Dance Lesson Planning Guide with Online and Printable Templates

Do you need a more clear trajectory for your dance students’ growth over the entire term, broken down into individual lessons that are not only productive, but fun? The newly revised and professionally edited Revised Holistic Guide to Dance Lesson Planning enables you to easily plan a year’s worth of lessons that address dance technique, creative and performance skills, and overall well-being through social emotional learning.

This newly updated resource now includes beautiful template pages for your curriculum/skill lists, yearly unit schedule, unit plans, and individual class lesson plans. These templates can be printed so that you can handwrite your plans, or you can type directly into the fillable PDF format.

“I feel so inspired and excited to plan my next teaching term! This resource is full of step-by-step practices to make sure that my classes will be cohesive, effective and build to successful learning. I especially like that technique was not treated as the end-all-be-all of learning. Shannon also gives equal weight to creative exploration and social-emotional growth, with concrete ideas for how to incorporate those areas into class. I can imagine my students not only becoming better dancers through utilizing this lesson planning guide, but also having more fun as we go, and feeling an increased sense of belonging and community.” – Diane Williams, Washington, USABy distilling the dance lesson planning process down to 4 essential questions, this guide will help you easily plan a years’ worth of inspiring, impactful, and engaging dance lessons for any age group, skill level, or dance style. As you answer the questions, you will create a dance class curriculum that keeps students progressing in technique, artistry, and social-emotional learning throughout the term, broken down into easily managed themed units and dynamic dance lesson plans that deliver results and keep students engaged and having fun!

The dance lesson planning guide contains two sample units and class plans, complete with example exercises, so that you can see the dance lesson planning process in action. It also features templates for your curriculum, unit schedules, unit outlines, and dance lesson plans, both in beautifully designed printable and fully customizable online formats.

This extensive 47-page resource guides you through the entire dance lesson planning process, from developing a holistic curriculum that helps students grow in dance technique, artistry, and social-emotional skills, to exciting and effective individual lesson plans for each class meeting. The guide contains two sample units and dance lesson plans, one for an advanced beginner jazz class with pre-teen students, and one for an advanced ballet class with teenager or young adults. The samples are complete with detailed example exercises, so that you can see the dance lesson planning process in action. The guide also features fillable PDF templates for your curriculum/skill lists, yearly unit schedule, unit plans, and individual class lesson plans. 

This dance lesson planning guide is based on my experience as a performer, choreographer, and educator of ballet, modern, musical theatre, jazz, and jazz-derived forms like lyrical and contemporary It is designed to be broad enough to apply to a range of dance genres and styles, but it does come from the perspective of Western concert dance.