Mindfulness and Movement

LISA BEYER, PHI TAU, DALLAS ALUMNI, AND ASHLEY BOURAS, PHI TAU, DALLAS ALUMNI

A guide to introducing social-emotional learning in the elementary music classroom

Elementary teachers are in the business of teaching kids to be thoughtful humans that treat each other with kindness. Social-emotional learning (SEL) in education is becoming a more popular focus as our current teaching environment rapidly fluctuates, and music educators have a unique advantage with a curriculum that allows for purposeful social interactions through creative movement and folk dance. SEL and mindfulness activities allow students to identify and navigate their emotions. Academics should be a secondary priority, because students must be in a safe place physically and mentally to effectively learn.

We took our Orff Schulwerk levels together at Southern Methodist University and became fast friends over those three summers. As we went through the intense professional development sessions and began experimenting in our classrooms, we both fell in love with teaching music through movement, especially creative movement. As we figured out what worked best for our young students learning to move and dance, we separately discovered how much of a difference mindfulness activities made with the children’s social-emotional well-being. Together, we have been working on a series of mindfulness activities that inspire creative discovery and exploration in movement, and seven years later we are still collaborators and great friends. These mindfulness activities can be used as individual lessons or can be scaffolded to combine the elements of folk dance.

The resource that inspired our mindfulness journey is called “Mindful Kids,” published by Barefoot Books. Whitney Stewart and Mina Braun wrote and illustrated these cards, and we both begin our lessons with them. These mindfulness exercises are written specifically for kids, and the language is simple and gives space for kids to breathe and be in the moment. Some cards we read verbatim with our students, others we paraphrase or rearrange, and most include extensions that we’ve adapted to our movement needs.

You might be asking yourself, “why take this particular path instead of teaching movement and dance the way it’s always been done?” One reason is that mindfulness and SEL exercises help children get in better touch with their thoughts and feelings. With increased awareness of how and what they are feeling in the moment comes less emotional reactivity and a greater ability to listen and communicate more thoughtfully and effectively. Being able to self-regulate emotions is vital for many aspects of learning, and we’ve seen the impact in our classrooms and throughout the school as well. Students show respect for themselves, their classmates and their teachers because of their shared experiences. They attain more bodily awareness of personal space and shared space and they make quicker connections to dance vocabulary. The biggest difference we’ve seen is a greater willingness and vulnerability to try new things in the classroom. As a result, their musical growth skyrockets!

One of the first dances we pieced together with mindfulness activities is a folk dance called “Sasha.” It involves interacting with other students and changing partners between repetitions of the dance. While the music sounds like a traditional Russian tune and most people label it as a Russian folk dance, like many other folk dances, its history is not clear. It uses counting words in Russian (“ras, dva, tri”) and the nickname Sasha (short for Alexander or Alexandra), but dances evolve as they get passed from generation to generation. We do know that the “Sasha” was first introduced in America by Bob Dalsemer from the John C. Campbell Folk School, but Dalsemer learned the dance from a Danish instructor who may have learned it from a German folk dance leader.

The dance itself is fairly simple and developmentally apropriate for lower grade levels or beginning movers. It begins with partners scattered around the room facing each other and wagging their index fingers, saying, “Sasha! Sasha! Ras, dva, tri!” After counting to three in Russian, the partners perform a hand clapping sequence followed by clockwise and counterclockwise elbow turns. They wave goodbye to their current partners and have 36 beats of music to find a new partner to repeat the dance. We broke down teaching these elements with the following mindfulness activity cards.

MINDFULNESS ACTIVITIES

Mindful Jungle Movements

• Objectives: muscle awareness and imagination

• Dance Application: mixer formation, scatter space, shared space, balance, weight, sway, swivel

This first activity can apply to any folk dance or movement activity. Mindful Jungle Movements gets students to move around the room while imitating animals, keeping awareness of their surroundings and their foot contact with the floor. Being able to utilize shared space is vital to any movement activity. Honing this skill is necessary for safety, classroom management and the teacher’s sanity.

Words To Yourself

• Objectives: replacing unkind words with kind words in your mind, empathy and positive social interactions

• Dance Application: choosing a partner

• Extension: finding a partner and sitting across from them on the floor, each partner takes turns sharing a compliment or encouragement

While this activity doesn’t center around movement, it focuses on choosing and interacting appropriately with a partner. Making those connections with your partner builds empathy and understanding. Before finding partners, we have a conversation in our classrooms about not turning down someone who asks to be your partner.

Tying awareness of creating positive interactions to something seemingly as simple as finding a partner helps students understand that words and body language have an impact. When the partners discuss compliments and words of encouragement with each other, we teach them how to be listeners. Students have different levels of comfort with eye contact and physical touch, so we have a conversation where students share different ways that show they are listening. At the end of every partner activity, especially one with high vulnerability, we emphasize the importance of thanking your partner. Without them, you would not have had your experience.

Kind Fives (inspired by “Loving-Kindness” card)

• Dance Application: body percussion with a partner, choosing a partner within a set time frame

• Objectives: empathy and positive self-talk

• Extensions: start with card — extend: say mantra, walk around the room for 32 beats and at the end of the cadence find a partner

This activity can be used for several folk dances and movement experiences as it teaches a type of patty-cake pattern. The students begin by speaking affirmations out loud to different groups of people: first themselves, then loved ones and then the world full of strangers. “May you be happy. May you be safe. May you be peaceful. May you be kind.” At this point in the process, they have had lots of practice choosing a partner, allowing this to transition easily into a partner choosing game.

The first goal of the new game is to find a partner after a certain amount of time passes, and the teacher shows the end of the cadence by altering the rhythm on the drum. Upon finding a partner, students speak the affirmations to one another in rhythm two times in a row, and then move around the room again. After that has happened successfully multiple times, introduce the hand connections for each phrase.

“May you be happy.” — Students touch their right hands together with their partner.

“May you be safe.” — Students touch their left hands together with their partner.

“May you be peaceful.” — Students touch both hands together with their partner.

“May you be kind.” — Students touch both hands to their thighs (partners do not touch).

The same game is repeated and students find a partner, connect their hands during each affirmation phrase, and then walk freely around the room until the movement phrase ends and they find their next partner. Finally, instead of just touching on the affirmation phrases, partners pat their hands together three times each.

“May you be happy.”— Students pat right hands together.

“May you be safe.” — Students pat left hands together.

“May you be peaceful.” — Students pat both hands together.

“May you be kind.” — Students pat their thighs.

Cooking Up Connections

• Dance Application: finding a partner, connecting with a partner physically (ex. elbow to elbow), transition from connection to right to left arm swing

• Objectives: finding connections in the world around you

• Extensions: find a partner and connect body parts as they move around the room, switch to a new body part at a sound cue (or after a designated number of counts) and continue to move while connected, repeat until connecting inside of right elbows then left elbows.

This movement game is one that’s lived in our classrooms in different variations, and when we were brainstorming ideas this card and game made an immediate connection. (Pun intended.) The creativity of students during this mindfulness exercise never fails to astound and amuse us. We walk the kids through the process of cooking a meal, from the farmer planting seeds, to the driver delivering produce to the store, to the families buying and cooking dinner. We take time to appreciate and thank the many people who are connected to our daily routines. These connections then translate to physical connections and students play the movement game!

The teacher names a body part and the students must connect with their partner but still be able to travel around the room safely. Starting simple with connecting elbows or shoulders quickly becomes hips or knees, and it is rare for a class to play this game without giggling. We eventually lead students to connect the inside of their elbows together, which becomes a right or left arm swing. This moment is usually accompanied by a collective, “Oooh! We see what you did there!” Now all of the puzzle pieces have been created, and the last mindfulness activity brings them all together.

Everything Changes

• Objectives: recognizing changes in the world around you and accepting the emotions that come with those changes

• Dance Application: form, count structure

• Extensions: review Kind Fives, add right arm swing then left arm swing, add “reminder” to your partner with “Sasha! Sasha! Ras, dva, tre!” then practice all parts with one partner before finding new partners and add music!

In the final mindfulness activity, the students dive into how change affects their world. We acknowledge that change can make you happy, sad, excited or upset. The students get time to reflect on changes in their lives, and they are given the opportunity to share if they feel comfortable. The idea of changes happening throughout life is connected to changes that happen in our classrooms, and we take the movement concepts they discovered in previous lessons and combine them and change them until they morph together to create our final dance. The students’ joy is infectious when they realize their previous lessons are related, and their excitement to learn what comes next is a great reminder of why we love teaching.

In the time that we have used mindfulness as a core tenet in our classrooms, we have witnessed students transform before us. The investment in a few minutes of mindfulness during each lesson has yielded incredible growth and using it as a jumping off point to learn movement makes those connections stronger. Students use techniques learned in music to calm themselves in difficult situations and to reflect on the world around them. Creating purposeful social interactions through creative movement and folk dance gives students the tools to succeed outside of school. It has been our greatest joy to watch children operate in empathy and awareness, especially during this time as we navigate this pandemic together.

Classroom Resources

Dance instructions: “Sasha” from Amidon, P., Brass, M. C., & Davis, A. (Eds.). (2007). “Sashay the Donut: Even More Dances for Just About Everyone.” Battleboro, VT: New England Dancing Masters Productions.

Recording used: “Mayim” from “Rhythmically Moving 5,” High/Scope Educational Research Foundation “Sasha” from “Sashay the Donut,” New England Dancing Masters

SEL Activities: Stewart, W., & Braun, M. (2017). “Mindful Kids: 50 Mindfulness Activities for Kindness, Focus and Calm.” Cambridge, MA: Barefoot Books.

Lisa Storm Beyer has been teaching elementary music since 2014, and currently teaches in Richardson I Richardson Independent School District in Richardson, Texas. She earned her bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Southern Methodist University and is certified in Orff Schulwerk and Kodaly. She is the assistant director of summer music education Workshops at SMU.

Ashley Bouras graduated from the University of North Texas in 2012 with a Bachelor of Music Education. She is an Orff Schulwerk certified teacher currently teaching in Richardson Independent School District in Richardson, Texas. She was initiated in the Phi Tau chapter of Mu Phi Epsilon in April 2010. As a Collegiate, she served as the chapter’s marketing committee head and vice president, as well as the 2011 delegate. She has served Mu Phi Epsilon as District Director for South Central 2 since the spring of 2013. Ashley was named District Director of the Year after her first complete year and has been chosen for the Honorable Mention several times. She is second vice president, Collegiate advisor for Mu Phi Epsilon.

Beyer and Bouras have presented at TMEA and for multiple school districts.