Scripting Word Problems

Combining Theatre, Wrtiting and Math into one awesome lesson.

Math, my least favorite subject. I do not like math, when we had to take math in college I literally took a class that was nicknamed among the Fine Arts students as "math for actors and their goldfish." I do not like math, but I realize that I and my students need to be exposed to more math. So I am trying to step outside my comfort zone for some of my assignments this year.

Students love turning Math word problems into scripts. 

Last week my third grade students were working on elements in a script. They learned the parts of a script and how to compose simple scenes. Then it came time for the closing assignment. Students had to form groups of three and write a script. Typically I just let students pick their topics, but as I said I'm trying to push myself this year. So I walked myself down to the math teacher to see what they ere studying in math. Turns out in math my students were studying two things (oh good more challenge!) 

The students were studying 100s grouping and greater than less than. So when we set about creating our scripts they had a choice in topics.

Here is how I organized this lesson. I am including my instructions and one of my student's scripts. I will also link to my TPT store for the rubric download for acting and rehearsing.

Basic Theatre Rubrics

1. Choose a standard- students needed to choose what type of math problem they wanted to solve.

2. Write your numerical math expression- I am not sure if this is the correct terminology but basically have your students write and solve the math problem they want to tell a story about (7 groups of 100=700 or 27>25). If you want to control how hard a problem you give, you could also assign them a problem from a textbook or worksheet.

3. Brianstorm your story- this is where we start integrating in story elements students had to write out their characters, setting, and conflict. Beginning, middle, end, etc

4. Rough draft of script- have students write out their script. To help ease problems I make sure to tell them that each student is responsible for writing their own lines. Helps stop a lot of fights.

5. Check your math- this is a very important step that I skipped when I first was assigning this problem. Students sometimes get so excited writing their script, that their math goes wonky. 1,200 becomes 12000 or something else. Just make sure they go back and double check the math.

6. Rehearse the play- remind students about finding entrances and exits and useing levels to create stage pictures.

7. Perform the play- let students perform the plays and have the audience solve the math problems. 

I love how they use stage directions and that one of the characters makes a mistake in the math. These scripts don't have to be long, they just need to solve the problem!

Well this is my idea for math word problem scripts. I love that this assignment integrates math, writing and theatre. It was a great way to get some cross curricular lessons for my kids. I hope you will give them a try! Let me know if they worked out for you! What math problems did your kids solve?

10 Ways to Foster Creativity in the Classroom part 1

Testing season is upon us which means more stress and less time to post. It also means kids are flopping under the weight of standardized tests. I always feel so bad for my students during this time of year, all the students have to sit still and quiet for hours on end bubbling in these bubble, worrying about if they are choosing the exactly right answer. It is enough to squash anyone's creativity. So to counteract all the b-o-r-i-n-g I have come up with 10 ways to help foster creativity in your classroom and get kids excited about learning during this very boring time.
I am breaking this post into two parts to last the two weeks of testing. Enjoy the first 5 ways to foster creativity and then tune in next week for part two!

Create a safe environment

The first thing you must do foster creativity is to create a safe environment. Students will not be willing to express themselves if they are worried about being made fun of laughed at. They need to feel very very safe in order to be creative. 

-teach good audience behavior

 If you are doing any in class performances you must teach audience behavior. Everyone knows how scary it is to get up in front of people. If those people are your friends, and they are not being respectful, learning shuts down completely. I plan on writing a whole post about teaching audience behavior but for now I will just say this. Students should be seated, still, quiet, and always applaud afterwards. No talking and No teasing are musts!

-do not allow rude behavior

If students are rude to each other they will not be creative. If students are worried about being made fun of they will not be willing to try new things. Shut down rude behavior quickly and effectively at the beginning of the year. In my class rudeness (including boo-ing is automatic time out). Typically it only takes one or two examples for a class to get the picture that rudeness will not be tolerated.

-no sarcasm

This is directed primarily at teachers! I know that I can be guilty of it sometimes. When we interact with our friends we use sarcasm. Sometimes that sarcasm can leak out into our classroom. Unfortunately students do not understand sarcasm.  Try not to use sarcasm with your students. They take it as you being mean and it can make them afraid to try new things.

No wrong ideas

-try to make all reasonable suggestions work

At the beginning students will give probably weak answers. Accept and encourage students. They are trying out to see if answering is safe. If you automatically shut down an answer because it isn't that creative or its a little silly, kids wont try again.  Accept and encourage all responses.

-encourage students to go farther

We play a ton of creativity games in my class. During these games students are encouraged to push the boundaries of creativity. Once kids get used to being creative encourage them to go farther. Don't just accept the first answer, have them try again. You can check out a few great creativity games here. I love the silly statues!

Don't give an example/answer

- set the ground rules then step back

One of the hardest things that I struggle with as a teacher is letting go of control. However, if we want our students to become more creative they have to have control of their learning. When you are ready for your students to get really creative, give them an assignment, tell them the rules and then step back and let them work it out for themselves. Don't explain every detail of the project. It is ok if doesn't turn out exactly like you plan. This happens a lot to me when we do improvisation. Students know the basic rules but they are free to create within the rules. I can promise you that the way I think an improv will turn out is almost never what actually happens and that's ok!

- don't give the exact same supplies and materials to everyone. 0ffer some choice

This suggestion will lead to some amazing projects. I do this when we create our puppets and make up designs in class. Every student gets the same basic supplies but the specifics are up to the individual. When creating our puppets students first must create an original character, after they have a character they have a huge variety of supplies to choose from. Then end results turn out spectacular. 

As you can see from the picture, the puppets are all the same but each child got a ton of choice in the actual creation. Check out how to create these puppets here!

Offer problems that have multiple solutions

When creating projects, allows for students to have multiple solutions. Try not to have only one right answer. One of my favorite projects is go divide students into groups and allow them each to block the same scene.  When then get together and talk about how everyone had different interpretations of how to present a scene and why each idea was valid. Helping the students get comfortable not "Copying" off of each other is a huge struggle. Encourage and praise students who find new and different solutions to the project. If you want to start encouraging students to find multiple solutions, give them an adaptation of the  circle test from the torrents gifted test. In this test students are given a page of circles and told them to turn it into something. Having students find as many different solutions as possible will really help stretch their creativity. The game "What could it be" Is great for this!

Let the groups struggle

Group work allows students to be more creative then you ever thought possible. When you set up group assignments make sure that you give very specific guidelines and rules. You want to eliminate arguments about procedural items.  Once the groups get started try not to settle arguments regarding the creation or implementation of the project (obviously settle any disagreements regarding rule breaking or meanness). Encourage students to compromise (I hate the complaint- "They are doing my idea" ). Having students find a way to incorporate all ideas will help foster creativity. 

Well I hope you enjoyed part one of my 10 ways to foster creativity. Make sure you stop by next week for my last five ideas! What are some ways you use to foster creativity? Leave me a comment and maybe you will see your idea on the next post!

Using Reader's Theatre to Increase Students' Creativity and Inference Skills

I love Reader's Theater. When I am looking for a short play for my class to perform. I often will choose a royalty free reader's theatre piece. For those who don't know Reader's Theater is a great addition to any classroom. It is a great way to engage the students and have them increase their reading fluency and creativity at the same time. Reader’s Theatre can be as simple or as complex as you want. Students can read from their chairs or create a full production. 

Reasons I love Reader's Theater

1. Easily engages all students- most students will pay more attention if they know they must speak at a certain time.
2. Easily differentiates for  different learning styles/levels- the same script can have advanced parts and easier parts so that all students feel successful.
3.  Easy group work- My favorite scripts are ones that have 4-6 characters. You can easily divide up your groups into different plays and have heterogeneous mixture of ability levels and all engaged.
4. Easy whole group instruction- Most plays can either be adapted to fit a whole group or just naturally come with enough parts for everyone in class. This way you can easily assess all student's level of engagement and understanding of a topic. 
5. Increased reading fluency-To be able to perform a play students must practice and rehearse. RT forces students to read their material multiple times. The more often they read a script the more often they see words, the better they will become at reading. 
6. Increases inference ability- Scripts very rarely state things explicitly, instead students must learn to infer emotions, costumes, feeling, props and all other aspects of the story based on simply dialog. Students who become proficient at RT become great investigators who are able to easily infer meaning from texts. 

Hopefully I have convinced you to give Reader's Theatre a try. If you are always using Reader's Theater in your classroom, read on to see how you can use RT to increase student's inference skills.

Character Analysis

Have students create a character analysis of their character. This is a great time to talk about internal vs external traits. I often like to have the students draw a picture of what they think the character's external traits are, then answer some questions on their internal traits. Be very careful not to let any students "off the hook" about character analysis. There are character choices you can make about even the smallest of characters.  You will often things like "my character only has one line I dont know anything about him" Have the student analyze what the character said, where the character lives, how old the character is etc. If they cannot find explicitly in the play an answer, have them make an educated guess then back up their reasoning "I think this character is 27 because they have one small kid". I would also warn you to be aware of the narrator trap. Most RT scripts contain a narrator. You can still do character analysis on a narrator. Look at if the narrator is biased, how intelligent the narrator is, if the narrator enjoys telling the story etc. 

Technical Analysis

Technical elements of theatre include the props, costumes, sound, lighting, and sets used in a production. Often times a playwright does not explicitly say what these elements look like. While they might give suggestions, "this play is set in a one room school house" they often leave the logistics up to the director (how many chairs you want, if you need a blackboard, etc). Allowing students to begin designing the technical elements for a reader's theatre production forces students to use their inference and reasoning skills. For example we recently completed a RT about Tall Tales from the Wild West. In the play John Henry, Pecos Bill, Sally Ann Thunder, Annie Oakley and Paul Bunion all get together to swap stories. Students had to infer the setting (a campfire) the time of day (night) and the costumes. Students did research of the costumes their characters might wear by looking up information on their character. They had to design a nighttime campfire scene to set the play in. We discussed how to make the room look dark without completely turning off all lights because the audience had to see them. They choose to use blue and purple lights to give the effect. Having students create a technical analysis of a play is a great way to build inference and creativity. Keep in mind students can simply propose ideas if you do not have the time/money to actually create props and costumes.

Program Design

Program design is a great way to engage and asses your more visual learners. If you have students who love to draw and create this part of the project is perfect for them. Students create a four page program (front cover) cast list, play synopsis, and back advertisement.  The cover must include the Title, Playwright, and Performance time/place. It also must include a picture that captures the essence of the play and makes people want to see it. Students then write up the cast list and a play summary. The summary is obviously a great way to check for understanding of the key plot points. On the back cover of the program I let students design an add for an upcoming performance. If you aren't holding any more performances let them create an add for a play they would love to perform. Once again this can either be a simple classroom assignment that all students complete, or you can have students design your actual programs for the performance.

Ticket Design/ Poster Design

Another great way to engage students in RT is to allow them to create the posters and tickets for the performance. If you want this to be a classroom assignment you can but I would encourage you to perform the play for someone (even if it is just another class that wants to come watch). Students can create posters and actually hang them up around school to advertise their show. They can also take posters home to parents to display on the fridge. Tickets are another great design piece. If you decide to do this production for parents, letting the students take handmade tickets home to give to parents, then collecting those tickets at the door, really adds a since of flair to the productions. Students get a huge kick out of putting on "a real performance" with tickets. As with the program design students must use their inference skills to find an important scene to display. They need to find a scene that is engaging and important but doesn't give to much away. They need to be able to infer what will make the audience come and see the production.

Reader's Theatre Unit

I love Reader's Theatre. If you are interested in using RT in your classroom, make sure you check out my Reader's Theatre Unit on teacherspayteachers. It has worksheets for all the items discussed in this post. It is a great packet to use with any RT production you might choose. If you need any help coming up with ideas of how to run RT in your class or simply need ideas of plays that might work for you feel free to contact me or leave me a comment. I am always willing to help fellow teachers who are trying out a play!

Have you ever use reader's theatre in your class? What were the difficulties? Did you find that RT engaged your students?

Using Greek Togas to Prepare for the Theatre SLO

This year I have had to start giving the dreaded SLO's (nicknamed slows in our school). For those who haven't experienced an SLO yet let me give you a rundown. A SLO stands for Student Learning Objective. They are basically tests for the classes that aren't typically given state tests. Students are given a pre-test at the beginning of the year and then are expected to grow X % amount by the end. In my county these tests are all multiple choice. That means that students have to show growth not by their acting but by text analysis and their ability to answer questions on acting. I have mixed feelings on the SLOs which I will get into at a later date but for now I want to focus on how you engage and excite your students while covering the seemingly boring topics. I have a very very limited amount of time to get my students to show 35% growth (only 40 minutes a week = 27 hours total a year) that is a lot of growth per hour. So I try to pack a ton of punch into each lesson. For the next few weeks I am focusing on the following topics: theatre history, rehearsal process, script analysis, and character analysis. My plan is to start off with Greek theatre and then hit the highlights of other major history eras. Each week students will get a crash course in a new part of theatre history. They will learn a little about the time period then perform a scene or adaptation from the time. Hopefully threw performing in several types of plays, the students will learn a lot about the rehearsal process, script analysis and character analysis, and a little about theatre history. It is not a perfect plan but I have to work with what time I've got.

Greek History

For Greek history I had a few facts that I wanted students to know by the end of the lesson

- Greeks were the first people in western civilization to perform traditional plays

-Greeks invented the chorus. I also wanted them to be able to explain what a chorus was and how it was used by the Greeks.

-the first actor came from Greek plays- Thespis. They also made the connection of why our drama club is called the Young Thespians

-Greeks performed the plays for religious ceremonies. We also very very briefly touched on Greek Gods and Goddess, luckily they had already covered that in their ELA class.

King Midas and the Golden Touch

I lucked out something major this year with my 5th grade ELA teacher. She and I just happened to pick the same story to study in both of our classes. This doesn't happen very often but when it does it sure makes life easier. I am trying to be much more organized and actually plan out these happy coincidences but it is a slow process. She had previously taught King Midas and the Golden Touch, I just so happened to have a wonderful Readers Theatre adaptation of the same story, so my script analysis portion took very little time for this play.

Since the students had already read the story and new the basic plot we could move right into our rehearsal block. I cast the play being very mindful to cast people who weren't often my leads as main characters. This was a great way to force my tech students out of their shell. We rehearsed the play being very mindful of blocking and characterization for this play. After we had rehearsed the play twice (this play really only lasts about 4 minutes so it was great for my time frame), we took a break to discuss the characters. We also talked about the differences between the short story they read in class and our play. 

Then it was time to have fun, I had put on a Greek play a few years ago, so I had already purchased a ton of white bed sheets. If you don't have any, run to goodwill and get some. You will use them all the time. I gave each kid a sheet and taught them how to wrap a toga. The kids loved putting on costumes for the play. After they were dressed it was time for the Final Performance. Students were graded on their ability to follow the correct blocking, project their voice, act in character and follow the script. The students had a wonderful time and learned a ton. I am hoping that if I keep this same format up for several weeks they might just learn a thing or to?

SLO breakdown

For my SLO students must know the following information.

-Order of rehearsal process (audition, casting, read through, blocking, finishing rehearsal, final dress, performance). With this assignment the students were able to experience casting, read through, blocking, finishing and a final dress/performance).

- Character analysis: Use history to create character- This one is obvious, we talked about Greek performances and choruses then performed one.

-Character analysis: Internal/ External traits based on text- Each student had to describe their character and use the text to prove it. Being able to use textual support is a huge push on our new Common Core so my ELA teacher had already been covering this in class. The kids were great at reading the lines and proving their character choices "My character is a young girl because in the script she says "Daddy play with me" and that tells me she is still young enough to want to play with her parents"

-Acting/ Rehearsal: Blocking- I had students talk about stage pictures and how you avoid lines. We also talked about how since King Midas was the lead he would often be at the top of our "triangle"

-Theatre History: Students learned a ton about Greek history in this lesson. They were even able to give me the highlights in our exit slips!

-Technical Theatre: Costumes- Students learned how to create a toga, while creating a toga isn't necessarily on the SLO it is always great to remind students about "historically accurate"  costuming. I know these togas aren't actually historically accurate but we were working with the time and money we had. :)

How do you all teach theatre history? Have you found Readers Theatre to be a great way to engage your students in reading and text analysis?

3 Free Theatre Arts Integration Strategies that Work

My school is great! My principal has really embraced the idea of arts integration throughout our entire building. She really wants to make sure that all teachers have the tools they need to be able to integrate the fine arts into the core Curriculum. She has even brought in professional artists in each area to give professional development. It's great. What's not so great, the advice i always hear from the theatre pd. For some reason every professional development i attend that talks about integrating theatre into classroom falls back on one vocab word: tableaux.

I hate tableaux! There I said it. For those that don't know a tableaux is a frozen stage picture. Students can create a picture of anything, a scene from a play, the food chain, a land-form, a story, a moment in history. It's all very helpful, but I am one of the few theatre teachers who cannot stand tableaux. I realize that if you are a core teacher, making the kids freeze is a lot less scary then letting them move. But really isn't moving part of the fun?

Since I hate tableaux so much, it makes me so sad to see professional development that only encourages teachers to have the students freeze. I decided I had to do something about it. So I now present to you: 

3 Theatre Arts Integration Strategies that Work

Story Time Freeze

This is for the teacher that loves tableaux, who is scared to let the students move much. Every story has a beginning, middle, and end. Whether that story is a moment in History or the food chain. Have students create a frozen picture of the beginning middle and end of their story. This not only gets students thinking about the order of a story but also has them work on transitions and how characters and things change throughout en event.

Pantomime

If you don't like noise, but don't mind a little chaos, pantomime is for you! Pantomime or mime is when you act without words. Having students try to convey a topic without using their voice takes a lot of creativity. For example, how could you act out the signing of the deceleration of independence without words, how could you show the parts of a cell and their jobs without words? This activity is great. You can always have the students explain their performance afterward (or they could write about it). I love pantomime as a well to demonstrate knowledge.

Press Conference

This is a great differentiation strategy. Choose a few of your advanced students to be your character (parts of a plant, planets, members of parliament). These students will answers all the questions in character. All of your other students will be the reporters that interview your guests. You can either have the students submit their questions or let them ad-lib their questions. Your interviewers should ask their questions. You can then have them write a newspaper article about the interview. 

Download my free lesson plan guide with more information on these strategies. Don't forget to follow my blog and TeachersPayTeachers site for more awesome freebies.

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If you liked this download (or see any issues or corrections that need to be made), please let me know. I appreciate all the support!

Students as Puppeteers, How to Make 80 Rod Puppets in a Week

I teach a lot of students. I mean I have a crazy number of students (over 500). This means that when we want to do any sort of art project I have to be able to do it for an entire grade level. This means that 80 kids need to be able to create puppets in the same week. It's a little overwhelming to say the least. For my upper grades I really try to do a meaningful puppet with them, so we create rod puppets.

I love rod puppets. They are easy to make and look great. I also like to introduce Japanese Bunraku Puppetry with this unit, even though technically Bunraku puppets are much more complex then the rod puppets we make, the students get a kick out of learning about a new culture. I use this video to introduce Japanese theatre. The link on amazon is down but you can probably find it somewhere. After the students study Bunraku we are ready to make our puppets.

Materials per puppet (buying in bulk helps save money)

12 in dowel any diameter

Masking tape

Newsprint or any scrap paper

Tissue paper or construction paper (I like tissue but construction works and is cheaper)

Googly eyes

Popsicle sticks rubber bands

Craft accessories (yarn, scrap fabric, pipe cleaners, feathers, anything you want rid of)

1 square foot of fabric (ask your parents, fabric stores or friends, there is usually someone who will donate this, I haven't bought fabric for years, if you can't get anyone to donate go to good will and buy lots of sheets, you can get plenty of colors for so much cheaper than at a fabric store)

The cost for me to do an entire grade level is relatively cheap

80 dowels -$10

Sheets - $10

Scrap paper - free

Tape - free 

Popsicle sticks 1000 count - $4

Rubber bands - free

Eye 700 count - $6

Yarn assorted -$8

Other accessories - free (scavenge your room and others, people always have stuff they are throwing out.)

Total about $40 (that's about $0.50 a student so not to shabby)

Step one.

Give each student a rod, square of fabric, tape, scrap paper, and tissue paper. 

Crumple the scrap paper into a ball and tape onto top of rod. I like to make a ball with one piece of paper, then cover it with more onto the stick until it is the size I want. Tape paper to stick head. Make sure some paper is actually taped to the stick.

Step two.

Once you have a big head (haha) add tissue paper to give you puppet a face color, tape this down.

Step three.

Cut a small hole in the middle of the fabric. Pull the fabric up over the stick and tape in place underneath. Hold puppet up. You now have the basic puppet done!

Adding arms 

If I have time on the first day we add the arms, if not wait until the end of 2nd day. Add Popsicle stick to end of fabric secure with rubber band.

Final Product.

Allow kids to decorate their puppets. To save supplies I tell the kids they can choose only 4 items. Every one chooses different supplies and their puppets are always end up being as unique as they are.

I always like to have the students perform with their puppets after they make them. This year we learned about flashback and foreshadowing. Students had to write a mini scene that represented one of those vocabulary words and perform it with the puppet. This turned out great! The students always love this project and they learn a ton about theatre!

I hope you liked this project. Let me know if you try it in your class I would love to know how it turns out.

Students as Sound Designers- A STEM to STEAM Lesson

If you are looking for a great STEAM activity, look no further than this lesson. This lesson is super cheap and great for teaching about sound waves in class. This is also a great lesson for students to explore how sound can impact a theatrical performance. Depending on your students' age and maturity, you can become very advanced with this lesson or keep it very very simple.

Prep: Download Audacity onto any computers you plan on using for this lesson. This is a free download that works on both Mac and PC. I would recommend you also downloading this to your computer as well so that you can demonstrate the sound effects creation as well. If your computer has a built in microphone you can use that for a free solution, or there are probably several sets of microphone headsets at your school that you can borrow for the purpose of your lesson. If you want to go a little more advanced and get a better quality sound you might want to consider purchasing a microphone from amazon. I got one similar to this for about $20.00 you can find them cheaper and more expensive if you are interested. For the purpose of the lesson the type of microphone doesn't matter, but if you are actually interested in creating your own sound effects for plays a good recording microphone is a must.

Begin by letting your students explore sound creation. Have them practice and create the most original sound they can come up with. I would record all the sounds onto your computer while the students watch. Audacity is great because it shows the sound waves recording in real time. Once students have recorded their first sounds, play back the track. Have the students make observations about the types of sounds they hear verses the sound waves displayed on the screen. This is the perfect opportunity to introduce sound vocabulary including Crest (peak of the wave) Trough (Bottom of the Wave), Amplitude (distance from the midline) and Wavelength (distance from one crest to the next).  Students should begin to recognize that amplitude affects the volume of the sound wavelength affects the length of time. Giving students apple opportunity to explore sound and sound waves will help students get a better opportunity of these science terms (it will also inspire lots of creativity and silliness and who doesn't love that!)

Once students have had some fun and have good handle on sound effect start having them work towards creating specific sound effects. I love to start off with the thunderstorm for the younger kids. They love snapping their finders and stomping their feet to create the rain and thunder. Older kids often get a kick out of creating haunted house sound effects. Let the students use different props and classroom items to explore how they affect the sound. Have them make predictions about what the wavelengths will look like for each sound effect.

For the final project give students a scene to read. Have the students analyze the scenes and create sound effects that will compliment the scenes. Students must create the sounds and record them on audacity. To emphasize the science component, students should then print off the wave length picture and label each sound effect. You might also want to have students draw and label all fo the parts of the sound wave as well.

I hope your students like this activity. Mine love using the computer to create and use sounds in presentations. How do you integrate Science and Theatre?

Students as Directors: Parts of the Stage

"Sweetie can you move downstage some.... No move downstage..... No move downstage ... No move towards the audience." Most school directors have had a conversation similar to this several times in the course of a rehearsal. Teaching our students common theatre lingo, especially stage directions can be a huge lifesaver in making your rehearsals run smoothly. Teaching parts of the stage is a lesson that must be taught, it becomes very frustrating to assume that students will just "pick it up." If you consciously teach this skill students will take learning this skill much more seriously. It will also help students transfer to different directors much easier.

I like to teach the parts of the stage in several different ways but first a word on consistency. When working in class, after school, or in rehearsal always use the correct stage directions. It can be very easy to get lazy about this. I know I am very guilty of this. When you are trying to hurry and a kid doesn't remember which way stage right it, you really just want to tell them which way to move. But I have seen a great improvement in my students vocabulary and stage use since I have made a very conscious effort to only use stage directions.

Different ways to teach stage directions. 

Start off by using masking or spike tape to mark off a stage. If you are lucky enough to have access to a stage mark off that, if not simply tape down a big rectangle on the floor. Divide the stage into your 9 sections. Start off by simply standing in each box, naming it and having the students do basic call outs. Once they seem to have a basic understanding of the parts of the stage you can start to have some fun.

Simon Says

Put some kids on stage. Depending on your area you can either put the whole class, a 1/2 class or small group. Have everyone choose their own starting place. Start off easy. "Simon says move up stage" "Simon says move stage right" Any student who does not move to the correct place in the correct time frame is out. I like to give the kids 5 seconds to get to the correct side of the stage. Counting down on your fingers works really well as a management technique. After you have done a few easy directions to get the kids use to the stage get slightly more difficult. "Simon says boys move stage right, girls move stage left" "Simon says if you are wearing pants move downstage if you are not wearing pants move upstage" however you can easily divide up the kids so they have to work harder on remembering the parts of the stage. After you have eliminated more of the kids get even more specific. "Simon says if you are wearing red move down stage left" "if you are wearing blue move upstage center." This game is a great introduction and works well with your kinesthetic learners.

Army Men (or any other small toy/figurine)

This is a great lesson for teachers that don't have the space to move around. This is also great if you like a little more control and less chaos in your class. Give each student a piece of paper and a few of the old school green army men. Have the students draw out a basic rectangle and draw stick people on one side. Then have the students label the stage according to wear the audience is. After each stage is drawn call out different stage positions and have the students place army men at the correct spot. You can even have the students practice creating stage pictures by allowing them to place several army men at once. Or you can give groups of students a large sheet of paper and have them practice placing an entire company onstage for a major musical. This game is great for your visual learners.

Stage Pictures

This is a good game for students who need some differentiation. Allow your more advanced students to be the directors to this game. Have your directors create stage pictures with different groups of students. The directors can only use stage directions to move the groups around stage. For added interest, you can add a mini lesson on levels to this game and your directors can practice using stage directions and levels to create their pictures.

Pick a direction

Give each student an index card and have students write a series of stage directions in short hand on the paper. Enter USR X DSR, Exit DSL. (enter upstage right, cross downstage right, exit downstage left). Gather all the index cards together and spot check for correctness. Then have students pick a stage direction card and act out those directions on stage. This activity is a great assessment because each card will be slightly different. Students won't be able to simply copy what someone else has done.

However you choose to teach stage directions, make sure you are consistent in using stage directions when you direct students in class and rehearsals. You should also talk to any other Fine Arts teachers at your school (especially dance and chorus teachers) and make sure that they are using stage directions in their classes as well. If everyone comes together and learns the correct theatre lingo, all of the students will benefit.

These are just a couple of ways that I have taught stage directions. What are some ideas you have for teaching stage directions in class?

Script Analysis- Dramatic Elements

Please Take Care My Dog Smells. This is the sentence I teach my kids when we begin our unit on script analysis. In my experience when a teacher says "today we are going to learn about script analysis" almost all the class shuts off. They groan and whine and complain. Lots of kids think that analyzing scripts is too hard they give up before they even try. Teaching students this silly sentence helps make script analysis easy.

Aristotle said that there are six things that make a good play. Plot, Theme, Character, Music, Dialogue, and Spectacle. Memorizing my silly sentence helps students memorize the six aspects of a good play. I have found that once they can identify the dramatic elements, they have a much easier job in analyzing the script.

I like to start and finish with plot. Most students know the basics about plot. It has a beginning middle and end. There needs to be a conflict and resolution. Most students as young as first grade are good at identifying beginning middle and end. At the beginning of the lesson this is where I start. After we cover the other dramatic elements I come back to plot and teach the plot diagram. Students learn about exposition, rising action, climax, falling action and denouement. I find that coming back to the plot diagram after you have covered the others elements allows the students more time to gain confidence in script analysis. Feel free to use my plot diagram poster that I provided. You can also download the entire packet on teacherspayteachers.

Check out my entire Plot Diagram Packet at TPT

Theme is another difficult element at first. Help the students by starting off with fairy tales and working your way to more difficult literature. Making an anchor chart of common themes also helps student gain confidence in identifying themes.

Character. This element you can go as simple or as complex as you want.  You can talk about simply identifying characters. You can talk about the difference between main and supporting characters. You can talk about dynamic and static characters. You can talk about the protagonist, antagonists, and foils. How in depth you go about characters really depends on the age and maturity of your students. My second graders have a great handle of stock characters but foils are well beyond them. Have fun with this part of your unit. In my opinion, characters are what makes theatre unique. Students of theater love studying about character, so push your students to discover all they can about characterization.

Music. According to the Greeks music encompassed sound effects, background music, and singing. Have students discuss how music enhances a play. This is also a great time to talk about how to choose background music or sound effects for a play. In my first grade theatre SLO this is a major part of the test. Students must be able to read a simple play and identify appropriate sound effects and music. 

Dialogue. This is another very easy part of the analysis to teach. Students find it easy to figure out when a character talks. I like to talk about the difference between monologue and soliloquy in this section. I also will touch on how characters talk. How they say something is just as important as what they say. Getting students to identify motivation of dialogue is very important to script analysis.

Spectacle. Spectacle rhymes with technical. Spectacle is all the other technical elements and special effects that make a play what it is. This is a great time to show several different versions of the same play and talk about how the different elements enhance or detract from the play. 

Download this FREE poster at TPT

Once students learn all the vocabulary words associated with each element, I recommend helping them create a graphic organizer. This does not have to be fancy (on some days i literally just have the students divide the paper in 1/2 one way and in 1/3 the other so that there are six boxes for the kids to work with. Have the kids watch a movie version of a Broadway play (my two favorite to show are either Peter Pan or Into the Woods depending on age).  Let the students practice identifying the different dramatic elements as they view them on the movie. I usually let the students work in groups for this activity so I can make sure they have the concept down.

If you want to take the concept even farther have the students brainstorm a play using the dramatic elements as a guide. You can then have them write the plays if you have time (I did this for my anti-bully campaign videos and it worked great!) However far you go with this lesson, know that students chunking the elements will help students no only identify the elements but also analyze scripts more effectively. And remember Please Take Care, My Dog Smells!

Arts Integration- Students as Producers

One area I personally struggle with is how to integrate math into the theatre curriculum. At our school it is expected that we integrate the core subjects into our classes and that the core classes integrate fine arts into their class. English and Social Studies are natural fits for Theatre. Both subjects have strong writing standards and history standards. It is easy to integrate them. Math not so much.

I have found one math lesson that works very well: Budgeting! This lesson is also great because it opens students eyes about the real cost of a play. It helps them see why we charge for tickets or why we can't afford to fly people like Peter Pan. Several of my students are under this crazy impression that we just get things for free. They say their parents complain that they have to pay to see the show. This lesson gives the students the information they need to talk with their parents about why we charge for the play.

Side note: I always give rounded fake numbers when talking with students about money. If they know too much about your actual budget, they start to make suggestions on how you should spend it (can you pay for all of us to go see that new movie? You should buy all of us food for each performance!) Feel free to check out the worksheets I made to accompany this lesson. They really help organize the students thinking. 

Check out my teacherspayteachers page to purchase these pages for only $1.00

Step one: easy budget. In the first step you want to model how a theatre budget works. If you have recently put on a play use it for a close example. This is also a great time to talk about Royalties. Many students and parents don't realize that we have to pay for the rights to put on the play. Give the students a few examples of how the budget works.

Example one cost

Royalties - $1050

Set - $200

Costumes - $400

Props - $150

Total expenses- $1800!

Step two: ticket pricing. Now talk about how ticket pricing is our way of making back the money we spent. If we price the tickets too low we don't make any money, if we price too high, no one will come. For the first examples I like to give an easy projected audience size (500).  Then the equation (ticket price) X (audience size) = gains. Gains- expenses =profit.

Example one price

Tickets - $0

0*500=0

0-1800=-1800

We loose almost $2000 if we don't charge anything.

Example two price

Tickets -$5.00

5*500=2500

2500-1800=700

We make $700!

Example three prices

Tickets- $20.00

20*500= 10,000

10000-1800=8200

We can make $8,200! 

Make sure you remind students though that their audience number will go down as the ticket price goes up. Have them work out their own ticket problems and come up with a suggested. Price for the show. 

Step three: budget analysis. Teach the students how to use and read a spread sheet. There is a great interactive example on this website Kidswork TV Director (This whole website is a wonderful theatre education/technology integration site-use the tv studio and theatre for more resources).

Step four: budget creation. Create a fake cost analysis sheet for a play. In groups or on their own, have the students create a projected budget for a play they would like to produce. You should have some areas that are mandatory (Royalities, costumes, lights, etc) and some that are optional (lunch for cast, flying system, etc). Give the students a projected audience size and let them create the budget and ticket price. For an added bonus have them write a justification for why they choose the things they did. You are welcome to use my worksheets for this project. You can get them for a dollar at teacherspayteachers Students as Producers worksheets

I hope this lesson helps you integrate math into your theatre class more! I also hopes it helps teach your students an important lesson about production cost. Did this lesson work for you? What other math lessons do you use in your class?

Rehearsal Centers for Drama

One of the hardest part about teaching a large group of students (my classes range from 28-35) is allowing everyone to have meaningful rehearsal practice. When I first began teaching theatre I wanted to watch everyone rehearse and give meaningful feedback to each individual students. This was a great goal. But not very practical. The one student/group that was on stage got feedback and everyone else got... fidgety. It also was a huge time waster. It took me forever for me to get through all the students in rehearsal and there was a ton of down time for the students who weren't actively on stage. I had to find a new solution. I now do rehearsal centers.

Rehearsal centers are great because it allows every student to opportunity to work on different aspects of their performance independently. It also allows me to focus on one group at a time and give meaningful feedback while everyone else is engaged elsewhere.

Note:  Your room will get very loud during these centers. You need to have some sort of system in place for quickly getting everyone's attention. I use the rhythm clap but use whatever works best for you.

I like to change my centers up ever so often. I have listed many more centers than you would probably want to use in class. I like to try to keep groups at around 3-5 so I create as man centers as needed for my group size. You can always pick and choose until you find some that work for you. I recommend you choose 5 centers and have the students rotate every 8 minutes (this will work great in a 50 minute class). I have altered this to use less time or less centers and it still works great. Also tell your students to continue with the script from where they are when they rotate. If they start from the beginning every time they rotate they will never practice the ending. I recommend every student having a script that is theirs that they are allowed to write on. This teaches students the importance of purposefully marking their script.

If you want some easy to use printouts for each of my centers check out my teacherspayteachers store. Rehearsal Centers


Characterization: (creating a character) at this center you want to focus students are learning more about their character. Students often make choices about their character without proving their reasoning. Create a worksheet asking students specific questions about their characters (or you can buy mine :) ) Make sure you ask the students about the character's age, gender, a motivation in the scene. Students need to be able to prove their answers from the text and also use their imagination (some answers you cant find in the script). Sometimes I let the students draw a picture of what they think the character would look like and wear at this station too.

Blocking: (moving around the stage) you will need an open area for this center. If possible this center should be in the same area they will perform for their final grade. In my class this is the stage center. Students should work through their script figuring out when each character should enter and exit. They should also establish where each character stands and when they move. This is a good time to make sure students are not standing in lines and not "blocking" each other from the audience.

Memorization: This is the easiest station to set up. Put several chairs in a circle and let the students practice memorizing their lines. I always have the students choose one person in the group to be the prompter. The prompter holds the script and tells actors the lines if needed. Actors must say "line" before the prompter can prompt (this eliminates a lot of tattling- "I knew my line and he said it anyways").

Timing: This station needs highlighters or yellow markers. I love this station because it forces students to slow down and read. My students have a bad habit of reading everything at the same speed. I use this to make them read the punctuation marks and stage directions. Students must read through the script marking every stage direction, period, and comma. Students then perform their script practicing pausing appropriately.

Facial Expression: I recommend going to the dollar store and buying five hand help mirrors. Its a small investment that pays off big time. Give each child a mirror and have them practice saying their lines into the mirror. Make sure they look at their eyebrows. The eyebrows add a ton of expression to a character face :)

IPad Facial Expressions: If you are lucky enough to have an IPad you can use the camera feature to have the students act out their facial expressions for the camera and play them back. This really ups the motivation and involvement but don't fret if you don't have one. The normal center works great too.

Body Movement: Ideally you will have a full length body mirror for this center. (You can usually get one at Walmart for under $10. Very useful for costumes in a theatre class). If you do not have a mirror, have students work together to critique each other on the body movement. Students should work on creating meaningful gestures and using their whole body to perform. I have my students usually concentrate on not wiggling and moving with purpose.

Vocal Work: This is a great technology center. If you have Ipods/Ipads you can use the voice recording app. If you have desktops/laptops in your room you can download Audacity and have the students use the computer mic to record their voice. You can also purchase mini USB  Microphones (a little expensive but I got mine from a donors choose project). Students can record their voice and then practice speaking clearly and with good pronunciation. Students should then listen to their recording and make sure they can understand their speech.

IPad Voice: If you use an IPad you can download either chatterbox kids or sock puppets app to add some fun to the recording process.

IPad Film Critique: Have the students record a movie of their performance then play back the performance. This center might be a longer one and you might need to let it go for two times.

Well I hope you enjoyed these centers. If you have any questions feel free to email me and I will be happy to help! Good Luck!

Arts Integration Ideas- Historical Monologues

One of the major pushes in Education right now is Arts Integration. Theatre is one of the easiest Fine Arts subjects to integrate. Throughout this blog I will talk about several ways to use theatre to enhance Common Core Curriculum. Today I want to talk about one of the first arts integration lessons I did. This lesson is my go to lesson when I need to show off my students in an Educational Setting. My students have presented this lesson in front of our Superintendent and all the principals in my county. All to often the "higher ups" in the county view theatre and other Fine Arts subjects as fluff. This assignment helped change the minds of the "higher ups" in my county. Hopefully you can use it to help change people's minds as well.

I would partner with your History or ELA teacher in doing this project. Since I only see the kids once a week for 40 minutes partnering is a must if I want the students to write anything. They just don't have time to in my class. 

Step one- have the students bring their history books to class. I then have them search through the book to find a historical person that inspires them. (I typically base this assignment around Black History Month but you could easily focus on any other topic you wanted to- presidents, women, heroes etc).

Step two- once the students have chosen their person, have them research specifics about that person. Depending on your time limits and the age of your students you can either create an outline for them to complete or simply have them write their five favorite facts .

Step three- have the students choose  their person's most exciting life event (Rosa Parks on the bus, Abe Lincoln before Gettysburg, etc) 

Step four- teach the difference between a monologue and soliloquy. Have students choose if they are going to write a monologue or soliloquy. 

Step five- allow students time to write a monologue from their historical person's point of view. Remind students that the soliloquy needs to be written in first person pov and they need to include what the person is thinking or feeling. If they are writing a monologue it still needs to be in first person but they should be talking to another person. Most of your students will probably end up writing soliloquies and that's great!

Step six- Once the monologues are written it is time to begin the rehearsal process. When students are rehearsing I like to set up rehearsal centers so that they can focus on individual aspects of their piece. I have also had students partner up to rehearse or you can simply embrace the chaos and let all the students rehearse together. If you are new to teaching or an English/Social Studies teacher who is not use to allowing rehearsals in the room keep in mind it will get noisy. I like to set up some basic rules (no talking to other groups, no wandering from your general area, etc. )You might want to keep a noise meeter in your room to warn kids if they get to loud. You could also take them to a gym/ outside area where they have more space to spread out. In my experience since the students know that they have to perform the piece they typically use the rehearsal period to their advantage with very little silliness. Make sure you tell the students before they start if their monologue has to be memorized.

Step Seven- Perform monologues for the class.  I would tell the students that they can dress the part if they want to . These performances typically turn out very well and all of the students learn things about the other famous historical figures as well.  When you have your performance day make sure you talk it up. You might even want to invite another class to come and watch the performances.

Step Eight- Grade the performances. Make sure you check out my Theatre Rubrics at the teacherspayteachers store. The rehearsal, script writing, and acting rubrics can be very useful in determining grades.

Make sure you keep a copy of the student's monologues that you liked. That way you have any easy demonstration piece for an observation or showcase.  Parents and teachers love to see kids participating in cross curricular activities and this is a wonderful chance to show your teachers what the students know.

Alternative Assignments:
Living Wax Museum- This is one of our favorite assignments at my school (and the kindergartners and first graders are the performers for the older students). Follow the exact same instructions for the lesson. When you reach step six have all of the students report to the gym. Give each student a "Button" to place in front of their character (Red Circle cut out of construction paper usually works well). All the students must then freeze in an exciting pose behind their button. When someone steps on their "button" they come to life, say their monologue then go back to freezing. This is a great assignment for other classes to come participate in. This is also great for students who get stage fright because they are only performing in front of one/two people at a time.

Literary Characters- You can use this same assignment but have the students create monologues for the book characters you are reading. Bonus points if they have to use so many sentences from the book.  Great say to engage the students in the reading.

Students as Playwrights and Directors Part 2 (The Director)

Last post I wrote about how to help students creatively write a story that they can use in this lesson. Part one is a great lesson for any drama/ ELA teacher. You can decided to skip part one or you can use another method for helping students create a story (you can also just pull short scripts if you would rather use something more authentic). Regardless of your method make sure you have a unique story available for every student.

In doing this project I did something I have never done before. I didn't let every play perform. Every group performed at least once, but every play was not performed on stage. Check out below for how I worked this system. As a theatre teacher, the idea that not everyone was going to perform their play killed me but there simply wasn't time. I mean can you imagine getting through 30 plays in 40 minutes, it just doesn't work. Not having every play performed was actually more freeing then I thought it would be. It gave me the freedom to choose which groups were clicking during rehearsal and allowed me to facilitate more class discussion. I will definitely be using this method again. 

Step 1- hand out stories to each student. These can either be the stories they wrote in part one, a creative story they wrote at another time or  a play you found. After every student has a story divide the students into groups. I made groups of four but feel free to adjust as need. I would recommend not having more than 5 in a group for time reasons. Once students are their groups assign a director order.(director 1, director 2, and so on). I did this randomly but you could assign an order as well.

Step 2- review the role of a director and actor. Director is in charge of casting, running rehearsals, and making final decisions. Actors are in charge of creating a character and practicing their parts. This is a great time to talk about how you need to show respect for everyone. I also point out that  the director gets to make the final call about all decisions and I will only step in for emergencies. I also point out that sometimes you don't like the part you are assigned (and sometimes boys play girl parts and girls play boy parts). Everyone had to do what the director said and they couldn't tattle if they didn't like their part. I did encourage the directors to be kind when casting, and if they had to change the gender of a character to make someone happy that was ok. 

Step 3- Model a rehearsal. This is a huge step. Do. Not Skip. Students need to learn how to lead. If possible choose a group with a weird number (there is always one with more than everyone else). Have one of those students be your model for this experience. I recommend giving the directors an exact order for what their rehearsals should look like, this will help you when grading later.

1. Read the story to the group.

2. Cast the play

3. Perform any rewrites or revisions that are needed (should not take very long)

4. Block the play (tell the actors where to stand and move)

5. Rehearse the play until time is called. Make any other revisions/ changes that are needed.

6. Director reads the play while the group performs.

For the modeling section I recommend you talk the students through each step. This way they know what to expect when it's their turn.

Step 4- director 1 rehearsal time. Now it is time to turn your directors loose in each group tell director one to begin reading their play and casting. Walk around and monitor groups but try your hardest to let the directors work their problems out with their team (after all that is what is being a director is all about). After the allotted time (5-10 minutes) have the groups sit back down and choose one or two groups to perform their plays. This is also a great time to have a class discussion about any issues that arose during rehearsal. We had a great talk about how it affects a play when one actor doesn't show up (after a kid had to go to the clinic during class). It really helped the kids to see how they affect each other in a performance.

Step 5- director 2 and so on rehearsal times. After a few groups perform director 1 plays allow the students to break back into their groups and rehearse director 2's play. Continue this process of rehearsal and performance until all directors have had an opportunity to direct. Make sure that every group has performed at least once by the end of assignment. Continue to have class discussions between the steps as problems arise. This is a great opportunity to highlight problems you have been having in rehearsal as well. ( I have a huge problem with kids talking to each other during rehearsal, I made sure to point out how frustrating it is when you are trying to direct and someone is talking to another group). These discussions are so helpful and I really saw an improvement in the acting and directing over the course of the lesson.

Step 6- exit slips. I had each student write about who they felt was the best director in their group. They had to give me a legitimate reason why they felt that way (he was good at giving directions, she was organized, he told me where to stand, etc.) This served two purposes, I was able to see who they thought was the best director and I was able to tell if the students could identify positive director traits. You could do this step on appear or verbally as you were summing up the lesson.

Grading- if you have the students perform both parts of this lesson you can easily get three grades out of this assignment: a writing grade, rehearsal grade, and director grade. I always use rubrics when grading this type of work. Here is a sample of the directing rubric I made for the class. Feel free to download and use in your class as well. You can purchase the full set of theatre rubrics on my teacherspayteachers site (follow the link at the bottom of the page).

This is a great assignment and the students really got into it. I have always struggled with hitting the directing standard in my lower grades. I will defiantly be using this again in my class.