I explore my feelings
To complete my method in the last session, we are going to explore and experiment with the 4 basic emotions. Emotions constantly influence you so it’s necessary you get to know and understand them. This will make everyday challenges easier and will give a positive effect on the quality of a person’s life and self-esteem. Children from 6 years old are still too young to understand the different emotions. However, exploring and experimenting with a number of basic emotions is already possible.
Goals
- Reflecting on emotions.
- Learning to express emotions through movement and dance.
- Experience your own emotions through music.
- To create amusement for the children
Essentials
- Music installation
- Pictures of 4 basic emotions
- A mirror
Introduction
During the introduction, 4 basic emotions will be introduced to the children. The 4 basic emotions are happy / angry / scared / sad. We focus on these 4 basic emotions throughout the entire session. Read the following step by step instruction where I explain what needs to be done.
1. Place the children in a circle.
2. Explain to the children what is planned for today
In this case: starting with a short lesson about the 4 basic emotions, warming up through an exercise around the 4 emotions, working with the learned emotions,....
3. Then tell the children we will first explore the 4 basic emotions.
4. Explain the exercise to them.
The aim of the exercise is to introduce the children to the 4 basic emotions by making them understand what these emotions are. You, as a mentor, will show the children the basic emotions using the pictures you have. Afterwards they have to imitate these emotions. They have to use a mirror so they can see their own face expressions.
Step 1: show the children the picture of the emotion happy.
Step 2: make them imitate this emotion. They can use their whole body to show how happy they are.
Step 3: take a mirror and go around the circle.
Step 4: then go through the previous steps with the other 3 basic emotions: angry, scared and sad.
Points of attention:
- Make sure that the children use their entire body when mimicking the emotions.
- Make sure the children feel good and comfortable. Call out what you see in a positive way.
- Optionally you can play some relaxing music. An option can be found in the link below:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fm3NI5mFhfg
- Use the 4 pictures to visualize the basic emotions for the children. In the links below you will find a picture of all the basic emotions.
https://i.pinimg.com/originals/52/8d/c4/528dc4836e61940422b691abfb523081.jpg
Warm-up
To get started with the 4 basic emotions, we will do a little exercise called Freeze. Read the following step by step instruction where I explain what needs to be done.
1. Make the children spread themselves across the room.
2. Explain the exercise to them.
The aim of the game is that the children move through the room to the rhythm of the music. As soon as the music stops, they have to freeze in the emotion that the mentor calls.
Points of attention:
- Make sure the children show the emotion with their entire body.
- Pictures
In the pictures below I show some possible poses that they can use to create the emotions with their body. I added 1 image for each emotion.
Core
During the core of this session we will be exploring and experimenting with the emotions through 2 exercises.
Exercise 1: corner work
1. Divide the space into 4 by placing a picture of a basic emotion in each corner. So in one corner the basic emotion happy, in the other angry, …
2. Place the children in pairs.
3. Place each pair in a different corner.
4. Explain the exercise to them.
The aim of the exercise is for the pair to imitate the basic emotion they can find in their given corner by movements.
Step 1: from each pair you choose one person to be the leader and the other person to be the follower.
Step 2: the leader has to turn the basic emotion they have on picture into a movement. The follower will imitate the leader and take over his / her energy.
Step 3: after a few minutes the pairs move to a different corner with a different basic emotion. Now it is up to the other child to be the leader and to turn the emotion that is now on the picture into movement. The child who was a leader in the previous corner is now a follower.
Step 4: the pairs rotate to the next corner and always change roles. They keep changing until they do every corner. In total there are 4 corners.
Points of attention:
- Make sure that the pairs have done each corner.
- Put on music of your choice.
Exercise 2: emotion dance
1. Make the children spread themselves across the room.
2. Explain the exercise to them.
The intention of the exercise is that the children should listen to a piece of music and express their feelings about this piece through movements. The music that will be used for this exercise is from Vivaldi in which a separate composition has been made for the 4 seasons.
Step 1: play the music from the beginning.
Step 2: let the children express the feeling that this piece of music evokes through movements. Do this until their inspiration runs out.
Step 3: continue the music from minute: 1O'32 ".
Step 4: let the children express the feeling that this piece of music evokes through movements. Do this until their inspiration runs out.
Step 5: continue the music from minute: 21'.
Step 6: let the children express the feeling that this piece of music evokes through movements. Do this until their inspiration runs out.
Step 7: continue the music from minute: 32'49".
Step 8: let the children express the feeling that this piece of music evokes through movements. Do this until their inspiration runs out.
Points of attention:
- Let the children move freely. They decide themselves how they make their movements. Nothing is right or wrong.
- Call out what you see in a positive way. Compliment them.
- Use the composition of Vivaldi - the four seasons. Below you can find the link of this composition.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GRxofEmo3HA
End
To finish this session on a good note we are going to do one last exercise around basic emotions. The exercise is called conductor. Read the following step by step instruction where I explain what needs to be done.
1.Place the children in a circle.
2. Explain the exercise to them.
The idea is that one person will play the conductor and lead the children's movements. These movements will depend on the 4 basic emotions. One person will have to go outside and find out who the conductor is.
Step 1: together with the group you decide who will have to go outside for a second.
Step 2: let this person go outside and make sure he/ she doesn’t hear what is being said in the group.
Step 3: agree with the group who will be the conductor and make sure no one tells the person that is outside.
Step 4: let the person who was standing outside back into the room.
Step 5: the conductor starts the exercise by portraying a basic emotion in a subtle way so that the person standing outside doesn’t know that he / she is the conductor.
Step 6: the rest of the group must immediately imitate the conductor and ensure that they don’t make it too obvious who the conductor is. For example staring directly at the conductor.
Step 7: at any time the conductor can decide to portray a different basic emotion with his facial expressions and body. The rest of the group then needs to imitate him/ her as fast as possible.
Step 8: as soon as the person who went out guesses who the conductor is, the game is over and someone else can go outside. The exercise repeats.
Complete
When the exercise is completed and the children relax again, you can tell them that the session is finished.
Points of attention:
- Focus on the positives
- Tell them how much you enjoyed the fact that they co-operated so well and that each of them did well individually.
Maak jouw eigen website met JouwWeb