1.3 Warm-up and skill-building rituals  (Page 4/5)

The activities

Activity 1 : The Warm-up : preparing body for activities

Activity 2 : Partners : demonstrating trust building partner skills

Activity 3 : The Cooldown and Stretch : recovering active muscles

Assessment grid

Dance: Move with rhythmical steps, glides, leaps, revolutions, gestures, etc., usually to music, alone or with a partner or set. Jump about, skip, and move in lively way.

CONCISE OXFORD DICTIONARY

Activity 1

Warming up:

You are going to embark on an exciting journey taking you on the adventure that is Dance.

Before any creative activity the body must be warmed and loosened up in order for the learner to move comfortably. The warm-up also puts the learner at ease with the physical situation and is introductory to the activities that are to follow.

To avoid any injuries during the class it is important to warm up the muscles. Start all warm-up sessions with breathing (controlled inhaling and exhaling), in order for the muscles to have enough oxygen to execute the movements.

Warm-up exercise:

These exercises can be done to music – preferably modern pop music to which the learners can relate. Tempo must be approximately between 125 and 136 beats per minute, which is a mid-tempo beat. (Compared to a slow tempo of between 84 and 125 beats per minute and a fast tempo of between 139 and 160 beats per minute.)

Refer to ‘Activities for Learners’ for the warm up exercise.

Helpful hints:

Learners should breathe normally throughout the warm-up.

Make sure learners have full range of motion when executing each movement.

Count audibly throughout the warm-up.

Learners must be able to hear your instructions above the music.

Take note of any learner not executing the exercise properly.

Take note of any learner not knowing left from right.

ACTIVITY 2

• With this activity the learners will be exploring movement with partners. When the learners move with each other as a partner there has to be an element of trust between the two dancers. This ‘trust’ can only be successfully implemented with your guidance in order for the exercise to be successful.

Background

At the beginning of the 19 ^th century, the difference between steps for men and the steps for women became more obvious.

Women moved lightly and gracefully, while men emphasized strength and nobility in their movements.

The men began to lift and support the women and sweep them up. (As we can see in Ballet with the pas de deux – pronounced pa-de-du)

The pas de deux is, above all, a partnership between two dancers, physically, musically and artistically.

Partnership depends on the rapport with the partner.

Exercise 1: relationship in space

Line the learners up from the shortest to the tallest.

Divide the learners up into pairs from this line-up, so that the partners are more or less of the same height.

The partners can be of the same or opposite sex – depending on their height.

Have the learners explore their space in relation to each other:

• facing each other
• back to back
• one behind the other

- side by side.

Have the learners explore the relationship between one learner’s movements to another’s – are the movements similar or different?