want to join me. It's going to be the year of "time-for-us-too". I am constantly on the hunt for that perfect planner and journal that will keep me on schedule and mindful. I haven't found it yet. But with the help of a couple of my good friends, in our daily text chat, we've brainstormed about this topic A LOT, and through our conversations, we've come up with some ideas that I think might help me (and maybe you too). If you are interested in joining me on this journey, you can download the printables I made below. Here's how I'm going to use them: TIME BLOCKS My biggest challenge is making space for all the things on my ever-growing to-do list - while still stopping work when I need to stop. My strategy for 2022 is going to be to keep a running list of urgent and long-term tasks, and then, each day pull out the things that are the priority and slot them into the time blocks in my day. It helps me to see what I'm doing more clearly, when I put it in writing -- even the non-changing things, like my regular teaching hours. You can use the boxes in the printable sheet here in any way that works for you. I plan to label the boxes by the time of day -- early morning, morning, after lunch, afternoon, evening, and night. Then, I will write down what I plan to do in each segment, with ultimate goal of not letting work bleed into time I have designated for home, family time, or myself. Some days, I might use the boxes for 6 different tasks, and set a timer of 30 minutes for each to see what I can get done.  LET IT GO Have you ever had a difficult conversation with a student's parent, a colleague, or a random stranger that makes your blood pressure rise or your heart race just thinking about it? You know the one -- it is an issue you resolved, but not without stress, and now you just keep thinking about it, getting annoyed, thinking about it more, getting more bothered, and then spiraling until you cannot focus? This Let It Go sheet is made for those moments! For me, I've learned that writing things out is cathartic and the key to taking back my power from the things I cannot change. Bonus -- you can rip it up when you're done writing.  aREFRAME I learn so much from the ideas of others, and my friend was the inspiration for this next tool. She often tries to see the flip side of something that is bothering her and re-frames it to be a positive or helpful thing. An example of this would be taking a thought like "I have NO time to answer all of these emails about trial classes, I'm swamped as it is!" and reframing it to "It is amazing that we have so much interest in our new program". Maybe by taking a step back and seeing it in this new way, we can remove some of the stress of a situation and work to find a solution.  I am not an expert at this by any means -- I'm sharing these ideas with you in the hopes that my fresh start might inspire one in you too, in any way that is helpful and works for you.
Do you have an idea that has really been working for you? Please share it in the comments! Visit my shop for more dance resources that support a creative, positive, and imaginative dance classroom. Keep in touch by signing up for my weekly newsletter, and join me on Facebook at dance dance HOORAY!  in
Whether the view from your window is snowdrifts and ice (that's me) or sunshine and palm trees (paradise!), we all have this ONE weather-related thing in common -- The undeniable FUN of SNOW -- even if it is just in our imaginations! Every January, I do an entire month of SNOWY FUN themed dance classes for my preschool and early elementary age students -- and they remember and ask for our winter activities year after year. When my students fuse the power of their imaginations with the dance technique and concepts they are learning in class, they all benefit! Adding interactive simple props help them to remember and understand the dance concepts even more. Here are three interactive snow-themed activities for preschool, elementary, and secondary aged dancers! Are you teaching virtually right now? These resource will also work for online students - I've got you covered. You just need to send them an emailed copy of the printables. SNOWFLAKE SKILLS - for preschool & early elementary ballet & jazz Create an at-home or in-studio obstacle course. If you have foam or felt snowflakes, you can use those OR print some copies of this snowflake printable. Line up multiple copies of the snowflakes, and do locomotor skills over and around them. The students can practice jumps, hops, tiptoe-walks, chasse' side to side, zigzagging through, leaping, & more. You can also spread the snowflakes around your space in a random pattern. Have the dancers do their own individual freestyle moves, with the one rule that they must jump or leap over the snowflake when they come to it. SNOWBALL FIGHT - can be adapted for all ages You'll want to take a picture of your students' shocked and delighted faces when you tell them they are supposed to take a fresh piece of blank paper and.....CRUMPLE IT and THROW IT! Use your paper snowballs in some of the following ways:
READY FOR SNOW - best for preschool & early elementary age This activity helps to immerse the students in a winter theme and use their imaginations to guide their movement. You can ask them, "What do we need to wear to play outside in the snow?". I like to be silly and suggest items like a bathing suit or cowboy boots -- the kids get a kick out of correcting me and choosing the right item! Use this printable to let the class help get the stick figure dressed for snow, or use this online version for your zoom classes. Then, create a warm-up exercise, where you use isolated movements while pretending to put on all of your snow gear! For my full lesson plan using this concept, check out this resource. Keep the fun going all season long, with easy-to-use, affordable, print-and-play games and dance lesson inspiration resources -- with 10+ winter-themed teacher tools for classes and camps! Visit my shop for more dance resources that support a creative, positive, and imaginative dance classroom. Keep in touch by signing up for my weekly newsletter, and join me on Facebook at dance dance HOORAY! |
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