Swingy Blues Music to accompany warm up and games!

About this time of year movement students begin to reveal their love or distaste for “movement moments”. Inevitably, it’s students who have experienced sedentary lifestyles who hesitate to move with freedom. It’s important to be mindful of not only family customs and beliefs, but also the possibility that a child has experienced trauma. Movement allows teachers to be creative in introducing meaningful conversations about the body. Here are some tips for conversation starters!

• Who had sore muscles last week?
• How much water and rest do you like after school?
• What is your favorite movement so far?

Swinging movement almost always makes a class happy! I love transitioning from the isolation and yoga based warm-up to the swinging warm-up. You can use blues music to introduce swinging circles.

This year my third grade classrooms are focusing on literacy integration. The books we read introduce a huge tie-in to science, social studies, spelling, vocabulary, and writing structure. Just by grounding our roots deeper into watery land we were able to “choreograph” swamp trees. Students learned to observe each other, make revisions of their own dances, and practice vocabulary.

The best moment was when a child raised her hand at the end and asked, “Ms. Kimberly, which muscles will I feel sore in tomorrow and what stretches can I do to help my muscles recover from this hard work?” In such a short amount of time this young woman learned that it is good to explore movement and that a little bit of soreness is a part of the growing process.