PE at key stages 1 and 2    (Year 3)

• Ask the children to talk about a stimulus. Teach them to use language to describe it, eg a machine might be jerky, circling, pushing, pulling, shaking. Help them to explore these action words through different movements.
• Teach them to change the speed, strength and flow of their movements, and the way they use space, eg cogs and pistons might move with jerky body parts; fast turning actions from high to low; slow, smooth continuous circling actions. Encourage them to use their whole body and individual parts of the body.
• Teach them to work with a partner and in small groups to explore different relationships, eg pushing and pulling actions going over, under and around each other; circling actions meeting and parting.

• Ask the children to create dance phrases from exploratory tasks, eg show a machine breaking down by exploding, turning, landing and rolling. Help them to achieve the quality of movement needed by demonstrating with your voice, eg BANG! S-t-r-e-t-c-h. Help them to create longer phrases and link them together. Teach them to explore movements with a partner, working in unison and in canon. Encourage them to be aware of their partner when moving in and through space.
• Ask the children to create phrases that combine different actions and qualities, eg slowly travelling backwards staying low; exploding into the air, collapsing, rolling, getting slower and slower then stopping.
• Help them to remember the order of dance phrases by talking them through the sequence.
• Ask them to use clear starting and finishing positions.
• Teach them to listen to the accompaniment. Listen to them talking about their ideas for dances.

• Teach the children some dance activities that make them feel warmer, mobilise the joints and stretch the body, eg skipping and swing actions; lifting, lowering, circling and shaking joints; holding stretches.
• Teach the children some stretches they can use to warm up and cool down. Ask them why it is important to warm up and cool down.

• Ask the children to practise and refine dance phrases. Encourage them to suggest how dances with a partner could be improved.
• Help the children to use a range of descriptive language to describe dance, eg for a fast-rising action - exploding, leaping, shooting, soaring, bursting; for a slow-rising action - climbing, growing, expanding, spreading, floating. Teach them how to recognise and describe canon and unison.