Day #7: Finishing Up The Talent Contests and Introducing Scripted Scenes with Partners

On Tuesday 1/26, we started off right with two warm-ups. We repeated the "Shake Down" exercise, mainly because the 5th grade class had not had chance to do it yet, since they were at an assembly on the day I introduced it, and we had to shorten their lesson. Again, the "Shake Down" is counting 1-8, shaking the right arm (shaking once for each number counted) and repeating this with the left arm, then the right leg and then finally the left leg. Then we repeat these steps but only count from 1-7, getting smaller for each round.

Then I introduced the warm-up exercise called "Zip, Zap, Zop". This is a very popular activity in theatre because it helps the students focus, get energized, make eye contact, and synergize with one another. Everyone stands up in a circle and faces inward, just like at the start of "Pass the Clap". Then the person who is chosen to start puts their hands together and sharply points one hand in the direction of another person in the circle (as shown here) and says, "Zip!" That person then does the same thing by pointing to someone else and saying,"Zap!" Then that person does the same thing by pointing to someone else and saying, "Zop!" Then it starts all over, one person at a time, Zip, Zap, Zop, Zip, Zap, Zop, etc. You are out if you say the wrong word or get off the rhythm. (We did not play with the students getting out since they were just learning how to play.) Also, since each class I teach at South Jordan Elementary is 28 students, I taught them how to do the exercise in one big group and we had about 6 people demonstrate, and then I split the circle in half to make two circles and had them start over. Making the groups smaller gives more people a chance and makes it easier to make eye contact and identify if you are being pointed at.

Theatre Vocabulary of the Day: Director, Stage Manager, Actor

Since we have mostly been acting and writing scenes in class, I felt it was a good time to start talking about the other types of jobs people can have in theatre. This is especially important to introduce because some students like theatre but do not like to act; it is good for them to know they can all have very important roles in the theater without being the center stage star every time.

The 3 most obvious roles at this point (minus playwright, which they have all done in some fashion at this point) are the director, stage manager and actor. Theatre simply dos not come together without someone to lead it, someone to organize it, and someone to be IN it. :) These were also very familiar terms to the students. 

 The director is in charge of casting the show, blocking the show (deciding where the actors move) and finalizing all the design elements (hair, make-up, lights, sound, set, etc.) They don't necessarily DO all of those design elements, but they get to decide what stays and what goes. The assistant director assists in this process and can stand in for the director if needed.

The stage manager is the organizational one. They write down all of the blocking, collect contact information, contact the cast, send out rehearsal reports to the production team after each rehearsal, take notes and give cues for all the production elements when the show opens. They make sure everything is ready to go at the top of the show because once a show opens, the director's job is technically done, and the stage manager is now completely in charge of everyone and everything. They instruct the stage hands as to what to do next (what set pieces to bring on or off), and the assistant stage manager (ASM) helps the stage manager out, since together they manage a lot of people.

 The actor performs in the play in various characters. A lead actor plays a main character. A supporting actor acts in a character that supports the lead actor. They are not quite a main character, but a side-kick kind of character that are crucial to the story. The ensemble (which means "together" in French) are the extras, the background characters, such as the chorus in a musical. The understudy fills in for another actor when he or she is sick. A swing actor understudies many roles, ready to swing into action in whatever part is needed on that night.

ACTIVITY: TALENT CONTEST (PT. 2)

Today we finished our talent contest scenes from last time. The 4th graders performed all 7 of their scenes and the 5th graders performed 3 last time, so we watched the final 4 scenes. Here are some images of the exciting scenes, sitting in the theatre in the round formation!

Doing a running contest while the host observes from behind the music stand.

Trying to lift a hippopotamus over her head! The kids noticed how red her face got.
That's called good acting!

Doing host and contestant introductions, using the marker as a microphone.
Her character was a sassy baby!

This group had 5 members so they had two co-hosts! Smart idea!
And it worked out really nicely.

This was one of my favorites: having a scaring contest, seeing how badly they
can scare a random audience member! I love audience participation!

This accompanies the last picture, where the host would pick an audience member
to be scared by a contestant. I loved their enthusiasm and willingness to participate.
Even though on this day, we went 30 minutes over our allowed lesson time,
Mrs. Bailey allowed them to continue to perform until all the scenes were finished
because of how engaged the students were. This made me smile!

This as another baby character, sitting in front of the host.
She had just juggled and is looking up to see the pieces fall down on her!
That was super clever. I think she was juggling pizzas.

This was some sort of race, with contestants ending up in all kinds of positions.
These students LOVE to make themselves crash or lay on the ground to indicate
that they lost that round. They have SO much energy!

Lexi loves pretending to be a baby in her scene and making
her character seem confused and constantly distracted by
the reactions of the audience! It's hilarious.

These contestants excitedly wait their turn to do their racing talent.
This photo demonstrates how they used the entire room to perform:
from the whiteboard to the sink and cabinets on the other side
(shown here), with the students sitting on the outside of this playing space.
They all really LOVE this staging formation a lot!

Activity: Scripted Scenes with Partners 

For the 3 groups in Mrs. Ormsby's 5th grade class that performed their talent contest skits during the last class (featured on blog entry #6), I gave them scripted scenes from this book: Acting Scenes & Monologues For Kids by Bo Kane. I already owned a lot of acting books but the scenes are for middle schoolers to adult age, and I really struggled to find short scenes for this age group.

Thus I highly recommend this book because the scenes are only 2 pages long and they are for only 2 actors, and the material specifically relates to their interests and experience. We only had time at the end for 2 partnerships to perform their scenes, but we will have everyone act out a scene next time. These books are helpful introductions into how to read a script and following stage directions.

Garrett and Wesley act out the scene "It's Gonna Explode!",
doing a school science experiment all wrong!

Again, they love throwing themselves on the ground.
As you can tell, their chemistry experiment did
indeed lead to a dramatic explosion.

This scene was super clever. These two girls put their scripts in their chairs
to make a classroom setting and pretended that the music stand
was the teacher. They even put a note on it that said "Mrs. Cupcake."
This scene is called "Pants on Fire" and it is about learning to tell the
truth when you break something, and not lying about it.

Next time, the students will all get scripts and we will act out their short 2-person scenes. Then we will begin to put together their final project, which will be performed for other classes in the school. We are still brainstorming as to what it will be, but most likely it will be small scenes under a similar theme such as Fractured Fairytales. I predict I will give them a lecture on the elements of fairy tales, which I just gave at another school where I teach 4th and 5th grade theatre. So look forward to that! See ya!