Dias de Los Muertos: A Skeleton Dance

If you pretended to be a skeleton, your movements could be very funny. How about making a skeleton dance?

Getting Ready

Movement: Look at the picture of the skeleton. See the big bones for the arms and legs. Check out where those bones are in your body. Try moving your arm and leg bones. Would a skeleton move in a smooth or jerky way? How many ways can you find to move your arms and legs? Try it out. Move your skeleton head. Try moving your backbone.

Rhythm: Get someone to make a 3/4 beat with a wood block. One , two, three. One , two, three. One , two, three. One , two, three.

Move to the beat as your skeleton. Have your skeleton walk to the beat. Have your skeleton bend and stretch to the beat. Try with a faster and slower beat.

The Dance. Find four movements your skeletons can do. They might skip, walk, run, hop, jump, leap, gallop, or slide. They can travel forward, backward, sideward, diagonally, and turn . Or your skeletons might twist, bend, stretch, or swing . Do each movement to two measures of the 3/4 beat. Repeat your movements. For example:

walk sideward x x x; ; walk sideward x, x, x ;

bend x, x, x; bend x, x, x ;

skip x ,x,x; skip x ,x,x;

turn x ,x,x; turn x ,x,x.

Repeat the movements

You have a dance. Practice it. Perhaps you can have someone videotape your dance

Critiquing your Dance Did you remember the four movements you chose? When did you remember to keep the "one , two, three" rhythm?

Think about what you did. If you moved in space, you were doing locomotor movements. If you were twisting and turning, you were doing non-locomotor or axial movements. These are the basic movements that all dancers use!