Stories as a stimulus for dance teaching and learning in the elementary school context

Stories are greatly enjoyed by young children, and as such they are engaging stimuli for teaching dance in the elementary school context. Dance is a powerful medium through which literacy learning can be enriched due to its embodied and multisensory methods. There are many ways to work with stories as stimuli in dance education. For example, it is possible to follow the form of a text’s narrative, investigating specific words and the quality of the movement that the text evokes. Furthermore, the book’s mood and atmosphere can be explored, along with the plot, characters, settings, rhythms, and the emotions it evokes. This article explores one book for its creative potential as a dance teaching-learning experience: Mixed: A Colorful Story by Arree Chung. It also offers extension possibilities for the color-focused ideas that are provided and considers supplementary creative dance tasks for five more color-themed books.