Thursday February 23rd 2012

Today’s Quote:  “Drama is a rehearsal for life”- Walt Disney

1)We again touched on Johnothon Needland.  “From Players to Peepshow” handout.

 

2)We address readers theatre.  We had told Phil that Ana Santos had briefly touched on Readers Theatre with us in our Language and Literacy class last semester, so the concept of it wasn’t new to us.  We were given many scripts by Ana, however, these scripts were very long.

Phil gave us a Readers theatre script labeled “McDonalds Oppressed Readers Theatre”.  I like how Phil covered the entry and exit of the readers theatre.  It’s important to define clear entry and exit procedures when asking students to be on stage.  Off stage ( I say off stage, however I do recognize that drama can be anywhere not necessarily on an actual stage) have selected student hold scripts under their left arm.  They will march onto stage, face the audience and commence.  Once finished students could bow and in a single file march off stage.

The topic of child labor was really different for me.  I never realized how much and how powerful drama could be.  There is definite room to go too far with certain grades, but this will be up to us to choose the appropriate subject based on student ages.

I would like to see some scripts for readers theatre for the younger ages, say grades 2 and 3.

We were also given another readers theatre handout “minutes of the evidence taken before the committee on the factories bill” (1832).  This script was used again to highlight the subject of child labor.

I really like the chamber theater idea.  It’s a takeoff of Readers theatre, however, instead of standing still the entire time everyone is encouraged to partake.  This readers theatre has motion.  We were given two scripts for a demonstration.  Both scripts were of the Wizard of Oz, however were tailored down to a three minute version and a one minute version.

At first we were all given roles as per the script.  Groups of us were assigned as munchkins for instance, two people were picked to be in a row boat for the tornado scene and of course all the main characters were assigned including little Todo.

We ran through the script acting out and providing soundscapes for each scene.  The first run through ran pretty slow, however the second time around everyone had a general idea of what was going on and coming next so it was a little closer to three minutes.  I really wondered how this could be accomplished.  Such a long movie and for us to do it in three minutes really? It went well.  I will definitely use the Chamber theatre idea in my instruction.

For the one minute version we again ran through it a bit slower first run around, and second time around aimed for the one minute mark.

What I really like about this activity is everyone pretty much gets involved.  As everyone can potentially be acting or making sounds at the same time it may look to a passerby like pure mayhem, but that’s ok.

I love how Phil brings in books for a draw.  This week he brought in a Grammy Awards questionnaire instead.  We were given about 10 questions regarding who we thought would win from a bunch of the categories up for nominations.  We were given the website in which to check out all the nominees.  I of course, forgot to bring mine to class and have since lost it.  As I haven’t watched many movies in the past two years I found myself saying, What? Who?  Didn’t know there was such a movie/person!  I brought the list to work just to see how what would end up on my sheet.  I was surprised that it actually got filled up.  Too bad I lost it.

Until next week

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