The Snow Queen

A dance and PSHE unit of work with year 6 at St John’s and St Clement’s schoolIncorporating speaking and listening and writing objectives

Written and delivered by Philippa Beagley

“Philip was good the way he did his cartwheel. Wesley was good when he span round and round and round”

“We have been learning some strange exercises like, Walking and Staring also sliding, rolling and moving in different ways.”

“We did a really fun warm up. Some of it was spiky and rough and the rest was smooth and gentle. ……I know that

everyone enjoyed it because no one made a moaning sound.”

“We did a dance when you have to try to push each other

over softly and harmless. I had lots of fun.”

“We have worked on a dance routine varying from flowing and graceful to ugly and angular.”

“Last week in dance my partners were Malaki and Coree. When I worked with Malaki we kept laughing when we were

doing the dancing bit because we kept getting wrong.”

“I think about Goblins when we crunch down and when we come up it’s like a breath of fresh air. I like working with

different partners.”

“It was fun. The best bit was when we had partners and one of us was statues and the other one had to move

around the other person.”

….she set us some targets. It was good fun.In week two we were set some new targets. We

did a warm up to begin. We did an exercise where we where supposed to be zombies and walk around the hall staring into peoples eyes. At times it was quite fun and others quite spooky. For example if someone was smaller and blinked a lot then you felt pretty powerful but if somebody was taller than you and you laughed or smiled you would be forced to retreat and go to somebody else.

Duncan [Year 6 St Johns and St Clements]

“Mrs Beagley wanted us to stare at each others eyes. At first I was embarrassed but now it’s fun. My favourite thing was the staring and I learned that if I use my imagination I

can do anything.”

“We eventually put it all together and then we showed it to

our parents and they thought it was very good”

“After we learnt dance routine we did an activity of spinning, sliding and rolling in affective ways so it looks like a glass

splinter from the Snow Queens broken mirror.”

“We were trying to think of our own things to add to the end

of the dance”

“I think I was OK at responding to and delivering constructive criticism and I enjoyed working in a group with

friends.”

“We have been working on constructive criticism- not just saying that you liked or disliked something but explaining

why and how it could be improved. We worked on responding to constructive criticism too.”

Observing the work has made me feel more confident about doing dance lessons myself in the future

English and dance lessons fed into each other in a way that made both come alive more. The dance sessions had a particular impact on the children’s speaking and listening

I felt it was particularly valuable for them to be able to own up to and deal with feelings of embarrassment ad vulnerability. This also seemed to help them to empathise more with others.

It was particularly noticeable that this project helped some of the boys who at times exhibit more challenging behaviour. Over the 6 sessions I noticed an improvement in concentration and focus.

Sue Brooks [class teacher]