PROJECT: USING ANTONYMS

TEACHER: MARY GAYRAL

SCHOOL: THIBODAUX ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

CONTENT: Language Arts/Dance Movement

GRADE LEVELS: 2

OBJECTIVES:

1. The learner will identify antonyms through the use of dance moves (ELA-1- E1)

2. The learner will apply and demonstrate critical thinking skills in dance. Content Standard #4

ACTIVITY:

Lesson Presentation:

The teacher models antonyms using a PowerPoint presentation. (Attached)

Guided Practice: The teacher models simple dance moves including axial movement (i.e., nonlocomotor movement) and locomotor movement.

For example: The teacher puts her hands straight up in the air and says, "over." The students in turn bend down in a locomotor movement and say the opposite, "under." The teacher lunges to the right and says, "right." The students respond with a lunge to the left and say, "left. Using nonlocomotor movements with her arms, the teacher makes two circular counter clockwise movements in the air and says, "hot." The students respond by doing two clockwise movements and say, "cold." The teacher turns and faces the board, then does a pivot turn and says, "front." The students do a pivot turn around and say, "back."

Independent Practice: The students will perform a nonlocomotor/locomotor movement naming two antonyms.

EVALUATION/ASSESSMENT:

The teacher will do a singing chant as the students do a nonlocomotor/ locomotor movement to respond to the opposite antonym. For example, the teacher will say, "I say stop, you say _______, and students will move in place. For an example of formal assessment, the teacher will have the students write sentences with antonyms. She will then have the students come up individually to say their sentences and demonstrate their moves.  

ART CONTENT/CONCEPTS:

Basic movement = locomotor and nonlocomotor; movement as communication.

GRADE LEVEL EXPECTATIONS AND STANDARDS/BENCHMARKS:
Louisiana 2nd Grade English Language Arts GLEs:
3 Identify and explain common synonyms, antonyms, and homonyms (ELA-1-E1)
National Standards for Arts Education – Dance
4 Apply and demonstrative critical thinking skills in dance.

MODIFICATIONS/ACCOMODATIONS:
Students will be paired according to ability. For example, one high functioning student will assist one low functioning student with dance moves. Low functioning students will be assigned two antonyms for the sentence writing assessment, while high functioning students will choose their own antonyms to write sentences. Low functioning students could be given pictures of antonyms to use in their sentence writing (for example, a picture of pot on stove and a picture of a block of ice. The students will then write a sentence about each picture.

VARIATIONS/ENHANCEMENTS:
The teacher and student can use other antonyms with this lesson, such as tall and short, fast and slow, happy and sad, strong and weak, loud and soft, big and little, old and young, one step forward and one step backward, and high and low.
The students could perform the dance movements fast or slow.
The students could use props (of teacher's choice).
Some students could perform standing up while others remain seated.
The students could act it out in a whisper while others could use a deep loud voice.
This activity would work well with an upbeat or moderately paced song.
Some students could do one of the suggested movements for longer counts.

TEACHER'S REFLECTION:
Using dance moves with the antonyms was fun for the children. They asked me if we could “play that game” again and again. Most of the students were eager to participate, while some of them acted shy. The shy students came around a little when they saw the other students getting into the lesson. They really enjoyed the little chant part of the lesson. For example, “When I say hot, you say cold,” and used the dance movements for it. It's a great lesson for them to get some of their pent up energy out!

Click Here to Download the PowerPoint Presentation of Antonyms for this project

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