Warm-ups: Creating Dances with What We Have

Each warm-up is a chance to use what we have and make what we need.

​One of my favorite activities is turning a simple warm-up into a class dance. Each warm-up focuses on a specific movement idea. We practice together in unison, gradually adding choreographic elements and techniques until something new starts to form. This method helps students learn particular movement concepts, refine them, and then experiment with direction, phrasing, and other components of choreography.
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When leading the first dance in the class, I like to start with something high-energy that grabs students’ attention and creates excitement. The isolation warm-up is a favorite because the music is lively and current, and it emphasizes isolating different parts of the body in various ways. It offers endless opportunities to develop skills that transfer across styles and connect to future choreography.

The warm-ups are designed to involve the right and left side of the body, supporting compositional practice and overall skill development. They’re perfect for exploring mirroring and canon, as these choreographic tools naturally develop from repeated movement patterns. Each lesson builds on a specific movement idea, reinforcing vocabulary and preparing students for deeper choreographic exploration.

​This year, I drew inspiration from Lady Gaga’s “Abracadabra.” It’s full of intricate details and dynamic contrasts. We studied choreographer Parris Goebel’s style, discussed her creative process, and observed the contrasting shapes, energies, and pathways between dancers in red and white costumes. To connect this study to our classwork, we began with isolation exercises and choreography inspired by the video. I then introduced dance qualities such as sharp/soft, fast/slow, and rise/fall—elements that challenged students to vary dynamics and intention. We expanded this with an improvisation activity called the Class Spell, where students generated movements based on prompts and combined them into a shared phrase. Finally, students worked in pairs to choreograph eight counts inspired by either the “red” or “white” qualities observed in the video, turning observation into original creation.

These components can be adapted and combined to fit any classroom. It’s up to each teacher to decide how and where they fit, adjusting the “recipe” to match their dancers, goals, and teaching pace.

Warm-ups are more than physical prep—they’re invitations to create. When we use warm-ups to make, we show students that every part of class can lead to choreography.

Nothing is left unfinished; our work begins the moment we step into the room.

This is a practice I share more fully in my book,  Choreographing the Curriculum, where I offer other practices to use make a dance with your warm-ups.

​Photo: Patrick Albert