Tuesday, May 11, 1999

Kindergarten gets creative

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Dance mixed with academics helps learning

BY SUE KIESEWETTER
Enquirer Contributor

Katie Richardson, right, teaches the Macarena dance to Diane Schneider's class at the Fairfield Kindergarten Center. (Gary Landers photo) | ZOOM |

        FAIRFIELD — Don't tell the children in Diane Schneider's class that their twice monthly meeting with dancer Katie Richardson is gym class.

        It's a creative movement class, as any of the 5- and 6-year-old pupils at the Fairfield Kindergarten Center will tell you. And it's fun.

        It's also educational, Ms. Richardson said.

        “Movement helps them develop physically, intellectually, emotionally and socially,” said Ms. Richardson, who uses curriculum developed for Fairfield by Susan Moser, based on the work of researcher Howard Gardner. “We use what they learn in school and ap ply it to creative movement.”

        Each 30-minute lesson begins with a few minutes of warm-up.

        “Reach for the sky,” Ms. Richardson said while stretching upward. “Now, wiggle your fingers. Go down. Touch the ground. Stretch over to this side. Now your other side.”

        From there the children move on to the “Hokey-Pokey.”

        As each child's outstretched right hand is stamped with an R to remind them which hand it is, they yell out different words that begin with R.

        As the first strains of music fill the room, the children excitedly begin squirming in anticipation of putting their right hand in.

        “I like doing the "Hokey-Pokey.' It's so fast,” 6-year-old Anthony Fafano said during a break. “We sing a lot of songs.”

        From the “Hokey-Pokey,” the students move right into the “Macarena.”

        "When you flip the hands, it's fun,” said Allison Hurst, 6.

        Besides dances such as the “Macarena,” Ms. Richardson uses storytelling, with kids acting out the parts. Doing this helps them develop locomotor skills including galloping, hopping, jumping, leaping, scooting and tiptoeing. Using motion, they learn concepts such as forward, backward, zigzag, around and through.

        “When a child moves, it stimulates the brain,” Ms. Richardson said. “Research has shown that if a child skips certain movements, as they develop they are more likely to have learning disabilities.”

        Ms. Richardson said she has seen other benefits as well.

        Once-shy children now speak up a little more when they meet with her.

        It reinforces patterns they learn in class as part of reading readiness skills. And it sparks their imaginations.

        “They love pretending and acting out stories,” said Ms. Richardson, who had the children pretend they were fall leaves in the fall and snowflakes in the winter.

        Six-year-old Javon Coleman likes the class.

        “I like to dance and jump like at Chuck E. Cheese,” Javon said. “We jump in here. Nothing's hard. I like the spin jump.”

       

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