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Students often rely on their verbal skills to tell a story. They “tell” us what’s happening instead of “showing” us what’s happening. “Show don’t tell” is a guiding principle in theatrical storytelling. We want to see what’s happening to characters as they experience it. We don’t want to hear characters explain the story or what they’re feeling. This lesson plan will put this principle into action through the exercise Silent Story.

Students will watch some of a workshop in acting for the camera and do some exercises that help them practice some of the differences between stage acting and film acting.

This can be a standalone lesson, or an add-on to the unit. It introduces the concept of the 3 V's: VIEWERS are looking for a VICARIOUS, VULNERABLE, and/or VISCERAL experience.

Introduce your students to Uta Hagen and the nine questions she uses for character development.

Students will create their own improvisational piece to an African fable called “Anansi: The Spider.” This lesson explores the different ways to tell a story through storytelling improvisation, which allows students to discover different movements, voices, and listening skills. In African theatre, there are many ways to tell a story; improv is often used when learning about fables.

In this sixth lesson, students continue to practice classroom norms and continue to practice giving strong feedback. In the performance task, students will give peers strong feedback through using body language and vocal tone to encourage and show eagerness for peers to improve.

Students will understand the importance of actively listening and using active listening to inform their character choices in performance. They will participate in listening exercises and apply active listening to their scene work.

Students use narration, dialogue and mime in this skit sequence where a character teaches the audience to be like them. Each skit has three scenes, two narration/acted out instruction scenes and one dream sequence. The teacher models this activity narrating different scenes of what it takes to "be" like him/her. They include students in the scenes, prompting them to act out his/her narration. The teacher emphasizes how the first two scenes include narration, and then dialogue when students "act out" the activity. The third scene, the dream sequences involves narration as the main character tells their dream, and mime as students act out the mime. Once students have participated in the teacher's model, they are divided into groups and put together a "Being Blank" scene sequences for themselves.

Improvising in pairs is an excellent training ground to improve listening and cooperation skills, and to practice exploring character and conflict. Students will read and respond to a Duet Improv introduction sheet, then apply their knowledge through pairs Improv exercises and reflect on the experience.

Use this lesson plan as a response activity connected to viewing a video of a musical in class. For example: At the end of semester or if you need a lesson plan during tech week - watch the musical and then do the exercise. After viewing a musical, students will exhibit their ability to analyze a specific character from a musical by creating a visual character profile.

Students will read an information sheet on Constantin Stanislavsky. They will then apply their knowledge in exercises and a topic quiz. Bonus exercise! A Reflection.

There are a number of different acting techniques: Method, Stanislavski, Viewpoints, Meisner, Viola Spolin. Use this lesson plan as an introduction to a specific technique. Instead of learning by lecture, have students learn by doing. The Relaxation Exercise encourages students to focus on relaxing the body part by part. The Animal Exercise encourages students to observe an animal, take on the characteristics of an animal and reflect on how animal exploration would be helpful in character development.

Students continue their exploration with script analysis by learning about objective, obstacle, stakes, and tactics and applying it to an exercise.

This is a great exercise when students are in the middle of preparing a monologue. Students will apply variety to a monologue in the following ways: - Variety of pace (choosing a line to slow down or a place to pause) - Variety of tone (choosing a line to deliver with an opposite tone) Includes two sample monologues.

Students will practice the techniques of choral speaking with a variety of pieces and applying specific vocal tools (volume, pitch, rhythm, emphasis) culminating in a assessed presentation.

In this lesson, students will first work in groups to create a pantomime called “Trapped.” The requirements of the pantomime mimic the elements of plot structure but shhhh, they don’t know that yet. Let them first enjoy the pantomime and then spring it on them that they just learned something.

It’s important for students to be aware of both onstage and offstage theatre roles. But applying stage management tasks to a classroom setting is not always easy to do. The Stage Management Calls Game gives students a practical way to hear and react to the various things a stage manager may say during a rehearsal or technical rehearsal.

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Students will demonstrate their ability to physically achieve an objective by using their bodies in a musical scene.

Students will block/stage their original musicals by planning and rehearsing the movement for the dialogue.