Miriam Shapiro Dancers- 1st grade

Miriam Shapiro, known for her quilts and sculptures depicting whimsical dancers was the perfect inspiration for our dancer paintings.  From the shapes of the body parts you can see I used a wooden figure model to show 1st graders how to break the body down into shapes and create movement.  The first day we played freeze dance and I called off different ideas for my students to freeze into(a large shape, connected to another students, the tiniest shape you can make, a jagged sharp shape, a soft round shape.  We also watched 3 videos on different kinds of dance(ballet, capierra, and hip hop/break dancing).  This was a ton of fun and gave us just the right amount of time to draw out our dancers and trace in Redimark.

 Day 2 involved learning or reviewing the primary and secondary colors.  I am in love with the sesame street video on primary colors(easy to find on you tube, sorry no link).  We painted our dancers with primary colors and then I had a station set up for complimentary colors for students to stamp interesting objects to make patterns(cush rings, forks, bottle caps).  While they were waiting their turn at the stamping station I laid out a box of "treasure" paper and fabric for students to create fun hats, skirts, ties for their dancers.