Technology

If you have a smartphone, it’s a guarantee that you’ve used emojis. Emojis are more than cute graphics on your phone — they’ve evolved into a unique visual language. While emojis themselves are a fairly new development (the first official emojis were invented in 1999 by Japanese artist Shigetaka Kurita), people have been using symbols to communicate for thousands of years. Students often have full conversations entirely with emojis. Emojis can give additional context and understanding to written language where tone isn’t always easily conveyed. In this exercise, students will pair up and analyse a short scene or musical theatre song using emojis. This exercise includes a warm-up, a full class introduction and discussion, partner work, and a full class analysis and discussion. Materials Needed Copies of a one-page scene from a play or lyrics to a musical theatre song, with each line/phrase/lyric numbered down the left. If possible, leave a fairly wide margin down the right-hand side of the paper, so students can write or draw emojis on that side. Alternatively, students can complete the assignment on their phone by making a numbered list (corresponding with the numbered line from the text) and putting their emojis next to the appropriate number for each line/lyric. Warm-Up or Bell Work Using emojis, make a timeline of what you’ve done today so far, hour by hour. For example, if you woke up at 7 am and drama class is at 11 am, you will choose five emojis, one to represent each hour of the day that you’ve been awake. Introduction As a full class, have students add emojis to the following sentences: • I’m sorry. • What do you think? • I’m not really sure. • I can’t believe he said that. • I can’t wait! Feel free to add additional sentences. Which emojis did your students choose for each one? Why? Did the emoji choice change the meaning of the sentence? If so, how? Exercise Instructions 1. Divide students into pairs. 2. Give each pair a one-page scene from a play or the lyrics to a musical theatre song. All groups will get the same scene/song. 3. Give a time limit to complete the assignment (or as much of it as they can complete within the timeframe). 4. Each pair will use emojis to represent the words, phrases, or emotions of the scene/song, line by line. Groups can use as many or as few emojis they wish, but they should aim for two to three minimum per line (unless it's a one-word line). Students can write or draw emojis on the right-hand margin of the scene/lyric page, next to the appropriate line. Alternatively, students can complete the assignment on their phone by making a numbered list (corresponding with the numbered line from the text) and putting their emojis next to the appropriate number for each line/lyric. 5. At the end of the time limit, discuss students' different interpretations of the emojis used, one line at a time. Here are some questions you might wish to ask: • Why did you use so many/few emojis for a particular sentence or phrase? • Did your emoji choice represent a literal word/phrase in the song, or did it have a more removed meaning? • For a particular sentence or phrase, did most students agree or disagree on an overall feeling/emoji choice? • Did any sentences or phrases have a large amount of disagreement on what emojis should be used? Which ones? What is causing the disagreement? Can students explain why they disagree and/or why they think their interpretation is correct? • How would you rate your understanding and/or enjoyment of the class work using emojis? 6. Each student will complete and submit an individual exit slip (found below). If you want students to submit their class work as well, have them either hand in the paper with the drawn/written emojis on the side, or take a screenshot of their work from their phone and email it to you (or upload it to your classroom webpage if you have one). Make sure students include both partners’ names on the emoji work, even though they will complete exit slips individually.

Distance learning using video conferencing software is full of surprises and challenges. Some days, connecting and running your class goes off without a hitch. Other days, it seems like anything that can go wrong, does go wrong, and your lesson plan ends up not looking like much of anything. We teachers have to give ourselves grace and realize that we are doing the best we can with the resources we have available. It also helps to laugh about it, if you can. Technology Bingo is a good way to have a laugh with your students, your colleagues, or just by yourself. Create a bingo card with various technological issues that have come up during your classes, and mark them off if (or when) they occur. Traditional bingo cards in North America are 5 by 5 squares (25 squares total), but you can also make a smaller card of squares or rectangles if you wish (in the United Kingdom, Bingo cards are sometimes made on a 5 by 3 or 9 by 3 rectangular grid). Ideally, your card won’t fill up too quickly (or at all!) throughout the term, but when issues do occur, you can just shake your head and say, “There’s a mark for the bingo card!” Here are some ideas that you can add to your Technology Bingo card. Of course, you can always include ideas that are specific to your class, as well as take suggestions from your students. You might also want to make one space a “free” space; traditionally the centre square of the 5 by 5 grid is a free space, but feel free to mix things up and put the free space in a random position on the cards. • “I think you’re on mute” or “I forgot to unmute!” • Internet stops working • “Your connection is unstable” popup message • Audio lag (you can use this more than once because it seems to happen pretty frequently!) • Video freezes • Student ends up in the wrong breakout room • Sending a private chat message to the whole group • Showing an unrelated website while sharing your screen • Students filling up the chat box with weird or irrelevant messages • Student turns off their camera and vanishes… where did they go? • Attempted choral speaking goes horribly wrong • Microphone feedback • Audio echo or background noise from someone not muted • Student keeps unmuting themselves • Student changes username to something that isn’t their actual name (without telling you!) • Trying to admit latecomers when you’ve already started the lesson • Attempting to teach students both online and in-person at the same time • Needing multiple devices to teach a lesson • Student mixing up left and right due to screen mirroring • “Can you turn your camera on, please” • “Try turning your device off and turning it on again” • Device powers down mid-lesson • “I’ve only got 1% left” • Student has trouble uploading their homework • “Can you repeat what you just said?” • Full system crash The website My Free Bingo Cards is a great resource to print free randomized bingo cards, if you wish to play Technology Bingo with your class. You can combine Technology Bingo with a problem-solving exercise with your class. Divide students into small groups and have them brainstorm and present solutions to the various technology problems. You can use those solutions to create a Technology Guidelines document for your future distance learning drama classes.

Mention “smartphones” or “cell phones” in front of drama teachers and most will immediately grimace or roll their eyes. Phones can be the bane of any teacher’s existence – it seems like students these days have their phones surgically attached to their hands and are in a perpetual state of scrolling, scrolling, scrolling. But let’s try reframing our thoughts on smartphones and discuss how they can be used in a beneficial manner. Here are six ideas for practical uses for smartphones in rehearsal: 1. Go green and use e-scripts instead of paper scripts.It’s not overly common yet but some show licensing companies offer the option to purchase e-copies of their scripts instead of paper copies. This is great for saving paper and saving on shipping costs, but it can be challenging to highlight lines or make notes directly on the script. However, having e-copies of the script certainly saves everyone from the excuse of “I forgot/lost my script!” 2. Students can listen to the score and rehearse on their own.For musicals, many licensing companies provide both vocal recordings and backing tracks as part of their performance rights packages, often on an app that can be downloaded onto a phone, laptop, or tablet. These tracks are usually specially made to expire after the show run is complete, to reduce the opportunity for piracy. Depending on your licensing rights, students may be able to download the tracks on their phones and rehearse on their own. In rehearsal, they can bring headphones and listen to the music when they are not currently working onstage. 3. Watch rehearsal videos.I frequently make rehearsal videos for dance or stage combat choreography and upload them to Google Drive, YouTube or Vimeo so students can watch and practice on their own time or when they’re not onstage during rehearsal. You can also record scenes or full runs of the show for students to watch back critically, looking for tics or bad habits like slouching, mumbling, playing with their hair, or not focusing on the action. Explain to your students that this is for rehearsal purposes only and delete these videos after students have watched them. Publishers do not allow show recordings. 4. Create a mood board on Pinterest for design inspiration.I make mood boards for every show I’m working on to collect inspirational images and get ideas for design points, particularly sets and costumes. You can add contributors to a public Pinterest board, so share your inspiration board with your students and encourage them to contribute images as well. You may also wish to have students create their own personal mood boards to get an idea of their interpretations of their characters. 5. Take behind-the-scenes publicity material.I love having students help with publicity for their shows. It shows their engagement and passion for the show, and gives a different point of view to audiences. Be sure to have a discussion with your students about what is appropriate and inappropriate to share, as well as what constitutes a “spoiler.” You want to create excitement for the show, but you also don’t want to give away too much too fast! Instagram takeovers and/or Facebook Live events can be a fun way to get students involved. Just be sure to change the passwords to those accounts if you have different students taking charge of them at different times. *6. Use a voice-recording app to have students review their lines. *Like with video, students can use a voice-recording app to record themselves speaking and listen for line errors, “ums” and “ahhs”, stumbles, volume and diction issues. Students can also use their voice-recording app to create a line-rehearsing tool. Have students record themselves (or their scene partners) saying their cue lines and leave spaces in between for their actual lines. Then, have students play the recording and recite their lines aloud along with it. A final note: If you are finding that smartphones are more of a distraction than a useful tool, then of course it is fine to ban them from rehearsals. Smartphones are a privilege, not a right. (For students who claim they need their phone in case a parent is trying to get a hold of them, that’s what the school’s phone number is for.) Use your discretion and remind students that if their phones distract them, they will not be permitted to use them in rehearsal. If necessary, create a phone contract with your students that clearly states the rules of smartphone use in rehearsals/performances and the consequences for misuse. Students will sign them and the stage manager will keep them on file for the duration of the rehearsal process and production schedule. A simple smartphone contract template download is included at the bottom of this article.

A “digital footprint” is the information about a particular person or company that exists on the Internet as a result of their online activity. This goes hand-in-hand with the concept of “digital permanence,” which has to do with the ways that digital information is stored. In short, whatever you post on the Internet is there for good, in some format or another. This means that you must always be aware of what you are posting, sharing, uploading, and consuming online – particularly when it comes to your drama classroom. We want to ensure that the drama community is a positive, uplifting, and safe place for our students and for us to be, right? But how do we go about doing that? Here are some tips to help you create and develop a positive digital footprint. • Before you even begin, find out what the rules, regulations, and policies are for technology and the use of digital resources at your school. There is no excuse for “I didn’t know.” Find out what your school policies are and follow them. It’s especially important to know these rules because the vast majority of your students are minors. Policies may include whether or not you are permitted to identify students by name in posts, or whether or not you are even permitted to share photographs or videos of your students’ faces. • Assess your digital landscape, starting with your home base. Do you have a teacher or departmental website/blog? If so, do you use it? What do you use it for? How often do you update it? If you haven’t been using your site, start! If you don’t know how to update your site – start learning! • Next, assess your social media landscape. Currently, the most commonly used social media apps with some longevity are Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube. If your school permits departments to have social media profiles, create an account for your chosen platform(s). Use the same username and profile photo for each social media account or platform. Take a look at the Theatrefolk Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram pages. Notice that the username (Theatrefolk) and profile photos are all the same across each platform. • Don’t be stressed out by the term “content.” It sounds fancy, but it just means what you are sharing online: photos, videos, articles, and the written text that accompanies what you’re sharing. If you’ve heard the term “digital content creator,” what that really means is simply “someone who makes stuff to post online.” That’s you and your students – or it will be soon enough! • Think about what you post, when you post it, and the frequency of posts. Post too often, and not only do you push your own information out of peoples’ news feeds, but you risk annoying your audience. Post too irregularly, and people might forget your page exists. Try to create a manageable, regular posting schedule. If you can post on the first day of each month, do that. If you can do weekly posts each Tuesday morning at 11 am, even better. • Try to mix up what you are sharing. Text is the most basic method of sharing, but photos and videos grab much more attention and get the most likes and shares, particularly if they are photos and videos of your students. Sharing articles can be useful when they relate to what you’re working on in class. And of course, when you have a production coming up, you’ll definitely want to share fun content online to encourage ticket sales. You can (and should) also share student-created content. Show off what your students have been working on and learning in the drama classroom. • If you are sharing content that you yourself did not create (for example, a photo or video that someone else took/made), be sure to credit the source. It’s really easy just to hit the “Share” button, but it’s so important to give credit to the original creator of the content. If you are sharing student work, again, find out how to credit them safely and accurately. If your student Mary Green took a rehearsal photo that you’re sharing online, do you credit them as Mary Green, Mary, Mary G., M. Green, or simply “one of our grade 10 drama students”? • Before you share anything, do a double-check before you hit that Submit button. Make sure there are no spelling or grammar mistakes in any written material (including if the image or video includes text). Ensure that all pertinent information is included and accurate (for example, show dates and times, ticket prices, creator credits, etc.). • Finally, think about why you are posting what you are posting. What is the purpose? To inform, entertain, educate, promote, uplift? What is the tone of the post – positive or negative? If it is negative, is there a way to present it in a positive manner? Remember, when you are sharing content under your drama department account, you are representing your school. Keep it fun but still professional and appropriate.

In our last blog post, we talked about what digital citizenship in the drama classroom is. Teachers, let’s now take a look at your own digital citizenship skills and knowledge with this quiz. 1. What is your current relationship with digital media relating to your drama classroom? • (A) Little to nonexistent. I’m busy enough with my classroom responsibilities to have time to update a bunch of social media. • (B) Average. We have a drama department Facebook page or Twitter handle that I update every so often, when I remember. • (C) Good. I enjoy sharing classroom photos and articles that I think my students would enjoy to our social media pages on a regular basis. 2. How often do you post to your drama department’s social media channels? • (A) Hardly ever. I don’t even know if we have any. • (B) Whenever I feel like it. Sometimes it’s later in the day when I remember; sometimes I go a few weeks between posts. Other times I’ll share multiple posts per day. • (C) I have a regular posting schedule. I post at approximately around the same time each day/week for consistency. 3. Are you up on the latest social media trends and apps? • (A) Sort of. I’ve heard of them, but I don’t really use them myself. I don’t know how my students keep up with the constant changes. • (B) Mostly. I’ve got Facebook, Twitter and/or Instagram down. But beyond that it’s a lot to figure out. • (C) You bet. I wouldn’t consider myself an expert in all things social media, but I do speak with my students about what’s going on in the digital world to keep myself somewhat up to date. 4. Have you ever used digital media and/or technology in your drama classroom (outside of productions)? • (A) Yes – Well, if the overhead projector counts. • (B) Yes – I share and retweet my students’ posts to our drama department’s website and Facebook page. I’ve also found some free classroom materials online. (link to our blog) • (C) Yes – We’ve explored options like using apps such as Instagram Stories or Facebook Live to share projects and exercises online. I like to challenge my students to figure out ways of including digital sources in our drama classes. 5. How are your students using digital media in the drama classroom? • (A) I have no idea. My classroom is a phone-free zone. • (B) I have some idea. They’re always on their phones, sometimes for useful reasons, other times to just chat with friends. • (C) I’m on it. My students use their devices for a variety of purposes – research, learning about new theatrical shows, etc. But if the devices are a distraction, they have to be put away. 6. How did you use digital technology to publicize your last theatrical production? • (A) Sort of. I created a Facebook event and invited everyone on my friends list. • (B) Mostly. I created a Facebook event, and shared rehearsal photos and video clips to our social media channels every so often. • (C) You bet. I created a Facebook event, shared rehearsal photos and video clips on a regular basis throughout the process, and my students organized an Instagram takeover during show week. Take a look at your answers, and count your As, Bs, and Cs: A: ______ B: ______ C: ______ If you got mostly As:Your relationship with digital media could use some work. You might be too busy to maintain a drama department social media account, or you might be doubting your technology skills. Try to take some small steps towards growing your digital citizenship skills – talk with your colleagues and students, read some articles, explore different apps. Your students will undoubtedly benefit from seeing you learn more, and you can even work together with your students to improve your skills together. If you got mostly Bs:You’re on the right track. While you’re certainly not a digital slouch, you could use some tips on using social media consistently, getting the most out of digital resources, or incorporating digital media into the drama classroom. Try starting by asking your students how they use digital media and how they think it could be used in the drama classroom. If you got mostly Cs:You have a great handle on digital citizenship! You’re up to date on social media trends, you work to integrate technology into the drama classroom, and you have a healthy relationship with devices in the classroom. Your students are definitely learning a lot from your useful and positive digital skills. Keep working to stay current on digital trends, and keep up the great work!

Digital citizenship is all about the confident, positive, and safe use of digital technology both within and outside of the classroom for communication, collaboration, education, and entertainment. This encompasses a lot of different topics including (but not limited to): • Internet safety • Privacy and security • Safe and positive communication and etiquette • Online relationships and cyberbullying • Different methods of creating and consuming information • Authenticity of information • Credit and copyright issues In the drama classroom, teachers and students can use digital resources for a huge variety of tasks such as: • Sharing what you’re doing in drama class (classroom updates, photos, videos, and so on) • Promoting your upcoming productions • Communicating with group members and colleagues • Sharing information such as schedules, notes, and rehearsal videos • Doing research on theatrical topics • Finding classroom resources • Reading scripts online • Watching theatrical videos • Listening to musical soundtracks • And more! The Internet is ever-present in our daily lives and so incredibly easy to access – most students have smartphones and are constantly chatting, consuming, liking, sharing, subscribing, and even creating online. Ask your students if any of them currently have a creative online outlet, such as a YouTube channel, specialized Instagram profile, SoundCloud account, or other creative content that they’re willing to share. Find out what apps they’re using, and what’s the new “thing” currently. With the Internet, this is constantly changing and evolving. At the risk of sounding like a dinosaur, I remember when Facebook was known as “The Facebook” and you had to have a university or college email address to join. Nowadays, Facebook is for everyone, but most high school students don’t bother getting accounts anymore – it’s all about Instagram, VSCO, and Snapchat. Come back to this post in a month or so and those apps will probably be outdated already! Along with the constant changes to the digital landscape, common digital citizenship issues within the drama classroom include: • Finding and using resources ethically and legally. It’s so easy to bootleg music, watch illegal recordings of Broadway shows, download and share scripts and scores without paying for rights, and so on. Are you going through the correct channels to obtain classroom materials, purchase scripts and scores, and access the videos and songs you wish to consume? Theft is theft, whether it is physical or digital. • Locating and citing sources accurately. Plagiarism is really easy to do with online sources, and it’s also easy to find sources that turn out to be inaccurate. Websites like Wikipedia can be edited by anyone, which means that the information found there can be incomplete, biased, or entirely wrong. And with free and simple website-building sites, anyone can buy a domain, throw some HTML together, upload some content, and claim to be an expert. It’s very important to ensure that the information students are consuming (and you, as teachers, are sharing) is legitimate. • How and when to share classroom and production content. Does your drama department have an online presence? Do you share useful articles and videos with your students? Does your local community know about your upcoming productions? Do you have a departmental website? Is your online footprint non-existent or do you bombard your followers with multiple posts per day? Do you need to brush up on your own digital skills? • How your students are using digital technology. Look at the five W’s when considering how your students use and approach digital citizenship in the drama classroom. • Where and When are students using their devices? Is it interfering with class work or rehearsal time? Are they using classroom-approved devices, or are they hiding their smartphones on their laps? • What are they using their devices for? Is it legitimate classroom work or are they just sending silly photos to their friends? • Who are they chatting with online? Are they talking with people they’ve only met online, or are these “IRL” (in real life) friends? Are the people that students are interacting with actually who they say they are? • Why are they interacting with technology the way they are? Do they have a positive digital footprint? Are they using apps and digital media for good purposes or for negativity? Why are they choosing to share what they share? (Students may not realize that everything you share online is there for good – even if you think you’ve deleted it. This is part of the concept of digital permanence.) • School-wide digital policies. What are the rules, regulations, and policies for your school? Where are they found? Do they differ from other schools in the area? What are the consequences of breaking digital rules and regulations? Are the consequences plainly described, or do you only find out after a rule is broken? Does your school have specific communication methods or apps that may or may not be used (such as teacher websites, specific digital classrooms, Facebook and/or Twitter pages, and so on)? How are students and teachers held accountable for their use of digital resources? When approaching digital citizenship with your drama students, it’s important to first assess and reflect upon your own thoughts about and uses of digital technology. Use the included Reflection to assist with this.

Episode 180: Technology in the Theatre Classroom Have you wanted to find some new ways to enhance your classroom with technology? Have you been told you need to integrate technology in your classroom but don’t know where to start or what would even make sense to use in the drama classroom? Anna Porter was in the same boat. She started by getting an endorsement in educational technology and a whole world opened up. Listen in to find out how you too can incorporate technology into the theatre classroom.

Drama teacher Joshua Hatt started using Google Drive as a response to the frustration of having his students lose curriculum booklets time and time again. His work developed into a powerful online home whereby students and teachers can communicate, contribute, collaborate, edit, and house all their documents online. Here, Josh shares 5 reasons why you should incorporate the online Journal (using Google Drive) into your classroom. Check out his course, Google Drive in the Drama Classroom, in the Drama Teacher Academy! 1. Harness the power of reflection.• Reflection is such a powerful tool in the drama classroom. Students who can reflect and use their analytical skills are the students who learn and can connect their drama to various situations in real-life contexts. • Thoughtful journalers are better prepared to articulate their intentions, plans and goals. They can also distinguish between needs and wants in a performance, based on the experiences with devising script work and improvisations. • Online journalling takes it to the next level! 2. Plan with the end in mind.• Presenting an online journal workbook at the beginning of the year helps both you, the teacher, and your students stay on track. • As educators, we always need to know where our students should end up in order to scaffold them correctly. A journal helps get us there. 3. Don’t lose any papers!• By moving to an online journal through Google, students are able to reflect on their work using actual photographs, video files, and audio as tools for more meaningful reflection exercises. • Creating this online resource means no more carting journals back and forth, having students lose their curriculum books, or wasted time hunting through files. It’s all right there on Google Drive, 24/7. 4. Engage in meaningful, timely feedback.• Google Docs allow for ‘commenting’ by anyone sharing the document – it’s a teacher’s feedback dream come true! • This real-time function allows you the opportunity to communicate with your students right away. Rather than giving them feedback formatively and having to wait until you cart your journals all the way back to the classroom, they get feedback instantly and can access it anywhere! 5. Collaborate in real time, wherever you are!• Students these days are all about chat and text – that’s their online language. If you’re using Google for journalling, you can enable the Chat feature and you can actually chat with your students live as they work. • Another way to use this feature is to set up some online office hours. You can access the journal from wherever you are. Students can ask you questions in the chat forum and get instant help. • Students can even chat with each other if they are sharing their journals with each other – amazing for collaboration. Are you sold? Are you ready to implement Google Drive in your classroom and try the online journal approach? Click here to see an example of a Journal you can use on Google Drive for drama students. If you want to learn more and get the hands-on skills to implement this in your classroom, check out Josh’s course Google Drive in the Drama Classroom, available at the Drama Teacher Academy – for a preview, see the video below!

Awhile back, The Guardian compiled five of “the best video talks on theatre” and I wanted to share them with you as well. The article asks the question: “How can the performing arts compete against technology?” I wonder if that’s the right question to ask. In fact, it seems pretty odd to me because “compete” is really the wrong word. Theatre competing against technology, who would win that fight? The spry young whippersnapper, always moving, always bobbing? Or the elder statesman who knows exactly when to punch? My bias may be with the elder statesman, except for the fact that I love the technological world we live in today. Technology is an effective complement to almost every step of my playwriting process. I use technology for everything from helping with research, to writing drafts, to organizing workshops to posting production photos. And though many writers did just fine for hundreds of years before the technological age, I would not want to write without it. Why do theatre and technology have to be thrown into an adversarial role? Why do they have to compete? Why can’t the two co-exist? And within the question of how the performing arts can compete against technology, what kind of technology is being referenced? Technology today has a sprawling reach – it encompasses so many things, so many pieces of machinery, so many nuts, bolts and computer sparks flying through space, zinging up and down wires. What exactly about technology is in competition with the theatre? Is it idea vs idea? Is it machine vs building? Is it screens vs the stage? There are so many technological elements that have been such a help and support to the theatre – the light and sound areas alone are astounding. We can create worlds through pools of light, projections, and soundscapes like never before. Does technology here mean eyeballs on a medium? Does technology win because fancy bells and whistles capture more eyeballs than theatre does? The death of theatre has long been predicted and it hasn’t happened yet. Further to that, in some circles, to compete is to suggest a winner. But how can you have a winner when the two objects are apples and oranges? They aren’t on the same playing field, so to pit one against the other seems, well, useless and unproductive. What do you think? How can the performing arts compete against technology? Is the question viable? Or does the question miss the boat on the relationship between theatre and technology? Exercise :For our students, any competition between theatre and technology is a non-sequitur. Technology is a part of their life and they expect to see it as part of their theatre. To that end, use this exercise with your students. Divide your students into groups. All of the groups are going to get the same story: a storm. It can be a tornado, a hurricane, a blizzard. The characters have to be in the middle of the storm (so no hiding in a root cellar while a tornado passes by off stage) and we have to see the storm on stage. Decide on what kind of storm, the characters involved, and the location. Divide the groups in half. • The first group of students get the direction: No technology. They’re not allowed to use lights, recorded sound effects, music, or projections. The storm must be created using just the actors and raw materials (fabric would be allowed but printed pictures would not). They can’t use technology in any way. • The second group gets the direction: All technology. They must use technology to support their scene – projections, sound effects, lighting effects. They can’t use traditional theatre techniques (like using fabric to show waves). The actors can say their lines, but they can’t use action to create their visuals – it has to be shown through technology. The aim of the exercise is to go to the extreme on both sides of the coin : all technology or no technology. Students may get frustrated by what they can or cannot do and that’s part of the exercise. How do they meet the challenge? On the technology side, it’s important to emphasize that it’s not the sophistication of the final product that counts but the approach. Maybe you don’t have a screen for projections, but students could certainly create a slide deck on a computer. This is not an exercise to prove one method is better than the other. To that end, assess this as a process-over-product exercise with a participation rubric. Each group decides how they’re going to tackle the challenge, rehearses and presents. After the presentation, discuss the place of technology in the theatre. What worked? What wasn’t as successful? Is it more effective to use a piece of fabric to show a wave or to show a picture? Which is more theatrical? Why? Is it better to combine methods?