Jessica Torres is a Middlesex Community College student completing a Human Services internship here at Green Street this semester as a teaching assistant in our Discovery AfterSchool Program. She will be making several blog posts and reflections during her time here for an inside look at our AfterSchool classes.
Black Girl Linguistic Play at Green Street
By: Jessica Torres
This week, contemporary dancer Camille Brown brought her production Black Girl: Linguistic Play to Wesleyan University. One of her dancers came to Green Street to run a special dance assembly for our AfterSchool students. I participated in helping the children learn different dance moves in the workshop using dance moves from Black Girl: Linguistic Play.
To start, guest dancer Beatrice had all the children introduce themselves by doing their favorite dance move. Some of the children were too shy but their friends encouraged them by showing off their own creative moves. After introductions, Beatrice had all the children spread out and face the mirror in the room – it was time to dance! We had a guest drummer, Jocelyn, there too to help get us moving.
Move 1 – Put your arms up and move your hands up and down.
Move 2 – Add in shrugging your shoulders.
Move 3 – Put your legs together and shake your knees.
Move 4 – Step one leg front, step it back into place, and then clap once do the same with the other leg.
Move 5 – Skip sideways with your right arm up and wiggle your finger, switch sides and repeat with left arm.
Move 6 – Whip and nae nae (a current popular dance move).
Once all the children learned each move, we put all the moves together. The children were laughing and having fun as we danced altogether.
Beatrice and Jocelyn really knew how to get all the children involved. I can truly say it was a fun experience for the children and for all the teachers and myself.