I found this wonderful lesson plan on
Deep Space Sparkle. Sure, you can still create this lesson with no problem, but if you purchase it on Deep Space Sparkle then it provides you with time saving worksheets that I found to be worth every penny! I have no affiliation with Deep Space Sparkle... I just love this lesson!
Day 1: I started the lesson showing the students a SmartBoard lesson on Matisse. We looked at his collages and specifically looked at
Two Dancers.
We also learned about Africa and the African culture. I always have 5th grade make an African mask, so this is a great lesson to ease them into Africa. I had the students pick a background color and another color to be cut up into lines and shapes. Remind the student that the emphasis should be your dancer, not a busy background. Keep it simple!
Day 2: The goal for the students is to create a collage of an African tribal dancer that shows movement. I had the students use the template guide provided in the
lesson. Like I said before, the lesson plan provides worksheets and other examples that helped give my students different ideas on dance poses, clothing, hair, and accessories. There is even a template for the body parts of the dancer. I love that every project turned out differently from one another and it displayed beautifully in the hallway. The students really got into this lesson and not only did they learn about Matisse and Africa, but they learned about composition, emphasis, movement and shapes.
