Context elaborations - Level 6 dance
Context elaborations are possible contexts for learning, with a suggestion of how they might be used with the focus achievement objective.
The listed context elaborations are examples only. Teachers can select and use entirely different contexts in response to local situation, community relevance, and students’ interests and needs.
Each context elaboration is coded, using the summary notation recorded with each strand. A bold strand code indicates a dominant strand in the given context. If both or all codes are bold, they are considered to have equal weighting in the given context.
For example, students working on performing a sasa dance sequence (CI) will have a major focus on rehearsing and performing (communicating and interpreting) that movement, but their performance could involve understanding dance in context (UC) or the cultural significance of sasa in Samoa and its background.
Relationships and connections
The contexts for learning outlined below make links to the
dance key concepts of relationships and connections.
- Identify and learn about the background history and features of a variety of cultural styles, such as waiata-a-ringa, sasa, Israeli folk dance. Learn movements or sequences within the given genre or style of dance. For example: The teacher or a community guest or student expert teaches movements common to the waiata-a-ringa or jazz dance style. (PK UC)
- Identify and learn popular social dances from a decade of the twentieth century (for example, rock 'n' roll from the 1950s, the twist from the 1960s, the hustle from the 1970s). Discuss the similarities and differences between the vocabularies, techniques, stylistic qualities, and performance protocols of the various dances. Using these experiences, select one decade and investigate and describe the social influences that contributed to the development of its dances. (UC PK)
- Use a co-operative learning activity to support students to investigate the background and features of a dance genre or style, before moving into whole-class teaching and learning in the style. For example: The teacher asks each group of students to find out about one aspect of the style (origins, important people or groups, significant events through time, the reasons for performing the dance today or in history, and so on). Each group then leads the class in an explanation of the connections and discoveries made. (PK UC)
- Investigate one or more dances that involve a combination of voice and movement (for example, haka, hula, musicals, ma’ulu’ulu) and examine the relationship between the movement and the text being voiced. With the teacher, choreograph and learn a dance that involves a combination of voice and movement. Present the dance to an audience, focusing on such performance skills as projection and focus. (UC PK DI CI)
- View and practically explore dances of a variety of ethnic groups that use specific objects as integral parts of the dance (for example, a taiaha, strips of material, a fan, bamboo poles, castanets, ribbons). Ask different groups to investigate the 'who, what, when, why, where, and how?' aspects for one of the dances and present their findings to the class. Students can then look at the interrelationship between props and the movements performed, across the different cultural groups, and make connections between their similarities and differences. (PK UC)
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Invention and creation
The contexts for learning outlined below make links to the
dance key concept of invention and creation.
- Investigate the content, form, and presentation features of a dance from a stage show (for example: Moulin Rouge or A Chorus Line). Students could brainstorm all the stage show titles they can think of and choose the one they wish to focus on. Use this information as a stimulus for developing movement material. In a group, choreograph, invent, and perform a reinterpretation or recreation of the original dance, setting it in a local context. (UC, DI, PK, CI)
- As part of creating an original dance for performance, students use a still or video camera to record work in progress. They then view the recording with others and discuss the strengths and limitations as well as accuracy and clarity of both the choreography and the performance. Students may say things like: “Make sure your arm is extended on that count” or “Crouch lower”. Use the results of the discussion to assist in developing the dance and to refine performance skills. (PK, CI)
- Explore action words to invent movement and then use elements of dance terms related to space, energy, time, body, or relationships, to vary or change the original action or movement. Students use this material to create a short dance sequence. (DI, PK)
- Create short dance sequences using a range of stimuli such as kowhaiwhai patterns, a teen issue (for example, conflict resolution), or text or poetry (such as Rain by Hone Tuwhare). Learn about other dances or dance practitioners who use similar stimuli in the development of their work.
- Give reasons for choreographic decisions including: the mood they are trying to show through the movement; the relationship between the movement and the choreographic brief or task; the use of contrasting elements of dance, such as space, time, body, energy, relationships; the use of choreographic devices such as repetition or retrograde.
- Perform the composition for the class, discuss and give feedback on the way the original stimulus or the elements of dance are shown through the dance. (DI, UC, PK, CI)
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Embodiment and performance
The contexts for learning outlined below make links to the
dance key concept of embodiment and performance.
- Rehearse and perform a dance in a variety of school contexts (for example, a classroom, assembly hall, outdoors in the quad) and adapt it to suit the venue/space and the location of the audience. Perform with the appropriate clarity, control, and accuracy expected of the performance, in the style being presented. (PK, CI)
- Perform dance sequences in a range of dance styles paying attention to the clear, controlled, and accurate execution of the stylistic features of the dance genre. (CI)
- Describe the ideas behind the movement and the production technologies used in dance performances students have seen, either recorded or live. Identify the elements of dance contained in what they see. Give examples of how the elements are manipulated and/or changed throughout the dance.
- Describe movements that show the manipulation of the elements. (UC, PK, CI) Recorded dances can be viewed on video or DVD or on the TEMPO Dance TV online. Examples of appropriate dances include: Poi by Mary Jane O’Reilly, Te Kakano by Michael Parmenter, or Mauri by Stephen Bradshaw (all Aotearoa/New Zealand dancers and choreographers).
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Last updated March 30, 2021
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