We hope you have had a great summer break! It’s now time to get back to the business of educating the nation, so let us make it easy for you to get into your new dance programme.

You asked and we listened… You asked for more photograph based resources like our freestyle resources as you said its so easy to teach, you also said  that your younger children love to sing as well as dance,  so we have been busy creating a whole host of goodies for you to try:

Foundation – Short Scheme for 3 – 5 years

• Nursery rhymes. Its a real cutey sing – along theme and focuses on beat, verse and chorus and working together

Key stage 1  – Short Schemes for 5 – 7 years

• Yogadance is our brand new creation using photographs of fun Yoga poses to help you build up your routine

• Do Re Mi a sing a long scheme using flash cards for props and simple choreography  Example Flash Card Do Re Mi

Key stage 2, 3 & 4 – Short Schemes for 8 – 16 years

• Freestyle Funky YogaFit is a scheme that helps you to build up a funky routine using photographs of yoga poses – no yoga experience necessary!

• Funky Urban Freestyle is a new scheme to help teachers with little or no Streetdance experience, build up a funky urban freestlye performance using photographs

Hi, I was recently asked this question by a teacher

“i have recently started teaching dance in nurseries and I am currently teaching a week long summer camp.  i am stuck for ideas with such young children! Can you help?”

I thought my answer may be of use to other teachers, home schooling parents and activity leaders too.

“Pre-school can be tricky, the key is to make it FUN.  Keep it simple and repetitive, and make sure you change the activity every 10 – 15 minutes to keep their focus.  For example:

Warm – up:  you could try the warm up idea from our free resources range (it says key stage one warm up, but its easily adaptable for early years). If you have signed up for free trial resources you will automatically get them uploaded in to your account.

Activity – Under the Sea (this is also a free trial resource you can use as its suitable for 3 – 7 years) This builds up a theme using different activities to keep focus and then they do a performance at the end.

Cool down – The shape circle – the children sit in a big circle in pairs.  Each pair run in to the centre of the circle and make a shape with each other, either touching hands, or feet or heads! It’s up to you to guide the children. They hold it as still as possible, applause and praise,  and then the next pair come in to the circle to make their own shape.  Once the children get the hang of it, they get quicker and quicker at getting in to the circle and making a shape.  It’s simple and fun and easy to negotiate.

If you like these ideas have a look on the Early Years /KS1 pages at out short schemes and choreography ideas http://www.imovesdance.com/key-stage-1/

If you need music to inspire check out our Little Stars CD.   CD 1 is a mix of funky nursery rhymes, I use this a lot and make up little actions to them.  CD 2 is happy boppy party music which I use to have on in the background for games and activities.  Click here for more information http://www.imovesdance.com/music/

Sign up for free trial resources here http://www.imovesdance.com/

Let me know if I can be of any more help. Good Luck!”

Hi

We are very excited to announce that “Kings Camps” - The Kings Foundation dedicated to developing children through sport, are now using imovesdance.com resources to help train their Jump Leaders all over the UK to teach great dance sessions.   Jump is a new programme available to all children who attend their fantastic summer camps.  Dance and Gymnastics is the focus of the Jump Programme and is in association with British Gymnastics.  Check out your local camp for your kids!! http://www.kingscamps.org/jump/

Dance Competition for schools launches in Sept 11

We’re looking for the best dance performance by a school in the UK! There are two categories:

• 7 – 11 Year olds
• 12 – 16 Year olds

What are the judges looking for?

1. Originality and creativity

2. Storytelling

3. Team work

4. Good timing and performance skills

Your dance must include the basic principles (movements) of dance i.e. turning steps, travelling steps, leaping & jumping steps, different levels and plains of movement, expression and gesture to tell a story, balance and stillness.

1st prize – a half day training workshop with an imovesdance presenter

2nd prize - £50 voucher to spend at the imovesdance.com online dance resource centre

all resources are approved by the professional Development Board (PDB)

How to Enter:

Your school’s performance should be between 2 – 3 minutes long. To enter your school‘s dance performance all you need to do is send us a DVD of the performance to: imovesdance.com, 109 Rustlings Road, Sheffield, S11 7AB

Enter Now!

Please fill in the entry form below – it will only take five minutes to fill in and entry is free.  Closing date for entries is Friday 16^th Dec 2011. imovesdance schools dance competition 2011 [click this link to print this information]

this Year’s Winners…

Ravenswood Primary School in Newcastle won half a day training workshop learning a new StreetJazz routine and funky yogafit routine. We also worked with their teachers after school demonstrating new ideas for key stage 1 and 2.  Here’s what they had to say…

“The children loved learning the dance, we loved yoga fit and thought it was a great way to work on the children’s balance and stretches.”

” The staff had nothing but praise for the session it was great to receive practical ideas that could then be applied in dance lessons straight away. Reception and year 1 have already done the me to you song and it was a huge success”

“… the whole experience has been really valuable to us and I think the whole idea of imovesdance is filling a big whole in school dance lessons!”

Hi

we are so lucky to be working with 5 case study schools this year who are all teaching  our schemes and then feeding back to us in order to keep our ideas fresh and imaginative.

First up, Stocksbridge Infant School in Sheffield, Year 2 and their amazing teacher Katy Oxford who reviewed “The Circus” scheme.  I worked with Katy and her Year 2 children for 1 session in PE lesson time, looking at beat and phrase, 8 counts of music etc and performing the “me dance” as the introduction to structured movement to music.   The 2 following sessions were lead by Katy who taught our Circus theme, looking at movements to the beat and using 8 counts to get each child back to their spot once they had finished performing.  Katy used our ideas so imaginatively and then made it her own by feeding off what the children enjoyed most and what they were naturally doing well. The performance was wonderful and you could see that they were all so focused.

Katy’s verdict, “I loved teaching it, and the kids just wanted to do it over and over again!  Every teacher who walked through the hall when we were practising stopped to look and then asked me what I was doing so they could teach it to their little ones.  Cant wait to do another one next term with my new Year 2′s.”

Big thanks to Katy and Year 2 at Stocksbridge Infants School

If you would like more info on the circus theme click here http://www.imovesdance.com/key-stage-1/

Ravenswood Primary school in Newcastle – winners of the imovesdance competition back in march –  won a special prize to work with us for half a day. we spent the afternoon  learning a fab new streetjazz routine and funky yogafit routine,  36 kids and I worked hard perfecting the moves and they looked amazing.  Its was so good to see so many boys enjoying the afternoon too.  We also worked with their teachers after school demonstrating new ideas for key stage 1 and 2 who through themselves in to the workshop and came up with some really creative choreography.  Many thanks for entering and a big well done for winning. See you all soon I hope,  Imogen

Well done to Year 2 children at Stocksbridge Infants yesterday, we have just learned all about moving to a beat and how many beats are in a phrase and then performed the “Me Dance” beautifully. Well done team!

Download this lesson plan and have ago yourself…. then tell us what you think!  imovesdance.com – free lesson for key stage 1, This is the first lesson in a 7 week dance and movement scheme of work you could teach to your little ones.  They love it and we practice counting and performing movements to fit within 8 counts.  The themes that follow are 3 weeks about countries, and 3 weeks discovering machines and learning the DVD Dance, hilarious and all good stuff, check out the Infant Start up kits if you would like to try the full scheme, http://www.imovesdance.com/start-up-kits/infant-start-up-kits/

Immy x

getting the music right is essential for any dance or exercise to music class instructor.  get it wrong and it can ruin the whole mood of the class. Pure Energy Music have been on a role recently with their funky disco house mixes.  One of my favourites at the moment is Disco Fever – its funky, non-cheesy and keeps the energy high all the way to the end of my class.    I find my self shouting over the head mic “Oh my god I love this track”, and then turning the volume up a little each time.

Disc one has a great funky disco feel, reminiscent of the early hed kandi days – I use this for my dance aerobic classes (135 – 145 bpm). Disc two (section one) “Shake Ya Booty”  is slower at 125 bpm,  perfect for my primary school disco scheme of work.  Section 2 “disco tec” is great for step, conditioning or even your older groups featuring tracks such as “you got the love” and “streetlife”.

I know its good when I play it in the car!

Go and have a listen for yourself at http://www.pureenergydigital.com/product-display/album/disco-fever-mg00393083.aspx

If you like this you’ll also like Funky House Workout http://www.pureenergydigital.com/product-display/album/funky-house-workout-mg00393093.aspx

Let me know what you think!

Imogen

Hi

We’ve just had our Primary School dance resources reviewed by Teach Primary magazine – scary stuff…and whoosh, I’m so pleased to say (and totally relieved) they have given us a storming review! Yippee…Hurrah…Fantastic. If you or your school are looking at investing in new dance stuff for next year check out the complete review in the July Edition of Teach Primary Magazine.  If not you will be able to download a copy of the review from the site once its been to press.  Go imoves team, I’m chuffed to bits. (joyously skipping away…la la la) Imogen x

Hi all

Gaye & I are preparing to go to the TES North Education Show in a few days and we are very excited to meet new and existing  customers, especially with the launch of our new website in the next few days.  Customers should find the new site far easier to use and find what they need, with 55 dance and fitness lessons and schemes to choose from its a little daunting at first.   We also have lots of new fab FREE resources to have a go at before you buy anything, we are so confident you’ll like what you see, you can try before you buy.

Anyway, it would be really useful to get a bit of feedback about the new site, so if you get a few minutes,  go and have a look around and sign up for your free resources.  We go live from Monday 11th April, so fill your boots on imoves…

If your in Manchester and fancy popping over to see us at the TES Ed Show, were on stand E1, near the restaurant area (we’re not daft).   Hope to see you there, Imogen & Gaye xx