I get it. You’re dealing with a million other things. Report cards are coming up and then – SHOOT – you realized you haven’t done your dance unit yet.
So you do what a lot of teachers do: put kids in groups and give them an assignment to create a dance – then assess it using a rubric. DONE! You breathe a sigh of relief.
Let me be clear – there’s no judgement. Group dance assignments certainly get the job done quickly.
But as educators we know… assessment without instruction is not actually moving the needle forward. It’s only assessing what students already knew.
Even if you don’t have any dance training – there IS a way to do better.
Imagine teaching another other arts strand. You wouldn’t teach music without listening to any music. You wouldn’t teach art without looking at any art pieces… so how can you teach dance without looking at any examples of dance?
The good news is it is extremely easy to find lots of dance examples. Youtube is full of them – and there are many professional dance companies who put up clips of their performances.
The tricky part is understanding the curriculum elements you need to focus on, and finding the right video clips to showcase those elements. Luckily, I’ve done some for you! Download the freebie below to see a sample lesson for teaching the dance element of “time”.
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