Preschool dance activities can make or break your class. Understanding your students needs and meeting them where they are at is extremely important. Below I have different preschool dance activities based on class size, age, and social development.
Giant Bubble!
Ask your dancers to draw a bubble around themselves. They can tell you what color/kind of bubble they are going to be for the day! Next emphasize staying inside your bubble because if we get too close to our friends our bubble will pop. Give them prompts for movement inside the bubble. Example: Reach to the edge of your bubble with your fingers, now try it with your toes, etc. This is one of my favorite ways to introduce personal space to my youngest dancers.
Memory Dancing!
For this exercise it is important for all students to be able to see one another. To begin, have the instructor start, explain that you are going to do a dance move, and then you are going to point to another dancer. Once you are pointed and called on you must stand up and repeat the dance move and then create your own. After you finish your dance move, point to another friend and have them repeat your move and create their own! This can be advanced by having the dancers remember each move and adding on. This can be a fun and exciting game as the dancers wait patiently to get a chance to have a turn. It also requires them to be attentive!
Pathways!
There are a variety of ways for pathways to be included into your dance class. You can do pathways with various rhythms, technique, dance phrases, and locomotor movement. With that in mind using the dancers personal space you can create a variety of patterns to move them through the space. Give dancers a traveling step by having them move on a diagonal, zigzag, circle, or square. Increase the difficulty by having them count how many steps they do in a specific locomotor movement before switching to another one. For example, if they have a designated square have them move corner to corner on the diagonal, add in tip toe walks, chasses, and hops. Ask dancers to count out loud as they perform 4 tiptoe walks, 4 chasses, and 8 hops on the diagonal. Adjust lengths based on the size of space for each student.
Creative Movement Cards
Creative movement cards are an excellent way to provide a visual for your students. Many children are visual learners and to make sure all students are understanding certain concepts, adding a visual is essential. You can use visuals for Scarf Movements, Sea Creature Creative Movement Cards, Insect Creative Movement Cards and you can check out Carley Jane Designs for more!
I hope you find these useful and let me know if you try them in your classes!
Which ones do you want to try?
These are just a couple examples of fun activities to do with your classes! There are countless ways to make them fit your classes specific needs by adjusting the difficulty and accounting for the space you have! If you are interested in song ideas or more ideas for class you can check out:
Spring Playlist for Pre Ballet
Winter Animal Songs
Amazing Preschool Dance Songs
