One of my favorite activities for getting children up and
moving is to start with a wonderful book, add a little bit of imagination and a few
movement prompts, and you have a ready-made lively and fun movement session. I
have written about this many times in previous blog posts.
I decided to put together a list of some of my favorite
books for dance stories for the autumn season, which have sparked creativity in
children over and over. When you
use these books as inspiration for movement, not only will you and the children
have fun, you will be enhancing early literacy skills by reading the book, then
moving and dancing to the stories. Through
kinesthetic learning, the dance story activity reinforces sequencing, develops
the children’s ability to identify with different characters, helps them to
explore and learn about the setting and background, strengthens vocabulary
acquisition, and nurtures many other valuable pre-literacy and early language
skills. In addition, the children will have that all-important large motor activity
time in which they can develop movement skills such as balance, body awareness, stamina, strength and flexibility, and coordination.
Late Summer/Early Fall:
In the Tall, Tall Grass, by Denise Fleming:
Children love the color, sounds and
movement evoked in this beautiful story of life in the tall grass. Some of the movement suggestions
are: wings flapping, snakes
gliding, hummingbirds darting and dipping …
Fall/Early Winter
Barn Dance, by Bill Martin Jr. and
John Archambault:
A dance teacher friend told me about this book years
ago. Children love to dance this
story. Prop suggestions: Bandanas for the children, orange paper
plates on which the children draw pumpkin faces, felt apples. Music suggestion: Bluegrass instrumentals. This story can be developed into a
wonderful classroom presentation for family and friends.
Barnyard Dance by Sandra Boynton: A fun book to use in conjunction with
Barn Dance.
Books about leaves and the autumn season:
Leaf Man by
Lois Ehlert:
Tap the Magic Tree, by Christie Matheson.
Let It Fall, by
Maryann Cocca-Leffler:
Leaves and
trees inspire movement, and with the
wind and rain in autumn, the leaves begin to fall to the ground. Twirling, swirling, falling, raking,
jumping, these are all movements that can be woven into the stories.
Have fun with these dance
stories!
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