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When teaching classes via video conferencing, it’s good to think about what’s going on behind you. This doesn’t mean pets walking through your virtual classroom or visible piles of laundry in view of your camera, although those should probably be kept out of view as much as possible! Having an interesting and creative background can grab students’ attention, be a conversation starter, or make them laugh. It’s also fun to switch things up and create a fresh atmosphere for your virtual classroom.

Virtual productions are popping up everywhere now, specifically designed to be performed online, and they are a wonderful way to keep your students together and keep their love of theatre going – just in a different way. If you’re thinking about doing a virtual production, here are a few tips to help you on your way.

This production situation analysis allows a class to determine their needs, before they start a production class.

This handout names and describes the structural elements of a script: character, objective, obstacle, tactics, and resolution.

The experiences detailed here can be used during online sessions for Warm-ups, Collaboration, Cool Downs. Students experience the 21st Century Skills-Creative Thinking, Critical Thinking, Communication and Collaboration (by distance).

The study guide provides the following: pre-viewing questions, viewing questions, and post-viewing activities.

The goal of this distance learning exercise is to help students become more aware of their body language in the virtual classroom (both conscious and unconscious) and how it makes others perceive them. Students have to turn their cameras on to participate, but it is fairly low-risk as they will complete the movement portion as a group, and they don’t need to have their microphones on.

Use this journal to take some quick notes in the moment for your lessons. What worked? What didn’t? How did your time management on paper work in real time with students? This way when you’re ready to assess your curriculum in full, you’ll have a good picture of the individual pieces and where changes need to be made.

10 Tips for Online Performances

It’s important to keep track of your own personal journey as you step into the classroom for the first time. This way, you have a document you can use to review and reflect on at the end of the year. You don’t have to write volumes every day. Just enough to jog your brain and help you take steps to continue doing something or change something for the next school year. There are two months worth of daily journal pages and weekly reflection pages in this journal. Save/copy a blank one so you can continue recording your personal journey!

In this toolkit you’ll find exercises, activities, and information that will help you get you through your first days, build your classroom management skills, and articulate the importance of your program.

Gai Jones, long time theatre educator, a member of many educational theatre associations, and an advocate of theatre competitions with sound educational theatre values, has developed this resource. Competitions are opportunities for students to succeed. Competitions encourage students to work toward a standard and goals. Evaluation can take the form of both formative and summative assessments. Competitions provide learning beyond the classroom as students are exposed to many types of performances and take part in receiving evaluations. This resource was created to help drama teachers consider these goals when taking students to competition (or not): • Celebrating growth and student success. • Learning how to evaluate judges’ comments. • Helping students develop strategies for competition stress. • Providing learning experiences beyond the classroom.

This packet includes an introduction for the teacher, and cover sheet for the student, to assign the Playwriting Part One packet for at-home distance learning, without technology.

This packet includes an introduction for the teacher, and cover sheet for the student, to assign the packet for at-home distance learning, without technology. There are many theatre professions that are necessary to the smooth running of a production but remain out of the spotlight. In this packet, students gain comprehension of some of those roles. Students will read articles on a variety of different roles in theatre, answer questions, complete an activity, and reflect on their learning.

Now that video conferencing is becoming a thing of the present, what etiquette rules need to be put into place for you and your students? You discuss many types of etiquette rules with your students: classroom etiquette rules, performance etiquette, audience etiquette - what about video conferencing etiquette?

A description of activities to do with students over video-conferencing.

This classroom movie study guide looks specifically at the 2013 filmed version of the live musical Shrek. The musical is based on the 2001 movie of the same name. The study guide provides the following: pre-viewing questions, viewing questions, and post-viewing activities.

The study guide provides the following: pre-viewing questions, viewing questions, and post-viewing activities.

This classroom movie study guide looks specifically at the 2007 movie version of the musical Hairspray. The film is based on the 2002 Broadway musical of the same name, which in turn was based on John Waters’ 1988 comedy film of the same name. The study guide provides the following: pre-viewing questions, viewing questions, and post-viewing activities.

The study guide provides the following: pre-viewing questions, viewing questions, and post-viewing activities.