Movement and Creative Arts Syllabus (Dance 1)
(grades 9-12/Semester Course/Elective)
Room 201/Wrestling Gym
Christine Joy Ferrer (AKA Tine or Ms. T)
tine@eomvmnt.org (for class work) or FerrerC@sfusd.edu
415-608-2512
www.eomvmnt.org

#1 Thing to Remember

“Life is NOT about discovering who you are, it’s about CREATING WHO YOU ARE and WHO YOU WILL BE.”

Have fun. Create you. Be Creative.

Course Description: This course is an elective open to 9-12th grade students. This class is a multicultural movement and creative arts exchange (dance/music/media arts) focusing on students’ creative expression.

Each class you will not only dance and embody creative movement that connects your mind, body, and soul, but you will be the creators, contributors and editors of your own creative/editorial content that will be published in your own arts and culture blog and end-of-the-semester catalog.  Job roles will rotate. In the larger perspective, the course will look at cultural and social values of the arts, and how it can empower you and allow you to connect with the world around you. This opportunity will provide creative projects for you to explore and experience, and hopefully bring more context to your life.

In the first half of class, movement exercises will be an eclectic, fusion of multicultural dance movements inspired by Afro-diasporic/folkoric rhythms. The intent is to give students an awareness and reverence for the physical body and its athletic and expressive capabilities, while facilitating a space where arts and culture is all around them. They will learn this through experience, by doing and creating.

Scheduled Projects include (subject to change):

  • I am [Word/Photo] I Am Poem –>I Am Video Project 15 seconds each…
  • Collage – bringing awareness to something that’s going on in the world, impacting your personal community, inspires you
  • Choreography Phrase
  • Terrarium Creation
  • Photo Storytelling (using phone cameras/tablets) i.e. day in your/a life
  • Create your own symbol
  • Class Podcast/Music Playlist (two songs each, non-mainstream, world music…)

Guest Artist/Teacher Workshop or Performance include:

  • Jarrel “Chumbinho” Phillips/ Jian “Aguia” Gianinni
    Capoeira – January
  • Jiridon
    World Music & Hip-hop – February
  • Yuko Hata
    Circus Contortionist – March

Class Field Trip
Precita Eyes Art Walk

Assessment/Grading
Self-Evaluation Sheets (Daily)/Reflection Journal 25%
Participation 25%
Weekly (or bi-weekly) Classroom Projects 25%
Final Project 25%

Final Project

Includes at least (5) personal projects of the semester (whether of the students choosing or their peers) published on eomvmnt.org on the “EclectiCreative” Project Blog (Students are welcomed to rename the blog the second or third week of the session). And (1) project for the catalog. Project deadline to be included in catalog is Monday, April 11, 2016.

AND

Re-create an old project, or creative project of your choosing via any medium you choose, i.e. spoken word/dance/music/art/poem to be shared on the final day of class or share with teacher individually, once group projects are shown.

—

Again, by the end of the session, students will produce a Movement and Creative Arts Blog published on eomvmnt.org (monthly updates) and featured on Mission High School’s website, documenting the progress of their work.

Students are the contributing editors/authors/writers/artists of their Class Catalog (All student selected work/Ms. T (Designer/Art Director will make final call). Document via video, written reflection, poem, photography + captions, drawing, dance, performance, spoken word, etc.

Proper Attire
Dance clothes are clothes that you can roll around on the floor in, sweat in and that you feel comfortable in that are recognized as such by the teacher. They may take the form of sweat pants, leggings, biker shorts and t-shirts. Also, sometimes we’ll be in our barefeet, socks or shoes depending on the day.

Classroom Participation
In order to create an atmosphere of shared knowledge and respectful exchange, students must agree to and demonstrate the ability to hold sacred the work of others. Projects created in this room will not be published unless its creator agrees to it. If student would rather NOT have ANY of their work published, that’s fine, but please submit it to teacher. Work must either be handed in or submitted via email. Once Ms. T makes note of it, you can keep your project.

FYI: Ms. T will be absent from March 16th-30th. She will be traveling out of the country to visit Haiti and train more in Haitian folkoric song, music + dance. You will have a sub.

Journals
Journals collected at the end of each week…
Short reflection about each class and self-evaluation each day
You can draw instead of write….