December 4, 2014

The next lesson I taught was about 2D and 3D shapes. This was a fantastic subject to teach through dance and we had a lot of fun! For my lesson I went to the store and brought some props.

Warm Up:

To warm up our bodies and get us thinking about shapes I had students use different body parts to create shapes as I guided them with suggestions. We did thinks like, “Draw a circle in the air with your finger. Trace a square with your knee...etc.” I also asked for ideas for different body parts, which included making a triangle with our stomachs and interesting ideas like that!”

Activity #1:

At the store, I found foam shapes that were flat and cut out—rectangles and circles. I showed the students these different shapes and pointed out how the rectangle had angles while the circle did not. I then asked them if they could show me shapes with their bodies that had lots of angles, then I asked them to show me smooth shapes. I spread out circles and rectangles around the classroom floor. I then split the class into groups for this activity, so they would have more space. When I played the music my group that was dancing went dancing around the circles and rectangles. Then, when I stopped the music, I would say either “rectangle” or “circle” and the students would find one of those on the ground and make a shape standing on it—either with lots of angles if I said “rectangle” or without angles if I said “circle.”

Activity #2:

For this activity I showed my students some of the 3D shapes I brought-- a cube, a cone, a cylinder and a sphere. While going over the different items I showed them examples of how those different objects could move and we danced them out.

Conclusion:

To end, we went over what the 2D shapes were like—circles and rectangles, versus what the 3D looked like—spheres and cubes. The students seemed to have a better grasp on the difference between these two and to have a fun time dancing!