I've been teaching a unit on Maori music in my 2nd grade general music class for years, and poi was something I started briefly mentioning a few years ago but didn't spend a lot of time on. This past year I put a lot more focus on it because my students were moving quickly through the curriculum, and I don't think I will ever go back! Here are some resources and lesson ideas for incorporating poi in your elementary music curriculum.
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First, I think it's important to contextualize poi for your students, especially if you are, like me, not Maori. Poi is a traditional dance from Maori culture that has since been taken around the world and adapted to different tools. This video gives an overview of the history and origins of poi, and this video shows Maori people explaining the significance of poi in their own words (this one would be good to show students). Some students may be familiar with things like fire poi or glow poi, which are different from traditional Maori poi in the tools and the movements they use- those can be a good connection point but it's also good to show what Maori poi specifically is like both in the past and today. I show a series of videos (over the course of the unit) that show traditional poi and how poi continues to be a significant part of Maori and New Zealand culture today, in this order:
In terms of actual poi for students to use, there are a lot of options. For a long time if I did have students try it out I just used the movement scarves I already had to let students practice the moves without needing to prepare any new equipment, and that worked fine for a quick activity or two, so you can always start there (making sure students are seeing what actual poi are like and explaining that we're just using the scarves to practice the moves). I know many people have also used knee-high socks with a tennis ball, or anything soft balled up really, in the foot. If you have a lot of socks you can get somewhere for free or cheap then this could be a good step up so kids can actually experience a little more closely the feeling of swinging something with a ball on the end that they can use to tap rhythms etc. I found that when I actually went to look at buying a bunch of socks in bulk to make a "cheap version" to use as poi, they were in fact not that cheap (to get a whole class set)! So I went the route that many who are actually learning poi use and made them out of rope.
I wanted to make my poi in the colors of my color teams (if you know me you are not surprised) so I got all 6 colors of this rope. It was cheap and it worked really well, and so far has held up great, so I recommend it! Making a knot in the rope to create your own poi seems intimidating at first (or at least it was to me) but after watching lots of videos I got the hang of it and then I was able to bang out 60 poi pretty quickly while I mindlessly watched a movie. Here's a demonstration of how I made mine, but you can also look it up online like I did and find plenty of tutorials:
In terms of activities, there are lots of great resources out there to choose from depending on your curricular goals/ the concepts you want to teach. Poi are a great way to teach and practice steady beat, quarter and half notes, whole notes, duple meter (you can pair this with tititorea, like I did, which is traditionally in triple meter- see this post), or even high and low by having students move their poi high and low to match a melody.
I incorporated poi with the Maori lullaby "Hine E Hine" because I wanted students to learn this song, which is one of the more famous Maori songs in New Zealand, and also to use it to have students begin to experience whole notes. Although this is not traditionally a poi song specifically, after we learned the song it was a great way to do some slow basic poi moves, criss-crossing across the body, spinning above their heads, and on each side, to practice the moves while also getting the feeling of the long notes. This was a great way to introduce notes longer than half notes and get students to physically demonstrate and experience them.
For actually learning some basic poi moves and focusing more on the poi, the traditional Maori poi song "E Rere Taku Poi" is perfect. This video has children of different ages demonstrating the moves with Maori singers demonstrating the song- I just had students follow along with the video to learn the moves and after a few tries most of them were able to do it!
Another great way to practice some basic moves in a fun way that is a little more challenging is with this "Spin Your Poi" song. I would not do with in the beginning, but I used this at the end of the unit to challenge the students who were getting it more quickly and do something more high energy with them:
Those are all the Maori poi lesson activities and resources I used. I hope this is helpful for you as you consider incorporating poi into your elementary music classroom- they are so much fun for the middle grades and a wonderful tool for experiencing rhythm, beat, and meter concepts especially, and of course a great addition to a unit on Maori or Polynesian music and culture. If you want to see all of the other lesson activities and resources I use to teach Maori music, you'll find those in this blog post, where you'll also find links to all of the other cultures I teach as units in my elementary general music curriculum.
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