A Slightly Unexpected Lesson

I came in expecting to teach the Gingerbread Man story and ended up doing a Jewish dance. During Christmas time Silvercrest Elementary does something called, Holidays Around the World. This is where the class gets to visit another classroom and learn about a different country and one of their holidays. So, the day I came in I did not have my usual class. It was another class that came in to learn about Hanukkah, a Jewish holiday. To help teach them about this holiday Mrs. Quick asked my if I could teach the class a little Jewish dance. Thanks to my world dance classes at BYU I did have some experience in Yemenite or Jewish dances and was able to pull something together on the fly. The dance was done in a circle and I had them take four step to the right followed by the Yemenite step. This is a three-step move with a quick, quick, slow timing. I had them step on their right foot, rock back to their left and then cross their right in front of the left, which prepared them to start walking to the left. Then, they would took four more steps to the left followed by the Yemenite step. This whole time they were holding hands, but now I had them let go and walk to the center. They took four steps to the center and clapped down low, then they took four steps back and clapped up high. I had them repeat that, then I had them turn in a small circle and grab hands again to start the dance over. The kids did a pretty good job with it. The whole changing directions thing was pretty tough for them, but with a little help they did alright. Mrs. Quick and I had planned to do this on the last day with her class as a fun wrap up, so I was pretty excited to see how they would do when the time came. But, we aren't there yet. We still have to do the Gingerbread Man story. That will be for the next visit.