Unit 26 - Choreographing dance

Wednesday 27^th September

Last week, my dance teacher Laura asked me to choreograph a sequence of dance which I would be able to teach a group of children in a primary school. This will then lead me to running auditions for a part in the show and eventually selecting a child to dance with me. This target was set for today which meant that I had to choreograph this in my own time. On Sunday, I hired out the performance studio for 3 hours so that I could choreograph the sequence and therefore meet my target.

Today in the lesson I was having a practice at teaching the sequence. I had to teach the dance to Laura who was acting as if she was a 10 year old child. This then gave me an insight into how I need to teach the children next week when we go into the primary school.

I started off by taking Laura through a warmup. I had previously choreographed this warmup so I was pretty confident when leading it. I chose to do the warmup to the song ‘Places’ by Martin Solveig and Ina Wroldsen because it is currently in the charts so hopefully the children will know it and it has a catchy beat.

For the rest of the session I was teaching the routine. Along the way, Laura gave me a few helpful tips which I should consider when teaching the children. Firstly, the children may not pick up the choreography very fast so I should teach them a little bit at a time, start the routine from the beginning and keep going over it until they get it. Also, make the children do the routine without me to check if they are confident enough and to check that they are remembering it. Another tip that she gave me was that I should call out the moves during the routine. This will then enable the children to be prepared for the next move. Another tip that she gave me was to face away from the children when teaching them the routine but keep checking behind just to make sure that the children are following the moves correctly. By faxing the same way as the children means that I do not have to worry about mirroring the movements and learning the whole sequence using the opposite leg and side.

The routine that I have choreographed is to the song ‘Like I can’ by Sam Smith and is a contemporary style dance. Here are some notes which I have taken so that I can remember the dance:

·     Start facing the front in a nice relaxed position.

·     Lunge to the right whilst drawing the right hand up in the shape of a semi-circle. Repeat this on the left whilst leaving the right hand above the head.

·     Contract forward with the head down and the arms parallel in front of the body. At the end of the move turn to face stage left.

·     4 contemporary-style scoops backwards.

·     Hop forward on the left leg bringing the right leg to the front and circling the arms forward.

·     Walk round on the spot for 4 counts.

·     2 gallops to the right and an open turn.

·     2 steps forward – when stepping left, the right arm goes out in front and when stepping right the left arm goes out in front. Arms should cross in front of the body and on the last count, arms go down to the sides.

Here is a video of me dancing through the sequence:

I found choreographing this sequence really hard because although I knew that I was going to be teaching this to children ages 8 to 11, I don’t know their ability so I had to choreograph something that wasn’t too easy but wasn’t too difficult. When I teach this routine to the children I will then be able to see the ability and then I will be able to choreograph according to how the children react to this first bit of choreography that I give them.

At the end of the session, Laura gave me some feedback on how I did throughout the lesson. She said that she was very happy with the sequence that I had choreographed because it won’t be too easy or too difficult for the children. An improvement that she gave me for the warmup was to remember to stretch out the neck. This is the only part of the body which I forgot to stretch out during the warmup. Laura gave me a tip which is to start at the top of the body and work down therefore I won’t miss out anything. My target for next week is to choreograph a short cool down to take the children through at the end of the session just to make sure that the muscles are nice and relaxed. I need to have this ready by next week. Also in preparation for next week I need to run through the warmup and sequence. I also need to create a playlist of the songs which I will be using on my phone so I don’t have to spend time searching for them.