STAGE 1 – Exploring movements (Expressive Arts)

Duration: 90 minutes

SPIRIT Skills:

• Critical thinking
• Creativity

Brief Description:

The lesson begins with an “artistic part: movement.” 

Using four pictures of familiar objects or states (melting ice cream, solidified candles, drawing a heart on a “wet” window, and boiling water with steam), the students come up with various movement-related words. 

We go through the images one by one:

• What do you see?
• What is happening in the photo? Where?
• How does the event in the photo move or unfold?

Together, we come up with definitions for each photo:

We create a mind map with movement-related words for each image.

Photo 1 (Evaporation – floating high in the air, lightly jumping, fluttering, little weight, moving very lightly):

FLOATING, RISING, BLOWING, SPREADING OUT, HOPPING

Photo 2 (Condensation – small, light, suddenly rolls downward with a lot of energy):

FALLING, DESCENDING, SLOWLY SINKING

Photo 3 (Freezing – also involves FORCE, requires a lot of muscle tension, going from something liquid to something very hard, moves slowly):

TENSE, STIFFENING, FREEZING, STANDING RIGID, SHRINKING

Photo 4 (Melting – the opposite of freezing):

RELAXED OR FLOWING, SOFTENING, SPREADING, LENGTHENING, SINKING

Next, the students physically act out all these words with their bodies. The teacher or a student demonstrates a specific movement, and the other students imitate it.

How does this develop particular SPIRIT skills

Critical thinking and creativity.

What do we want to achieve regarding SPIRIT skill development (student understanding and/or behaviour)?

Critical Thinking (e.g., “What is happening in the photo? How does it move or unfold?”)

Children engage in critical thinking by analysing the images and identifying movement patterns related to each scenario. They focus on interpreting the relationship between the object or state and its associated movement, while formulating definitions for each picture. Behaviour:

• Discussing and comparing with peers to identify key details in the images (e.g., “What does melting ice cream look like when it moves?”).
• Listening attentively to the teacher’s questions and actively participating in defining the movement words (e.g., “It’s floating, but how do we describe it?”).
• Thinking critically about the movements and contributing their own ideas to the group’s mind map.

Creativity (e.g., “How can we move our bodies to represent this?”)

Children use their creativity to translate abstract movement words into physical actions. They experiment with their bodies to find ways to express these movements, showing flexibility in adapting to different concepts. Behaviour:

• Acting out the words in creative and varied ways (e.g., “How does floating feel? Let’s hop lightly!”).
• Imitating movements demonstrated by peers or the teacher, then modifying them to add their own personal twist.
• Collaborating in pairs or small groups, exploring different ways to embody each movement, showing excitement and energy.

Academic/Curriculum Objective connection

When moving, consciously make use of the space they or others occupy.

Recognize, imitate, and describe the energy in a movement.

Materials and tools needed for implementation 

4 pictures (melting ice cream, solidified candles, drawing a heart on a “wet” window, and boiling water with steam. Own body.

Preparation notes

No special preparation is required for this phase

Guided Questions

• More specific adapted quided,supportive questions
• 1. When looking for the smallest, most subtle movement is a challange:
• Imagine that you are a little drop of water that is just beginning to turn into steam, so slowly and quietly that no one notices! How could you move even more subtly than that—almost invisibly, as if moved by just a tiny breeze?”
• I see that you’re moving your whole arm right now. What might it express if, next time, you moved only the fingertips of your little finger very, very slowly?
• 2. When looking for the biggest, most energetic movement is a challange:
• How far would you have to stretch, or how would you have to jump, to look like wildly hot, steaming water?”
• If we want to imitate the most intense boiling water, do you think a one-time movement would be enough? What would it mean if we repeated the movement many times with our whole bodies? Let’s try it together!”
• 3. When students don’t know how to use their bodies to illustrate the movement of matter
• Let’s imagine we’re trapped in ice. It’s like we’re tied up very tightly and can’t move at all. How could we become that motionless? How does this tension feel in your body?”
• “Do you think we could also make a wavy, sliding movement on the floor, as if we were liquid water spreading out across the room?”
• 4. “Who liked this movement?” – Supporting empathy and the expression of emotions
• Let’s close our eyes for a moment and imagine this movement again! How did it feel for your bodies to perform it? Was it pleasant, soft, and relaxing, like ice cream slowly melting in the heat, or was it too stiff and tense?
• If this movement were an animal, would it be a cuddly, soft little kitten, or an angry dragon? Ask the person sitting next to you: did they imagine the same animal in their mind, or did this movement bring something completely different to mind for them?

Stage Debriefing Questions (Optional)

Raising Awareness of Critical Thinking and Flexibility

• When you first thought you’d found the subtlest, smallest movement, but then managed to make an even smaller one: how did you figure out the trick?
• What changed in your minds or bodies when you decided to try again instead of giving up after the first solution?

Raising Awareness of Creativity and Resilience:

• I noticed that you tried a wide variety of movements with your bodies until you finally found the state-change movement you were looking for. What did you feel and do when your first movement idea didn’t work well? How were you able to come up with a completely new movement?

Raising Awareness of Empathy:

• How did you notice within your group when someone really liked a movement, or, on the contrary, when it was tiring or uncomfortable for their body? How were you able to understand each other’s feelings without words, just by observing each other’s body language? How did you feel when your idea wasn’t the one that was accepted?

Tips and Tricks for dealing with stage challenges

• Challenge: the students to perform larger movements, to carry out the movements more slowly, and to make the movements more clearly (e.g., when rising, they should really make themselves big).