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Teaching artist Alex Gossen introduces the fundamentals of breaking and equips students with a few basic steps they can use to groove to their favorite music.

Vocabulary You Will Learn:

• Breaking—An energetic style of dance typically performed to hip-hop music, characterized by and or athletic movements. It originated among African American and Latino people in New York City during the 1970s.
• Groove—A rhythmic, repetitive movement done on the beat of the music. Also meaning: to have fun! 
• Accent—To emphasize movement in dance.

Materials You Will Need:

• Nothing—just yourself!

How to Create Your Own Breakdance 

1. First, bend and straighten your knees so that your body is bouncing up and down in time with the music. If this doesn’t work for you, you can try moving your shoulders up and down, your chest forward and back, or your head from side to side. You can experiment with making the movements bigger or smaller as you groove.
2. Now it’s time to accent, or emphasize, your movement. Decide whether you want to accent down, so your knees are bent on the beat of the music, or up, so your knees are straight on the beat. Whatever you choose, that’s the position you want to be in when the beat of the music hits. 

3. Next, add some flavor to your groove! You can do this by moving different body parts as you groove. You can try shimmying your shoulders, circling your chest, bobbing your head from side to side, or moving your feet in a simple step-touch movement. 
4. Whatever you do, focus on just moving to the music and having fun!

In this video, Alex teaches us the basics of breakdancing and shows us some steps so we can groove to the music. If you want to go even further, think about these questions: 

• How does the dance change if you try a different movement to start with—if, instead of bouncing on your legs, you bob your head or move your shoulders up and down? Do you find using a different move makes it harder or easier to stay on the beat? Does it change the way the groove feels in your body?
• What about if you add some different accents to the dance? If you bobbed your head, maybe try shimmying your shoulders or moving your feet. Do any of these change how the groove feels to you?
• You can experiment with extending the dance and adding one of the other moves Alex taught to the end of the groove you’ve already created, or even adding your own movements. How does the dance look and feel when you’ve added another move? How does it feel to move from one groove to the next as you build on the dance?
• At the beginning of the video, Alex talks about how he had trouble fitting in as a kid, but when he started breaking, he found his passion and a community of others who loved the same thing he did. Is there anything in your life that has helped you find a community of like-minded people? Do you have a passion, artistic or otherwise, that has given you a sense of belonging?

Accessibility

Don’t forget that you can turn on “Closed Captioning” to view the YouTube video with English captions.

More about the Teaching Artist

Alex Gossen (he/him) is a dancer and teaching artist based in Brooklyn, New York. He has taught students of all ages in a range of settings from school classes to community dance sessions to cyphers. His goal is to teach people to be more in touch with their feelings and find ways to connect with the people around them.

Kennedy Center Education Digital Learning

Eric Friedman 
Director, Digital Learning

Kenny Neal 
Manager, Digital Education Resources

Tiffany A. Bryant 
Manager, Operations and Audience Engagement

JoDee Scissors 
Content Specialist, Digital Learning

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Gifts and grants to educational programs at the Kennedy Center are provided by The Paul M. Angell Family Foundation; Bank of America; Capital One; The Morris and Gwendolyn Cafritz Foundation; Carnegie Corporation of New York; The Ednah Root Foundation; Harman Family Foundation; William R. Kenan, Jr. Charitable Trust; the Kimsey Endowment; The Kiplinger Foundation; Laird Norton Family Foundation; Lois and Richard England Family Foundation; Dr. Gary Mather and Ms. Christina Co Mather; The Markow Totevy Foundation; Dr. Gerald and Paula McNichols Foundation; The Morningstar Foundation; Myra and Leura Younker Endowment Fund; The Irene Pollin Audience Development and Community Engagement Initiatives;

Prince Charitable Trusts; Dr. Deborah Rose and Dr. Jan A. J. Stolwijk; Rosemary Kennedy Education Fund; The Embassy of the United Arab Emirates; The Victory Foundation; The Volgenau Foundation; Volkswagen Group of America; Jackie Washington; GRoW @ Annenberg and Gregory Annenberg Weingarten and Family; Wells Fargo; and generous contributors to the Abe Fortas Memorial Fund and by a major gift to the fund from the late Carolyn E. Agger, widow of Abe Fortas. Additional support is provided by the National Committee for the Performing Arts..

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