Lesson 1: Dragon dance

After watching the ‘Story of Nian’ that explains the Chinese New Year Story, children dance to music traditionally used to celebrate the festival, moving in response to the musical elements: crescendo, tempo and duration

Before the lesson

Download classroom resources

Learning objectives

  • To learn about the music used to celebrate the Chinese New Year festival

National curriculum

‘Pupils should be taught to:

  • appreciate and understand a wide range of high-quality live and recorded music drawn
    from different traditions and from great composers and musicians’

See National curriculum - Music key stages 1 to 2

Success criteria

Cross-curricular links

Attention grabber

Main event

Differentiation

Pupils needing extra support: Pair these pupils with a more confident partner.

 

Pupils working at greater depth: Ask these pupils to partner with less confident pupils and discuss with them how to match their movements to the music.

Wrapping up

Assessing pupils' progression and understanding

Vocabulary

Created by:
Elizabeth Stafford,  
Music specialist
After a brief spell as an opera singer, Liz embarked on a 20-year career in music education, teaching at early years, primary and secondary. After Liz had her daughter, she started her own business Music Education Solutions® Limited, helping teachers…
Find out more
For copyright reasons, you may not screenshot this page.
Press esc to exit