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Activity
Activity

Horses at the Farm

Created September 15, 2023 | Added May 22, 2025

  1. Students pretend to be horses, sleeping in barns (represented by plastic hoops on the floor).
  2. The instructor is sitting at the piano and chants:
    • Bell Horses, Bell Horses, what’s the time of day,
      One o’clock, two o’clock ,
      Time to go away
    • The instructor plays a {rn:V7} arpeggio, students (“horses”) wake up.
    • At a high signal from the piano, the horses jump out of the hoop.
  3. Piano plays different durations and rhythms: (running, jogging, skipping, marching, long steps, jumping, galloping, etc.)
    • Students respond in movement
    • The exercises includes stops, maybe turn around, or stretch, all signals coming from the piano.
  4. The instructor sings “Time to come back home“
    • Pitches: ^5 ^5 ^5 ^5, ^1.
    • Piano plays {rn:V7} and {rn:I}
  5. Review the motions and draw the different note values on the board.

Adaptations / Extensions

Extension

  1. In a corner of the room, the instructor will place cards with note values
  2. Include a new signal after each locomotor event
  3. At the signal, the kids pick from the floor the card with the note value they just moved and bring it to the barn

Variation

  1. Students sit on the floor holding hands.
  2. One or two students are horses and sleep in the middle
  3. After the instructor’s chant, the students lift their arms making room for the horses to move around the barn with the music.
  4. The students who were in the middle pick the next two horses.
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Author

Adriana Ausch-Simmel

Adriana Ausch enjoys a career as a singer and Dalcroze Eurhythmics teaching artist. As cross-style singer she has performed solo and chamber programs and presented Dalcroze workshops in Boston, New York, Toronto, Hangzhou (China) and Bucharest (Romania).  She currently teaches as Dalcroze Eurhythmics faculty at Longy School of Music of Bard College, where she created several Dalcroze courses for graduate and undergraduate students: Eurhythmics Lab, Plastique Animée, Improvisation for Singers, Music and Architecture and Cabaret. Adriana Ausch is the founder and president of the New England Dalcroze Chapter in Boston since 2011 and was the Chair of the Dalcroze Eurhythmics department at the Winchester Community Music School in Winchester, MA from 2006 until 2024. Adriana Ausch earned the MM, Certification and License in Dalcroze Eurhythmics at Longy School of Music. She completed her MM in Vocal Performance at Longy. Previously she earned an MM in architecture and was active as in architect in Romania and Germany.

Horses at the Farm
Adriana Ausch-Simmel, Author

Catalog

  • Resource ID
    2263
  • Original Date
    September 15, 2023
  • Date Added
    May 22, 2025

About

  • Category
  • Dalcroze Branch
    Eurhythmics
  • Dalcroze Teaching Techniques
    Association, Quick Reaction: Aural/Musical, Relationships of Time, Space, and Energy
  • Music Topics
    Beat–Division–Multiple
  • Movement Topics
    Gallop, Jump, March, Run, Skip
  • Specialties
    K-12 Music Education

Community & Access

  • This is a free resource available to all.
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About the Author(s)

Author

Adriana Ausch-Simmel

Adriana Ausch enjoys a career as a singer and Dalcroze Eurhythmics teaching artist. As cross-style singer she has performed solo and chamber programs and presented Dalcroze workshops in Boston, New York, Toronto, Hangzhou (China) and Bucharest (Romania).  She currently teaches as Dalcroze Eurhythmics faculty at Longy S…
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