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Round Valley Arts Curriculum

DRAMA Kindergarten Grade 1 Grade 2 Grades 3/4 Grades 5/6 Grades 7/8 Grades 9/12	DANCE Kindergarten Grade 1 Grade 2 Grades 3/4 Grades 5/6 Grades 7/8 Grades 9/12
ART Kindergarten Grade 1 Grade 2 Grade 3 Grade 4 Grade 6 Grades 7/8 - Classroom Grades 7/8 - Art Survey Grades 7/8 - Art I Grades 7/8 - Art II Grades 7/8 - Advanced Placement Art Grades 9/12 - Ceramics Grades 9/12 - Advanced Ceramics Grades 9/12 - Dimensional Design Grades 9/12 - Advanced Dimensional Design	MUSIC Kindergarten Grade 1 Grade 2 Grade 3 Grade 4 Grade 5 Grade 6 Recorder - Grades 3/4 Beginning Band - Grades 4/12 Intermediate Band - Grades 6/12 Concert Band - Grades 7/12 Symphonic Band - Grades 9/12 Beginning Choir - Grades 4/12 Intermediate Choir - Grades 7/12 Advanced Choir - Grades 9/12

*Emphasis for third grade

I. ARTISTIC PERCEPTION AND RESPONSE

Students become aware of themselves, space, time, energy, and the power of dance to communicate ideas and feelings. As they dance, watch, talk, and write about performances and their own experiences, they increase their awareness, related to dance, of:

1.      * compare stage drama, radio, TV, and film and identify similarities and differences,

2.      * make careful detailed descriptions of people, places, and real-life incidents,

3.      talk and write about environment as an element of drama,

4.      talk and write about their feelings when watching/listening to a play, film, radio drama or a     real-life incident with dramatic values,

5.      read and discuss different forms within plays and stories (dialogue, monologue, prose [descriptive and narrative] and poetry).

Students will be exposed to these terms:

II. CREATIVE EXPRESSION

Students communicate observations, feelings, ideas, and experiences about their own world. They create drama based on real events, stories, poems, and places as well as those in their imaginations, developing these foundational skills.

1.      * Nonverbal (develop awareness of body, movement, and space)

·        do warm-up and isolation exercises.

·        Perform theatre games for focus concentration and observation (see suggestions for second grade also bibliography).

·        Explore design and shape in group "freeze formations" (forming people statues).

·        Build a group-created, imaginary machine or appliance using their bodies, clapping, tapping, and vocal sound effects.

·        Move in response to natural events and places (storm desert etc.).

2.      * Verbal

·        Practice vocal warmups, scales, diction rhymes, tongue-twisters, voice projection.

3.      * Language Skills

·        Describe how something is made.

·        Give directions for finding a specific place.

·        Narrate, refine, and record a story (as if for radio theatre).

4.      Creative Mime

·        Move as animals in different situations (caged or free).

·        Use movement to create a character.

5.      Performance

·        Perform these skills for classmates and parents.

III. HISTORICAL AND CULTURAL CONTEXT

Students increase their experiences of different kinds of artists and forms of drama from various cultures. They see plays, hear storytellers and poetry readers in performance when possible.  These opportunities can be supplemented by television, video, films, and cross-classroom performing.
They:

1.      * learn that some actors are professional while others participate in drama as recreation,

2.      * learn that drama productions include many people besides actors,

3.         listen to a recorded (radio or audio) play,

4.      * view a film with child actors (children's classic), 

5.         write and/or enact a drama history of their own experience.

IV. AESTHETIC VALUING

Students refine their ability to talk and write about their reflections on performances they have observed. They:

1.      * recognize stage presence and dramatic impact in professional performers and in each other  (clear-cut movement, focus, and concentration) of the actor (mime), the actor's perception of space, the environment as a dramatic element);

2.       evaluate one another constructively, using as criteria

·        believability (truth),

·        delivery (audibility, expression, concentration),

·        creativity (originality, ideas, imagination, detail).

V. CONNECTIONS, RELATIONS, APPLICATIONS

Understanding relationships between the arts and with disciplines outside of the arts.

Students can connect, relate, and apply various types of arts knowledge and skills within the art form, across the arts disciplines (dance, music, theater, and visual arts), and with disciplines outside of the arts.