Reflection

For some of you, school has already started. For others, that first day is looming right around the corner. Either way, it’s easy to get tossed into the whirlwind that is the beginning of the school year: deciding on plays, setting up procedures, and writing curriculum for multiple classes. All of that work is important to have a successful and smooth running classroom. However, it’s just as important to check in with your needs and goals for the upcoming year. You know what you want for your students, but what do you want for yourself? How often do you self-evaluate?Teachers frequently ask students to evaluate themselves. Self-evaluation is an important part of the learning process; it cultivates critical thinking skills, promotes self-reflection, and (hopefully) fosters a sense of responsibility for one’s work. Self-evaluation is not just for students. Teachers also need to develop critical thinking, practice self-reflection skills, and identify goals for their work. Self-evaluation can help you: • Give focus to your teaching • Determine areas you love • Recognize areas you don’t • Highlight your strengths • Pinpoint skills to improve • Avoid burnout. • Become a better teacher Many teachers don’t have time to sit around and reflect throughout the year. So why not do it now, before the roller coaster really gets going? This will give you a document that you can refer to periodically to see if your goals have changed. You’ll be able to review it at the end of the year to see what you accomplished and what you can improve on. Where do I start?The beginning of the year is all about promise. What do you aspire to achieve? How do you feel when you look at the year ahead? 10 Self-Evaluation Questions for the beginning of the year:1. What are my teaching goals for this year? 2. How have my teaching goals changed from last year? 3. What do I love about teaching? 4. How will I bring my love of teaching to the classroom? 5. What do I hate about teaching? 6. What action will I take to deal with these negative feelings? 7. What is my top strength as a teacher? 8. What is one area I feel needs improvement? 9. What action will I take to improve this area? 10. What am I looking forward to the most for this year? Bonus! Finish these sentence starters. • Teaching is important to me because… • I am the kind of teacher who… • I aspire to be the kind of teacher who… • I expect all teachers to… • The one word to describe my teaching goal this year is…

We’re always asking students to reflect. It’s almost like a knee-jerk reaction. Reflect on that exercise! Reflect on group work! Reflect on the unit! Here’s a rubric just for reflections! But how often do you reflect? How often do you give serious thought to what you do in the classroom, what skills do you implement on a regular basis, and what areas would you like to change? The answer is that teachers, especially drama teachers, have little to no time for anything extra. The day is full enough as it is! But as the years go by, there’s always going to be some things that work well with some students but not other students. The more you’re aware of your skills and strategies, the easier it will be when you have to adapt them. Summer may not be the time when you want to think deeply about your classroom, but the school year is right around the corner. And before you know it, you’ll be back in the trenches implementing the same procedures with the same level of success. If that’s worked for you, great! You’re awesome and you should be rewarded. A well-run classroom is a work of art. But what if things aren’t working as smoothly as you’d like? What kind of questions should you ask yourself? We’ve put together a Free Classroom Skills Reflection for Teachers. You can download the PDF below. There are 25 questions for you to think on, ponder, and (of course) reflect over. Do it by the pool with a cold drink in your hand. It is summer after all. Here are some of the questions:1. What makes a good teacher? 2. What five words come to mind when you think of a successful classroom? 3. How do you establish expectation? 4. What changes (if any) do you want to make in how you establish expectation? 5. How often do you use modeling in the classroom? 6. What is your classroom management strategy? 7. What (if any) changes do you want to make to this strategy? 8. What are you learning or want to learn?

Theatre is all about change. Not only do we want to look back and identify origins, but it’s also important to explore theatre history to see how the form evolves. Often that evolution comes from an intense reaction to the previous era: Romanticism embraced spectacle, melodrama, and emotion. Realism went in the opposite direction with real-life characters and situations.  But how do we connect students to eras that are difficult to relate to? It’s easy to say “XYZ is important,” but if students don’t find a connection with it then the impact is lost. For example: Theatre of the Absurd. The origins of Theatre of the Absurd (in a very brief and generalist overview) cover plays written mostly in the 1950s and 1960s with the main theme “life is meaningless.” To that end, traditional theatrical structure is often ignored, dialogue makes no sense, and characters are not grounded in reality. The playwrights most commonly associated with this are Samuel Beckett, Jean-Paul Sartre, Eugene Ionesco, Jean Genet, and Harold Pinter. Some well-known Theatre of the Absurd plays are Beckett’s Waiting for Godot, Sartre's No Exit, Genet’s The Balcony, Ionesco’s Rhinoceros & The Bald Soprano, and Pinter’s The Homecoming. Certainly, there are other playwrights and other plays written in the genre even to this day, but these are the playwrights and plays most units of study turn to.  It’s challenging for students to link the theme “life is meaningless” with what they see in a Theatre of the Absurd play. They know that what they see on the page doesn’t make sense, but they don’t make the connection that the reason it doesn’t make sense is because it explores a specific theme. They just think the stories, characters, and dialogue are dumb. One way to connect students is to start with a visual introduction to an era instead of a textual introduction. Twenty-first-century students tend to be visual learners, so use images to initiate a discussion. How do we do that? Most of those who originally wrote Theatre of the Absurd plays were in Europe during WWII; both Samuel Beckett and Ionesco were in France. If you search online for what France looked like during the war, what comes back are pictures of towns reduced to rubble. A total wasteland (a sample picture is included in the PDF download below). How could you have hope for the future in such a place? When you start with an image that clearly defines “life is meaningless,” it becomes easier to see what influenced these writers and why they rejected the Realism era of plays. As much as Realism-era writers wanted to create “real life” on stage, it wasn’t real life. Theatre is a form with structure, dialogue, and characters, and this is what Theatre of the Absurd writers highlight by going in the opposite direction: a lack of structure, symbolic or one-dimensional characters, nonsense dialogue.  Introduction to Theatre of the Absurd Exercise• Show students a picture from France in the aftermath of WWII. Use one of the ones included in the download or find your own.  • Don’t give students context for the picture. Don't tell them where or when the picture comes from or mention Theatre of the Absurd. • Have students write down their thoughts. What do you see? Where is this place? What emotions come up? What happened here? A worksheet is included in the download. • Discuss their findings as a class. What are the similarities and differences in how students experienced the picture? Ask students: What would it be like to live in the place shown in this picture?  • Each picture has people in it. Have students write a monologue from the perspective of one of the people in the picture. Start by having students brainstorm their ideas (Who are they? What have they been through? What do they want? Who are they talking to?), and then write their monologue based on this information. Again, don’t tell students the origins of the picture or mention Theatre of the Absurd. A Brainstorm Worksheet is included in the download. • Divide students into groups and have them share their monologues.  • Discuss the phrase “life is meaningless.” What does it mean? Explain to students that the picture was taken in France in the aftermath of WWII, when many places were reduced to rubble. Ask students: Can you imagine trying to live a normal life when everything is destroyed? • Ask students: If you were writing a play, how might you show the theme of “life is meaningless”? What could you do to the structure, dialogue, and characters of a play to highlight the “life is meaningless” theme? • You may want to use a model. Provide a monologue and have students suggest changes to the text. How do we make the structure of the monologue meaningless? How do we make the dialogue meaningless? How do we make the character meaningless? You can highlight some absurd elements such as repetition, circular plots, lack of communication, symbolic or representational characters. In the download, a sample monologue is provided along with a potential absurd version.  • Have students rewrite the monologue so that the structure, dialogue, and character fits the theme “life is meaningless.”  • Divide students into groups and have them share their pieces.  • Share with students that they have entered the world of the Theatre of the Absurd, just as many of those who originally wrote absurdist plays in the aftermath of WWII. The picture we worked with was taken in wartorn France. Can you imagine how a playwright seeing this world around them would feel that life is meaningless? How could you have hope for the future? • At this point, you can dive deeper into the background of the Theatre of the Absurd, or share an absurd play with students. 

Uta Hagen held a lot of influence in 20th century American Theatre. She made her Broadway debut in 1938 in Anton Chekov’s The Seagull. She also acted against Marlon Brando in A Streetcar Named Desire. She also originated the role of Martha in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? Uta taught for years at the Herbert Berghof studio in New York. She instructed many well-known actors including Jack Lemmon, Matthew Broderick, and Al Pacino. She wrote two books on acting: Respect for Acting (1973) and A Challenge for the Actor (1991). When it came to the craft and technique of theatre, her career encompassed the four roles of actor, director, teacher, and writer. In Respect for Acting, Uta identified 9 questions an actor should ask themselves as they prepare. It’s all about being as specific as possible. (Note: She reframed these questions into six steps in A Challenge for the Actor.) 1. Who am I? Who is your character? Identify all the details: name/age, physical traits, education, personal opinions, likes, dislikes, fears, ethics, and beliefs. 2. What time is it? The year, the season, the day, the minute. What is the significance of time? 3. Where am I? Identify the country, the city/town, the neighborhood, the building, the room or the specific area of the room. 4. What surrounds me? What is happening in the environment around you? Weather, landscape, people, animate/inanimate objects? 5. What are the given circumstances? Identify events in the past, present, and future. What has happened, what is happening, what is going to happen? 6. What are my relationships? This is more than your relationship to other people. Think about your relationship to objects, characters, and events. 7. What do I want? What do you want immediately? What does the character want overall? 8. What is in my way? What are the obstacles to getting what you want? 9. What do I do to get what I want? What actions do you take (both physically and verbally)? What tactics? These questions will give students a comprehensive list to follow with their character development. Start students off by having them answer these questions about their own life and then identify the answers for any character work they do.

It’s the first day of semester. You have a Grade Nine / Drama One class or a group of students you haven’t worked with before. They stare at you, you stare at them. How can you determine what they think about drama, what they think about your class and how they might perform for the weeks ahead? Should you plunge into the deep end or ease slowly into the water? The first week of drama class will set the tone for the rest of the year. Use a Drama SurveyThe Drama Survey is a tangible way to assess your students’ thoughts and feelings. It will highlight the students in your class who are uncomfortable with self-expression. Self-expression is key to success in the drama classroom. Students need to share their opinions on scenes and performances. Students express themselves in their journals, monologue writing, and character creation. Your classroom may be the one place students feel at ease to display their true personality. Students can make the survey the first entry in their drama journals. There’s a sample survey at the end of this article, but you can create your own with questions specific to your classroom. Questions to AskMake the survey easy to answer. Aim for something that can be completed in 15 minutes. The time limit is important – encourage students to write quickly. Their answers will be more instinctual. Don’t bombard students with “tell me everything” questions and yet, don’t make it so vague you learn nothing. The survey should give you a roadmap for your semester (e.g. if none of your students have been on stage before, your lesson plans might need adjustment). Start out the survey with some multiple choice questions: • I am looking forward to drama class. Yes. No. Maybe. • I am good at drama. Yes. No. Maybe. • I have acted before. Yes. No. • Does performing in front of others scare you? Yes. No. Maybe. Include open-ended questions that will illuminate their thoughts on the class: • What is drama? • Why did you take drama? • What do you hope to learn? And end with questions that illuminate the individual student: • How do you express yourself? • What is your favourite food? Music? Article of clothing? • List three words that express how you’re feeling today. • Do you often tell the truth? If not, why do you hold back? These answers will demonstrate how students will write in their journals, how they’ll act during a peer evaluation and even how they’ll handle criticism. Follow upAssess the success of the class and give your students a follow up survey at the end of the year. First have students look back and reflect on their first survey. • How have their answers changed? • Do they have a different opinion of drama? • Do they have a different opinion of their abilities? Some multiple choice questions: • I look forward to coming to drama class. Always. Sometimes. Not really. • I have learned something new about drama. Yes. No. • I feel comfortable performing and sharing my ideas in drama class. Yes. Not Really. No. Ask questions that relate specifically to the class: 1. My favourite unit this year was… because… 2. My least favour unit this year was… because… 3. My favourite activity this year was… because… 4. My least favourite activity this year was… because… And end with questions that relate specifically to the individual: • I feel more confident about performing in front of others. Yes. No. • I feel more confident expressing my opinion. Yes. No. • Explain your answers. Use specific class activities as examples. The Drama Survey can help you communicate with your students. It can highlight which activities are most and least successful. The Drama Survey is a useful, insightful classroom tool.

Performances are rarely the only area where learning occurs in the drama classroom. What goes on during instruction, what happens in rehearsals and group work, how problems arise and are solved — these are all elements which can't be quantified in a final product. Journaling provides a way for students to record, track, and reflect on their journey from the beginning of the year to the end. Journals are also a great place for students to generate and gather source material for creative writing. Most drama classes will include a writing project of some kind and the journal is one way to keep material in one place. What should go into a drama journal?• Questions and answers • Reflection on a particular exercise or class • Evaluation of a student's own work and the work of others • Personal growth tracking • Challenges and possible solutions • Expectations and goals • Ideas/research/source material for creative writing • Character work for a scene • Reactions to performances • A record of achievements and areas of improvement What should stay out of a drama journal?A journal is not a diary, it is a classroom tool. It's easy for students to misunderstand the purpose of the drama journal. Reflection is different from writing in a personal diary. It's one thing to criticize yourself or a fellow performer; it's another to critique a performance, providing reasons for your opinion and offering suggestions for improvement. It is in this way that journaling is a learning tool and an opportunity to improve a skill. How do I ensure quality work from my students?Journal entries should use complete sentences unless otherwise specified (e.g., a collage). Every journal entry should start with the date. A standard length should be between 200 and 300 words. In terms of content, the purpose of journal entries is to show that the student understands and is able to comment thoughtfully on a specific experience, using examples from class. There has to be more than, “This was good, this was bad, I don't know what I learned.” There has to be effort. Having said that, some students don't know where to start and thus offer shortened answers simply because they have never had to write in this manner before. To encourage a fully realized response, journal entries can follow two templates: 1. The WHAT of the situation followed by the WHY. If a question asks students to give their opinion (WHAT struck you about the performance of Group A?), they must follow up their opinion with reasons WHY. This way, students can practice moving beyond simply criticizing what they see, because they have to back up their opinion. Students should be aware that the WHY is the most important part of the answer because it shows thought and consideration. 2. The WHAT of the situation, followed by the HOW. The HOW portion of the answer allows students to break down experiences beyond blanket statements. It's more than, “I acted in a scene.” Students have to consider how they approached the character, how they worked in their group, how they came up with the blocking. Here are some WHAT/HOW examples: • What exercise did you do? How did you approach it? • What was the audience response? How would you evaluate your work? • What can you change for next time? How can the exercise change? • What was the outcome of the exercise? How can you improve? • What did you learn? How will this apply to future exercises? • What did you dislike about the exercise? How can you improve the experience for yourself? • What was it like to work with your group? How well do you work with other people? You know your students best. You know if the act of old fashioned pen and paper writing in a notebook will inspire or repel them. Maybe they make videos instead. Maybe they create collages. The form of the journal is not as important as the act. Analysis, reflection, creative expression, self-evaluation, and peer-evaluation are what matters. Journaling is a skill that will serve your students for years to come.

The biggest obstacle to writing a play often comes before the first word. It happens in the idea stage. I want to write, but my ideas are stupid. I know I could write something great but where do I start? How do I know my idea is a good one? These are the thoughts that lead directly to writers block. When it comes to play ideas there are three things you should teach your students: 1. Ideas don’t grow on trees – you have to look for them. 2. The more ideas you have, the less you have to worry about good or bad. 3. Ideas are a place to start. Sometimes they are just a fragment, a sentence or a question. Ideas are not finished products. There is this misconception that writers just magically think of things to write about. And that every idea is a gem right out of the gate. It’s just not true. Writers look for things to write about. They create a habit of observation. To observe is to look specifically at people, places and things. If you observe on a daily basis, if you’re always looking, you will come up with ideas on a daily basis. Writers learn to write down what they see and hear, what they experience. They write down their observations. It’s not enough to leave an idea in your head. That’s when ideas get lost. Writers know that an idea is something to play around with, to try out. An idea is not a finished product. An idea is a place to start. And sometimes the idea will work, sometimes it won’t. That’s important to know. Ideas don’t always become finished products. When a student writers falters with an idea, their response is to assume they can’t write. Instead, remind students that not all ideas develop fully. This process of idea creation put a lot less pressure on a student writer. You don’t have to magically come with a wonderful thing to write about. You simply: • Observe the world around you • Write it down • Try it out ReflectionWhen starting a playwriting unit, it’s important to get idea misconceptions out in the open and then out of the way. Discuss with students – What is an idea? Where do they come from? Have students reflect on their abilities to turn an idea into a play. Practice the act of observation with your students and get them in the habit of writing their observations down. And lastly instil in your students the fact that an idea is not a finished product. An idea is just a place to start.

Characters come alive in the smallest details: a favourite food, a favourite type of music, a fear of spiders, an allergy to plums, a scar from a fall at two years of age, a love of reality television. These details make a character three dimensional and human. They make a character specific. The details may seem mundane, but think about what defines you as a person. Is it the grand events in your life, or the day to day? Small details add a layered richness beyond the world of the story. Sometimes you’ll find a place to work them into your writing, and sometimes you won’t. But coming up with details have to be a part of your character development process when working on a play. The more you know about your characters, the deeper the well you have to draw from, the more specifically you can write for them. This character development exercise will allow you to create the details of the small for your characters. What’s In Your Bag?Empty out the bag you use most regularly, whatever you take with you when you go out. If you don’t carry a bag, think about how you carry what’s necessary – what’s in your pockets? First, look at the bag itself. • Write a short paragraph about the bag. Why did you choose it? How long have you had it? Do you need a new one? Secondly take out all the items and lay them out on a table. Write down everything in your bag and then analyze the items as a group: • What’s your opinion on the amount of things you carry every day? • Is everything functional in your bag? • Is there anything in your bag that shouldn’t be there? • Do you carry anything that comes with a memory or an emotional attachment? Lastly, analyze three items in your bag. • Why do you carry this item? • What purpose does it hold in your life? • Is there any emotional feeling or memory attached to this item? Why or why not? Once you’ve answered all the questions, look back at what you’ve written. What does your bag say about you? Are you surprised by any of your answers? Why or why not? Apply this exercise to a character Now, apply the same process to the main character. It could be a character in a play you’re studying, or a character in a play you’re writing. 1. Give this character a bag. • Describe the bag. What does the bag look like? How old is it? • Why does the character carry this bag? Is this character the type of person who can’t leave the house without a huge bag? • If the character definitely wouldn’t carry a bag, create the reason why. 2. Once you’ve established the bag itself, make a point for list of the items in the bag. • What does this character carry on a regular basis? • Is there anything job related in the bag? • Based on what you know of the character, what items are expected? • Think of one unexpected item that would be in the bag. 3. Take three items and analyze them. • What does the item say about the character? • Why is it in the bag? • Is it functional for the character? Why or why not? • Does it have an emotion or a memory attached to it? 4. Look at what you’ve written. What does this bag tell you about this character? Bonus If you want to go further, write a monologue or scene that takes place in the world of your story involving this character and their bag. Exploring the world of the small in your characters is always going to give you a wealth of material to work with.

Critical Thinking is a buzzword. It’s one of the keystone 21st century skills. How do we incorporate critical thinking into the drama classroom? Provide steps not buzzwordsCritical thinking is a necessary skill. But it’s one thing to know this and another thing to to say to someone “You must be a critical thinker in order to survive the 21st century!” Students don’t need to know that. They don’t even need to hear the word. Besides, the word critical is a little too close to criticize. If a student hears they’re supposed to be critical, it’s a short step from critical thinking to negative thinking. Critical thinking when properly applied, has little to do with being negative. What do you do instead? Reframe the term and provide action steps. What is a critical thinker? A critical thinker is specific. A critical thinker likes to learn about something they don’t know. A critical thinker has a point of view but can see value in the opinions of others. A critical thinker is able to draw conclusions. A critical thinker asks questions. A critical thinker challenges. A critical thinker reflects. A critical thinker is engaged. And in my mind, that’s what we want for our students – we want engaged thinkers. That’s something you can say to your students: I want you to be an engaged thinker. Because a student who is engaged, is going to be specific, is going to reach out to learn new things, is going to work to draw conclusions, is going to ask questions, is going to reflect. After you reframe the word, give your students steps to follow. What does an engaged thinker do? • They ask questions • They answer questions specifically • They draw conclusions • They have a point of view • They are open to the opinions of others How do I do this in the drama classroom? Start with one step at a time. Your class is preparing scenes in groups. During the post presentation discussion, have each student ask a question about the scene. That’s it. Get them in the habit of asking questions after every scene they present, after every play they watch, even after every new topic you present. Questions alone will improve your students critical thinking skills. Make your class a welcome space for students to give their point of view. Students hate being wrong and hate being laughed at. Because of that, giving their point of view on a topic or a scene could be terrifying. Maybe they’re reading a play like Waiting For Godot and they just don’t understand it. Start at the beginning of the year by modeling not only what it’s like to give a point of view but to respect the point of view of others. Get your students in the habit of saying the words I respect your point of view. Get in the habit of saying that it’s okay if students don’t like a play you’re studying (if they can then go on to get specific about their dislike). One tip: Instead of saying I respect your point of view but.. get in the habit of saying I respect your point of view and… That “but” signals students that their point of view is probably wrong. The thing is that a point of view is never wrong. It’s what somebody believes. Visualize and Dramatize the ConceptToday’s students are visual learners. They want to visualize concepts, not just hear them through instruction. What do you do instead? Get your students to visualize and dramatize what it means to be an engaged thinker. It’s drama class, so get your students on their feet and involved in a theatrical way. Discuss with students the opposite first. What is a trivial thinker? What are the characteristics of a trivial thinker? What do they look like? How do you see them? How do they sound? How do they move How do they approach class? Get students up on their feet and embody the trivial thinker. Focus on the character aspects of this person: Their physicality, the volume and pitch of their voice. Come up with a name and three personal details for this person: Tammy Trivial (Or Tim Trivial) who slouches, has goldfish (because cats are too much trouble) and microwaves all her meals. She never questions anything, she doesn’t care about anything and she doesn’t like to learn. Have students embody this character, move about the room in character, and interact with each other in character. Now have students pretend that Tammy Trivial is in their class. Ask for a group of volunteers to improvise a moment in which they are rehearsing a scene assignment. One of the students plays Tammy Trivial. Coach this student to “be” trivial and to dis-engage with the whole process. Discuss afterwards what it’s like to work with Tammy Trivial and what someone like Tammy Trivial does to class work. Once you’ve modelled someone who is dis-engaged, get students to visualized what an engaged thinker looks like. What does it mean to be an engaged thinker? How do you see them? What do they sound like? How do they move? What’s their name and what are three personal details: Eli Engaged (or Emmy Engaged) is always trying something new: he loves Ethiopian food, wants to visit the arctic and has tried stand-up, even though it didn’t go so well he wants to do it again. Get students to physicalize and vocalize this type of person. Encourage them to embody this character, move about the room in character, and interact with each other in character. Coach them to ask each other questions, in character. To share their point of view on something. To receive that point of view respectfully. You are having your students try out the aspects of the engaged thinker through character. At the end, prompt each student to ask a question about the exercise. Get into the habit of ending exercises with a question round. You may get a flurry of “Why did we have to do this?” And that’s ok. In this case, ask the question back, “Why might it be helpful to have a visualization of an engaged thinker?” Ask them to draw their own conclusion about the exercise. What inferences do they make based on the exercise? ExerciseStudents write a two person, one location scene between Tammy Trivial and Eli Engaged. They find themselves in a stuck elevator or maybe they’re on a first date, or they work side by side in two cubicles in an office. Remind students to keep the characteristics of each character in mind as they write. Focus on how each character moves, and sounds. Focus on how each character approaches situations – Would Eli ever be sarcastic with Tammy? Probably not. The point of the exercise is less about the scene itself and more about helping students solidify these two concepts (the dis-engaged thinker and the engaged thinker) as characters. It gives the concepts grounding. ReflectionStudents reflect on the exercise and explain what it means to be an engaged thinker in their own words. Reflect on how they approach classwork currently and how they can incorporate engaged thinking into their future work.

Jessica Stafford of Owensboro Middle School was in the middle of rehearsing Hoodie for the KTA middle school festival. She generously shared this “Positive and Negative Post-it Exercise” she used with her cast. ““Students write on Post-it notes the negative words they have heard from others about themselves and the negative words they think of when they look in the mirror. They are only allowed one word or phrase per Post-it. The Post-its are placed on a large piece of orange paper hung on the wall. Students then write positive words they have heard from others or think of when they look in the mirror. These are placed on a large piece of blue paper hung on the wall.”” The purpose of the exercise was to gather words for a specific scene in the play about personal perception, and the assignment received a variety of reactions. ““The kids loved and hated this assignment at the same time. They found it so incredibly easy to come up with the negative and hateful words but needed prompting from myself and others in order to find the positives. I think they were relieved to see they weren’t the only ones with the same negatives. I promised them I would do my Post-its, too. I told them that adults can walk the same walk — positive and negative.”” The exercise was used in a rehearsal setting but it could certainly be adapted to the drama classroom. It’s an exercise that explores how students feel about themselves, how others talk about them, and helps establish empathy. Here’s an outline of the exercise. Download the full instructions, plus the scene used in the exercise, reflection questions, and a worksheet below! Instruction• Read the “I see you/You see me” scene with your class. • Discuss the scene either as a class or in groups. • First, students write on Post-it notes the negative words they have heard others say about themselves and the negative words they think of when they look in the mirror. • Students place these Post-its on a large sheet hung on the wall. • Now, students write on Post-it notes the positive words they have heard others say about them and think of when they look in the mirror. • Students place these Post-its on a large sheet hung on the wall. • Students review the sheets. What do they see?  • Have students reflect in their drama journals on what it’s like to see the two sheets side by side. What do they think?  • Have students pick one word from the positive sheet and one word from the negative sheet. • Students personify these two words. Turn the positive word and the negative word into characters. • Students write a one-page scene between the Positive Word and the Negative Word. • Students share their scenes.

How often do you self-evaluate?Teachers ask students to evaluate themselves all the time. Self-evaluation is an important part of the learning process; it cultivates critical thinking skills, it promotes self-reflection, and hopefully a sense of responsibility for one’s work. Self-evaluation is not just for students. Teachers too need to develop critical thinking, self-reflection and a sense of responsibility for their work. A successful teacher is a connected teacher – able to identify what’s going right and what needs improvement. A connected teacher never stops learning from what they do in the classroom. Self-Evaluation can help you: • Determine areas you love. • Recognize areas you don’t. • Highlight your strengths. • Pinpoint skills to improve. • Avoid burnout. • Become a better teacher. What assessment questions do you ask yourself on a regular basis? Teachers don’t have the time to self-evaluate after every class. But every teacher should have an action plan in place to touch base with how they’re doing throughout the year. This is especially true for new teachers – the more you assess what’s happening in the classroom, the quicker you’ll improve, and the more confidence you’ll have. Students can spot a floundering teacher a mile away. The bottom line is that you love to teach. Self-evaluation can help you hold on to that love for years to come. Where do I start? Ask and answer questions that establish an outlook for the year, gauge how you’re doing in the middle, then reflect back at the end. If you work in a semester system, change this to the beginning, middle, and end of the semester. Here are 10 Self-Evaluation Questions for each step. Beginning of the YearThe beginning of the year is all about promise. What do you aspire to achieve? How do you feel when you look at the year ahead? 1. What are my teaching goals for this year? 2. How have my teaching goals changed from last year? 3. What do I love about teaching? 4. How will I bring my love of teaching to the classroom? 5. What do I hate about teaching? 6. What action will I take to deal with these negative feelings? 7. What is my top strength as a teacher? 8. What is one area I feel needs improvement? 9. What action will I take to improve this area? 10. What am I looking forward to the most for this year? Bonus! Finish these sentence starters. • Teaching is important to me because… • I am the kind of teacher who… • I aspire to be the kind of teacher who… • I expect all teachers to… • The one word to describe my teaching goal this year is… Middle of the YearThe middle of the year is about the specifics and the students. What is happening in the classroom? 1. How do I feel about my teaching halfway through the year? 2. What is working with my students? Are they learning? 3. What is not working with my students? Why aren’t they learning? 4. What action will I take to improve student learning? 5. Is my classroom well managed? Why or why not? 6. What action will I take to improve classroom management? 7. Are my students engaged or disengaged? 8. What action will I take to improve engagement? 9. Am I engaged in the classroom? 10. What action will I take to improve personal engagement? Bonus! Finish these sentence starters. • Halfway through the year and I want to keep on… • Halfway through the year and I want to change… • Halfway through the year and my teaching goals are… • Halfway through the year and I feel the students are… • The one word to describe my teaching thus far… End of the YearThe end of the year is about reflection. How far have you come? Where do you need to go? 1. Did I achieve my yearly teaching goal? Why or why not? 2. What was my best moment as a teacher this past year? 3. What was my lowest moment as a teacher this past year? 4. What action did I take to deal with this moment? 5. What action will I take so that this moment won’t happen again? 6. Did I feel supported by my colleagues and administration? 7. What action can I take to cultivate or improve this situation? 8. What professional development do I have planned? 9. How am I growing as a teacher? 10. What do I love about teaching? Bonus! Finish these sentence starters. • The one word to describe my year is… • As a teacher I am most proud of… • As a teacher I want to get better at… • My goal for next year is… • In five years I see myself…

Who am I? It’s a question not a lot of people ask. Who am I? What defines me? Effective artistic expression begins with you. If you’re going to write a well detailed character, you should know those details about yourself. If you’re going to write an opinion on an issue, you should know why you have that opinion. If you’re going to critique someone else’s work, you should know how you’d respond to the same criticism. Exercise:Complete the following tasks: List five words that best describe you.Think about these words. Look them up in the dictionary to make sure they describe you perfectly. Look up their synonyms and antonyms in a thesaurus. Why did you choose these words? Find five images/pictures that best describe you.They don’t have to be literal (I’m tall so here’s a picture of a tall guy). If you feel that you’re disorganized, you could choose a picture of a mess of colour (like Jackson Pollock) or a messy room, or a broken plate, or a wall of graffiti. Why did you choose these pictures? List five symbols that best describe you.Again you don’t have to be literal. Are you a stop sign? Are you a yield? Are you a no smoking sign? Are you a no shirt, no shoes, no service sign? A radiation sign? A cross? No parking? No pets? Information? Here is a website with a ton of different symbols. Why did you choose these symbols? List five sounds that best describe you.Are you a howl? A flute note? A guitar riff? A bang? A thunder clap? The ting of a bell? Why did you choose these sounds? This is not an ooky-spooky “be one with yourself man” activity. To define yourself in these specific ways creates a visual imagistic picture of yourself. This is a vital skill when it comes to dramatizing characters. You want to write in an visual imagistic way so that an actor can clearly picture the character and so can an audience. What do I do with all this?• If you’re doing this with a class, have students take all the images, sounds, words, and symbols and create a 30 second non verbal piece. Then have the class reflect on what they see. What impression does the piece create? • Write a monologue that takes place inside one of the pictures. What is happening? Are you in the picture or is it someone else? Throw one of your sounds into the middle of the monologue – what’s the effect? • Write a scene between a Symbol and a Sound. What type of character would each represent? • Re-write the scene and throw yourself into the mix. How would the symbol and the sound react to you? • Create a Wordle. Reflect on what it’s like to see a picture out of the different words. I’ve put my example below. Use wordle.net and put words in the text box. I used my five words, five sounds and described the five symbols.