Lana’s Blog

I have had such fun with my Theatre Class recently. We have created a process for our performance. Who knows how long or short it will be? The group agreed that we should include a ladder on which to hang relevant words, an oversized top hat from which to extract words and a large book from which we will include names of members of the audience . When instructed,the audience members who are named will collect a word from the hat and then give the word to a puppet who will stick the word onto a specified point on the ladder. Slowly the words will form a sentence.

As the words are drawn out of the oversized hat, the relevant piece is performed.  We do not know the oder of the performance as it will be determined by the word from the hat. The class has worked out which word connects with each piece we have improvised. Our task now is to turn ten improvised pieces into rehearsed works of worth.

The students worked on their set pieces today and will complete them tomorrow, which leaves us 2 double lessons to rehearse and finalise our performance work.  Then we’ll blog. I am always interested in how students will problem solve when creating oversized set pieces. They are always happiest when painting, phoning spotlight to research where we can purchase dye, creating props, and causing general havoc.

I am extremely comfortable with the variety of pieces which have been chosen and the way in which the group is performing.

The history of this group is that at the end of 2005 three local schools amalgamated to produce 2 schools. One is a Senior Secondary College for students from Years 10 - 12 and the other is a Middle Years School for Years 7-9 on two campuses. This meant that the kids in my Theatre class have not grown up together at school but are from 3 different schools.  Walking into my Year 11 Theatre class this is not evident. I am very happy with the way the group includes each member of the class and respects eachothers differences.  There is a healthy sense of belonging and wellbeing.  I hope this continues as we add students next semester.  Five lessons left…….

Lana

I have written many times and never been able to create a blog that “works”.  Hopefully I have now been taught successfully by my students…namely Sunny!!!

Jade and Seraya just taught me that I need to copy my blog before I post it..in case I get lost in the ether like Braidee. I’m on a huge learning curve.

 There is much confusion about this project. I think that when we are in class doing the work it makes sense to the students, yet when we have our single lesson on a Friday period 5 I am against….Friday afternoons, the impending weekend, lethargy, students perceptions that some other blogs seem to be focussed on feelings rather than work and confusion with the task of “blogging”.  This is not quite what I expected.  I am also not sure what I expected.

Our Process so far……

*  I gave the students the line “planting the seeds…with our thoughts we make the world”.

* The students sat together in samll groups and brainstormeed using a lotus diagram which I collected and will use their ideas as springboards and stimulii in forthcoming lessons.

* I asked the students to close their eyes and imagine the opening image of their ‘performance’ which we shared.

* They then had to imangine the closing image, which they shared.

* We then created short pieces which we performed to eachother after a short period of development which included a beginning image an ending image and building the middle.

* When we saw each piece we discussed what elements we would like to keep that had potential and could be developed further. Of course a list was kept and became part of our resource file.

* Next lesson I played Bach’s “Air on a G String” and the student lay down and listened, went to sleep or imagined lots of stuff.  They were then asked to communicate their ideas to another person through movement and sound only.  Some of the best work happens when words are not used. The students then joined ideas and choreographed pieces which they performed to the music.  Again we shared ideas, useful moments and kept a list of things which can be explored further.

* I gave the class the word “UBUNTU - A person is a person through other persons; I am because we are.”  I discovered this at a Professional Development about community. It complements our seeds growing.

It’s interesting that the kids are now a little bit antsy about what their performance may look like. Some folk are doing Drama Ensembles, Music Performances and have outside committments with work and Fruit Fly. So whatever we do it needs to be doable.  I don’t know what it will look like, but I do know that there is heaps of talent and ideas in this room and that this is supposed to be FUN.

I’m looking forward to the next session. 10 lessons to go.

Lana