Movement Articles for Drama Teachers

This month, we’re going to be using the five senses (sight, hearing, taste, smell, and touch) as the basis for exercises and theatre games. This week, we’re looking at the sense of touch, through...

By this point, students will have learned about and practiced miming preparatory skills (including stillness, focus, and visualization), portraying items of different weights, and interacting with...

We’ve all seen the classic “mime stuck behind an invisible wall” routine, and when you mention miming to students, typically they’ll immediately start waving their hands around in that fashion....

In our previous Middle School Miming article, students explored using their hands and arms to maneuver invisible objects of various sizes around a circle. Now, we’re adding moving throughout the...

Miming is a great topic for middle school drama students. The art of miming uses the actors’ bodies and imaginations to tell a story, without using their voices. It’s all about “making the unreal,...

Many wonderful scripts feature lovely intimate moments between characters: a wedding, a special moment with a crush, a declaration of love, a first kiss. However, many actors (of all ages, not just...

This is a classic theatre game; you might know it as Shadow Walk, Follow the Leader, or Leader & Follower. It is deceptively simple at first glance: students walking around the room imitating each...

Japanese artist Shigetaka Kurita invented modern-day emojis in 1999, and they’ve found their place in our world as a unique visual language. Emojis can be used as a way to express ourselves when...

The following is a quick, simple warm-up game that works for virtually any age range and skill level. All you’ll need is a stack of Post-it notes or a pile of scrap paper, some writing implements,...

The following exercise challenges students to explore character movement by focusing on the speed of movements. This exercise is mental and physical — students will brainstorm a list of characters...

A director friend recently sent me a message asking for advice about how to help her students with their upcoming show. _Hi Kerry, _ Any tips on helping my students to slow down and stop rushing?...

Do you want your students to show you MORE onstage during a heightened emotional scene? “Joshua, can you be more sad here?” “Sannah, I think your character needs to be more angry right now.” “Lise,...

This warm-up exercise is simple, but sometimes that’s just what you need — a simple yet fun warm-up that gets your students up and moving around. This exercise is also quiet — no speaking allowed!...

*Welcome to our Featured Play Spotlight. * Funhouse by Lindsay Price is an incredibly unique and challenging vignette-style play that is an excellent catalyst for conversations around bullying....

*Welcome to our Featured Play Spotlight. * Shuddersome: Tales of Poe by Lindsay Price is a creepy, cross-curricular masterpiece with tons of flexibility, theatricality and a whole lot of fun. The...

*Welcome to our Featured Play Spotlight. * The Butterfly Queen by Christian Kiley looks at the nature of sacrifice and putting others first, and is an opportunity to have a truly transformative...

*Welcome to our Featured Play Spotlight. * A Deep, Poetic Journey Into Something by Forrest Musselman is a dramatic character study for high school student performers with excellent movement...

When teaching virtually to students with their cameras on, teachers get to witness all sorts of interesting student antics — students tuning in from strange locations (their closet, their family’s...