KS1 Dance: Time to Move. Antarctica

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1. The coldest place on Earth - 2. Icebergs and Emperors - 3. Penguin parents

Diane Louise Jordan has three sessions inspired by the climate and wildlife of Antarctica.

Antarctica

An adventure to the bottom of the world - a land of icebergs and mountains, snow and ice. After twisting and turning in snowflake-shapes, the children stride and leap through deep snow, and forge their way through a blizzard. Smooth, cross-country skiing requires good left-right co-ordination, then co-operation when skiing in a line.

Iceberg-shapes are created with tall, stretching-up actions, then with smooth, wide-spreading ‘melting’ shapes. Slow, graceful floating and bobbing in the sea (in groups) leads to streamlined curving and twisting, for underwater swimming like seals. By contrast, ‘Emperor Penguins’ need straight backs and movements for swaying, leaning, scurrying, waddling and sliding, following each other in lines.

The penguins return in programme 3, ‘greeting’ each other in pairs, then rolling an egg to their partner. A penguin ‘colony’ shuffles slowly, to keep warm from a blizzard (in three circles) then, as light relief, a penguin chick takes comical, slip-sliding first steps. This final programme includes performance of an extended penguin dance sequence.

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