Workshop Notes
Central District of Massachusetts Music Educators Association
4/1/10 - Second day of two
Teaching Traditional Dance and Singing Games to Children
Dear Central District of Mass. Music Teachers,
We had a great time with you again, last Thursday.
Here below are notes on what we did in this second
workshop. If you have not yet seen them, there is
a separate website page of notes on the workshop
we led last January.
Blaydon Races p. 8 in notes 1.
in NEDM's Chimes of Dunirk collection
We like doing this to jig medleys.
We did this is a mixer, but you can also do it with
younger children without changing partners.
We often call this at weddings. We always start
teaching this, as we do with any circle mixer, by
having the dancers promenade and defining the
gents/moons/peanut butter/inside partners and the
ladies/stars/jelly/outside partners.
My Heart is Ready p. t
I tried out a few new tenor notes that
didn't work. Here is the harmonization
that we did in January and settled on
last Thursday:
MyHeartIsReady.pdf
Shake Them Simmons Down
A great dance for preschool and Kindergarten.
ShakeThemSimmonsDown.pdf
Going to Alberta p. 6 in handout 1
In NEDM's Sashay the Donut collection
This is a GREAT way to teach the ballroom position (used for the waltz,
the polka, and for a contra dance swing) at the same time as a simple
polka step. We have found this to be a great dance for little kids,
big kids mixed ages, community dance, in short, for anyone. You can
do it as an a cappella singing game, or accompany it with piano,
guitar, accordion, or Orff instruments, or do it to the music of
the Sashay the Donut CD.
Heel & Toe Polka p. 10 in handout 1.
In NEDM's 'Chimes of Dunkirk' collection.
With younger children and at community dances
we usually skip the right elbow turn that follows
the clapping, and we go directly to
'everyone pass right shoulders with partner, walk
straight ahead, and take two hands with new partner.'
We have done this dance with children as young as
Kindergarten. Like other circle mixers, you can start
out teaching it with the children staying with the same
partner, and later on teach the changing partners version.
Rural Felicity p. 5 in handout 1
This is in NEDM's Sashay the Donut collection.
I like using jig medley's for this. It is great
for a multi-age group of dancers with little
dance experience.
Simple Square with recording
p. 6 in handout 2
This square is not quite so simple. We recommend
first dancing "Comment ça va" (in NEDM's "Sashay
the Donut" collection) so the students can learn
the corner allemande left, partner dosido, corner-
allemende left again, promenade partner sequence
of figures. It can be wonderful for an evening
multi-age community dance, especially if your
students have done the dance before.
Lucky Seven p. 10 in handout 1
Thank you for telling me I had taught this
before. It resulted in, for me, a surprisingly
new experience: dancing it to the wild
and wonderful "Toast" from NEDM's
"Other Side of the Tracks" CD; a completely
different experience from dancing it to
"The Coming Dawn" from the same CD.
Grumpy March p. 8 in handout 1
in NEDM's Sashay the Donut collection. We put
the "Wizard's Walk" medley on our "Sashay the
Donut" CD specifically for this dance.
This is a great dance for upper elementary, middle
school and high school.
I have changed one figure from the book: right after
the "grumping" across/clapping figures I have everyone
take hands in a long skinny circle to circle right. THEN
they drop hands and skip back the other way.
Thorn Rosa p. 8 in handout 2
In NEDM's Jump Jim Joe collection
Version one: Thorn Rosa is in the
middle of one circle.
Version two: Thorn Rosa is in the
middle of the "castle" circle. Around
that is the "thorny hedge" circle.
First Night Quadrille p. 8 in handout 1.
In NEDM's Listen to the Mockingbird collection.
A great dance for, say, 4th grade and up who have
a fair amount of dance experience. We love
doing this to Old Time Reels on NEDM's
Sashay the Donut CD.
Teach your students Lucky Seven first so that
they already know the grand-right-and-left
figure going into this wonderful flowing
square dance.
Silver Rain p. 4 in handout 2
We did the Amidon SATB choral harmonization
of this. We often sing this song with children:
unison melody to guitar.
Haste to the Wedding p. 5 in handout 2
In NEDM's Sashay the Donut collection.
This is the simplest contra dance we know; a
great first contra dance for, say 4th grade and up.
Dizzy Snowflake
This is your dance. I LOVE this dance!
Here it is:
Circle mixer
A1: Bow to partner, dosido partner (8)
Promenade partner (8)
A2: (All stop walking. Ladies stay
put while gents turn around to face
the lady behind them who is their corner)
Bow to corner, dosido corner (8)
Promenade corner Clockwise
with gent on the outside and
lady on the inside. (Corner becomes
your new partner.)
B1: All promenade towards the center,
drop hands, take hands in circle, and back out. (8)
Forward and back (8)
B2: Circle left (8)
Allemande right this new partner.
Larry's Mixer p. 6 in handout 2
From the Seed song is p. 6 in handout 2
Here is the dance we did that I made up to
go with this song:
If you go the sun
*Walk sideways with hands miming sun rising.
and if you got the rain
*Walk sideways the other way with hands miming rain.
and you plant a little seed
*Crouch down.
in the old back lane
Then jump and turn halfway with
arms moving directly over head,
end pointing in opposite direction.
And you wish and you hope
hands clasped together in front,
take step to diagonal left, then diagonal right,
And you keep the weeds down
Crouch down, keeping head up.
You might find, oh
standing up, step and gesture with arm to left.
You might find
step and gesture with arm to right
a root growing down from the seed
mime with hands
in the ground
take one step forward (leaving other foot in place)
ending with forward leg bent a little and back leg
straight as arms and hands sweep from front to both
sides (separating) as if miming the flat surface of the ground.
Kings and Queens p. 9 in handout 1
In NEDM's Sashay the Donut collection
We used 'On the Danforth' from NEDM's 'Other Side of the
Tracks' CD for this dance. You might also use our other
version of 'On the Danforth' which is on our 'Sashay
the Donut' CD.
Before we teach this dance we will dub each child a King or a
Queen, and talk to them (sometimes while the music is playing
to help sustain the mood) about what it means to be a King and
Queen: They have royal posture, they never rush, they make
good decisions, they are very attractive; basically describing
the ideal King/Queen or, which, in my mind is being the
very best person they can be. This is in the style of an
historic English country dance.
Circle Waltz Mixer (p. 8 in the handout)
In NEDM's 'Sashay the Donut' collection.
We used 'In Continental' Waltz from the 'Sashay' CD
for the music. This is a wonderful dance for a wedding
where you can do it the original way we learned it, doing
a short waltz instead of the two hand turn. In the original
dance gents are the "posts" and women are the "twirlers",
but it works perfectly fine in a non-gender community
dance with a two hand turn. In order to make sure
that this works in a community dance you:
Limit the dance to Kindergarteners and older.
Tell K-3 students that they must dance with
an adult or a child who is 4th grade or older.
Start by having everyone promenade, and have
the older partner promenade on the inside.
Tell all the inside (left hand) partners they are
"posts" and all the outside (right hand) partners
they are "twirlers".
All look at partner and say "goodbye".
Posts stay in place and keep their feet planted
during the "twirl" figure.
Carefully teach the first "twirl" each "Post"
does with their left hand neighbor, from left to right.
Once the dancers get that twirl, the rest of the dance
can go pretty smoothly.
BEST,
Peter and Mary Alice