Harry’s Horrible Hair

• Theresa Cocci
• Posted 11/29/21
• 0 comments

A Movement Lesson

Suggested Grades: K-2

National Core Arts Standards

#1 — Generalize and conceptualize artistic ideas and work.
#2 — Organize and develop artistic ideas and work.
#4 — Select, analyze, and interpret artistic interpretation for presentation.

Objectives

• Explore various emotions through movement.
• Build a vocabulary relating to expression and movement.
• Apply vocabulary to selected repertoire.

Materials

• Book: Harry’s Horrible Hair by Theresa Cocci
• Recording: “Hungarian Dance No. 3 in F Major” by Johannes Brahms
• Scarves or pieces of yarn
• Polyspots or foam circles
• Casel’s SEL Framework, www.casel.org/what-is-SEL

Overview

Integrate Casel’s SEL framework using the children’s picture book Harry’s Horrible Hair. Students explore and discuss how creative movement and SEL relates to Harry’s changing emotions throughout the story and perform their own version to a Brahms Hungarian dance.

Book Synopsis

Suggested Teaching Process

Lesson 1

1. Read Harry’s Horrible Hair.
2. Ask students to listen for words that describe how Harry is feeling in the story.
3. Ask the students to look at the illustrations and notice the expressions of the characters in the book.
4. List the words that describe Harry’s feelings on whiteboard or chart paper.
5. Display words students identified in a column labeled Feelings/Emotions.
6. Create a second column labeled Body Movements.
7. Ask students what kinds of movements match the words in the Feeling/ Emotions column.
8. Use both locomotor and non-locomotor words.

Feelings/Emotions	Body Movements
Happy	Extend upwards, reaching, lightness
Sad	Bending low, limp, swaying
Upset/hurt	Twisting, bending, spinning, stomping

9. Practice the movements that correspond with the feelings.
10. Play a game.
    • The teacher plays a steady beat on a hand drum.
    • The teacher speaks an emotion and students respond with the corresponding action.

Lesson 2

1. Listen to “Hungarian Dance No. 3 in F Major” by Johannes Brahms.
2. Ask students to respond to the music using prompts.
   • Show the feeling of the music by walking their fingers up and down their arm.
   • Ask, “How does a happy walk feel?”
   • Show the change of the music from major to minor by changing their finger walk.
   • Ask, “How does t his sad walk feel?”
   • Listen for the increase in tempo, the intenseness and change in the music.
   • Ask, “Does t his sound like Harry falling into the hold?” “Can you show this by rolling and spinning your hands in a circle?”
3. Pass out scarves or pieces of yarn and polyspots.
4. Students stand on a polyspot.
   • Hint: This part of the activity can be done in place, or moving through the classroom.
5. Play the recording again determining choreography as a class.
   • Ask students to apply the movement word ideas to each section of the music.
   • Emphasize the use of levels in the body – high, middle, low.
   • What level should we use in section one?
6. Continue with sections 2-5, stopping after each section, applying the vocabulary words the students’ movement.
   • Ask students which section of the music feels as though Harry’s sweater is unraveling? Students can use their string or scarf to show the unraveling movement.
   • At the last section, remind students to hold a pose and rest in that pose for to end the piece.
7. Divide the class in half.
8. One group performs while the other half remains seated practicing audience etiquette.
   • Switch and the other half of the class then perform their movement ideas.
   • Begin to assess the students’ understanding of their movement vocabulary.
   • At the end of each performance, leave time for discussing what each group noticed about each other’s performance.
9. Discuss students’ feelings about this movement exploration using the Casel’s SEL Framework:
   • Self-awareness — identifying their emotions
   • Social awareness — demonstrating empathy and compassion
   • Responsible decision making — identifying solutions for personal and social problems they may have encountered
   • Self-management — using planning and organizational skills
   • Relationship skills — practicing teamwork, showing leadership

Suggested Choreography

0:00-0:07	Introduction: Make a pose that you can freeze in your own space. Get ready for a happy walk.
0:08-0:26	Move into your happy walk. Extend your chin, face, and body upwards. Think about the lightness in your step. (Students could also walk in place if no room in the classroom is available.)
0:27-0:45	Change your body movements, bending and shrinking down with your body. Hang your body down to show the sadness that you’re feeling.
0:46 -1:04	Feel the mood change of the music, back to the happy walk feeling. Lift the body to show everyone your beautiful sweater.
1:05-1:21	The minor feeling of the music returns. Express your feelings by moving slumped shoulders, arms hanging while you walk. Feel the change in the music as you begin to walk faster.
1:22-1:34	Walking quickly, you don’t see the hole. Twist the body downwards like you’re falling. Use your scarf or string to show the twisting, spinning, and unraveling of the yarn from Harry’s sweater. Sway and spin around and around.
1:35-1:52	Look at your unraveled sweater. Check the front, back, and each side and move sadly, and slowly.
1:53-2:17	Along comes Molly, your friend, who cheers you up and you both walk home in your happy walk. Rest and freeze.

Extension One

1. Retell the story.
2. Provide opportunities for students to share how they feel during different sections in the story.
3. Divide students into small groups giving each group a section of the story.
4. As the story is read, each group performs movements that they had created for their section of the story, while the teacher plays accompanying repertoire.
5. Below is an example:

Narrator: “Harry the Hound had the most horrible hair.” “It was patchy, thin, and stuck out everywhere.” “When people would see him, they’d stop and they’d stare, they’d point and say, just look at that hair.”

• The first group stands and as the teacher accompanies or plays recorded music, the students move to the music and recreate their scene of the story. Then they are seated.
• Page 1: Suggested music “Rogue’s Song,” by Bela Bartok.

Narrator: “He lived with Miss Maggie and Molly her puppy, whose love and whose care made him feel so lucky.”

• The second group stands and again as the teacher accompanies or plays recorded music, the students move to the music to recreate this next scene in the story. Then they are seated.
• Page 2-3: Suggested music “Happy Farmer” by Robert Schumann.

Extension Two

1. Create a sound story.
2. Divide students into small groups.
3. Students select unpitched percussion instruments for different characters and actions in the story.
4. Read the story.
5. Cue each group to play on specific words.
6. We enjoyed rotating parts, too, so that students get to play all of the different instruments.
7. Consider recording the sound story and sharing it with students’ teachers and families.

References

Wiener Philharmoniker. (n.d.). Hungarian Dance No.3 in F Major, WoO1. On Brahms: 21 Hungarian Dances. Rainer Brock.

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