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develop self-discipline
UNIT
Part of the Drama Two Curriculum
Devising
by Corinna Rezzelle
While the Drama Two Curriculum has a focus on acting, it’s always important to include a unit on the technical theatre skills that are necessary to any production. Students will also be able to use what they’ve learned in this unit in their upcoming devising project.
Students will begin by exploring design for the stage by experimenting with line, shape, texture, size, and color. They will expand their understanding of stage properties and scenic flats. They will then apply their knowledge of these building blocks of design to create a high-concept design for a miniature “stage.”
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UNIT
Part of the Drama One Curriculum
Stage Movement
by Karen Loftus
Students will get “onstage.” They will explore what is important for onstage action, the basics of stage directions, and how to keep open. This unit will culminate with students trying out what they’ve learned in a short scene.
This unit is more about the technicalities of moving on stage. By giving students something concrete to focus on, it allows them to overcome any stage fright.
Ensemble-building exercises are also included in this unit. If you have time at the end of a lesson after you’ve completed your instruction and are wondering what to do, you can never go wrong with an ensemble-building exercise!
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UNIT
Part of the Drama One Curriculum
Pantomime
by Karen Loftus
In this unit, students will explore nonverbal communication: first, through body language and gesture, and then through the specific art of pantomime. Students will learn hand position, tension, follow-through, and action/reaction/interaction with objects through warm-up games and exercises. The unit culminates in a two-person pantomime performance.
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UNIT
Part of the Drama One Curriculum
Voice
by Karen Loftus
This unit focuses specifically on the technical aspects of vocal production. By understanding how voice is created, students will be more aware of how to improve their vocal production. Students will explore posture and breathing exercises, as well as how to use the diaphragm, projection, and articulation. The final project will test students’ ability to properly project and articulate a joke across a large space.
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UNIT
Part of the Drama One Curriculum
Ancient Greek Theatre
by Karen Loftus
This unit on Ancient Greek theatre focuses on the function of the chorus, the choral ode, and the details of the theatre space. It touches on plays and playwrights of the era, culminating in a final project of a modern version of Medea that includes a choral ode.
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UNIT
Part of the Drama One Curriculum
Improvisation
by Karen Loftus
Students sharpen their listening and reaction skills through improv games, exercises, and scenes. They will learn five specific guidelines to apply to their improvisation: accept the offer, bring information to the scene, make active choices, make your partner look good, and don’t force the humour.
There are so many different ways to approach a unit on improvisation. Keep in mind that you will have students who are really excited about this unit and some students who dread it. It’s best to start with low-risk games and exercises and then build up to higher-risk ones. Low-risk games in this situation mean partnered interactions that aren’t shared with the whole class.
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UNIT
Part of the Drama One Curriculum
Commedia Dell'Arte
by Karen Loftus
Students will discover, analyze, and explore the history, characters, and style of commedia dell’arte.
Commedia dell’arte is a theatre history unit mixed with improvisation, physicalization, and exploring specific characters. In this unit, we’re going to focus on three main aspects:
1. Causes and Effects of Commedia (History)
2. Stock Characters
3. Commedia Performance Practices
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UNIT
Part of the Drama One Curriculum
Elizabethan Theatre
by Karen Loftus
How do you introduce students to Shakespeare? This unit introduces the Bard through life in Elizabethan England and the playwrights, players, and playhouses. It also explores how to approach unfamiliar words and context clues in Shakespeare’s texts.
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UNIT
Part of the Drama One Curriculum
Playwriting
by Karen Loftus
Students will explore the structural elements of a play: character, objective, obstacles, tactics, resolution, and raising the stakes. They will also learn how to write character-driven dialogue and stage directions. Students will work in groups to create and present a short play.
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UNIT
Part of the Drama One Curriculum
Japanese Theatre
by Karen Loftus
This unit will enable students to identify, compare, and contrast three different styles of Japanese theatre: Noh, Bunraku, and Kabuki. There are three proposed projects in this unit: a research assignment where groups delve into further detail about one of the three styles; a performance project where students utilize what they’ve learned by enacting a scene from a Kyogen (comedic) play; and a Bunraku puppet play.
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UNIT
Part of the Drama One Curriculum
Scenic Design
by Karen Loftus
This unit will focus on the basics: what is scenic design? How do the scenic designer and director collaborate? What is the process that the scenic designer goes through? The unit will also explore basic drafting techniques, and rendering techniques.
Based on what they learn, students will create a ground plan and a rendering. Please refer to the Pacing Guide for more details and ways to supplement with other DTA materials.
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UNIT
Part of the Drama One Curriculum
Front of House
by Karen Loftus
This unit looks at theatre jobs in the business category: front of house, marketing, and box office. The aim of these jobs is to interact with the public. Students are able to identify what “front of house” refers to and understand the various roles of a theatre company’s front of house members.
Students will also explore how a show is marketed and demonstrate their knowledge of marketing by creating a simple marketing campaign for an original show.
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UNIT
Part of the Drama One Curriculum
Drama One Final Project
by Karen Loftus
The final project will incorporate multiple areas that students have studied over the course of the year/semester: playwriting, acting, scenic design, and marketing. They are putting everything they’ve learned into a final package, including writing, rehearsing, and performing.
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UNIT
Musical Theatre
by Anna Porter
Musical Theatre has two components that separate it from straight plays: song and dance. This unit gives students the opportunity to try out both. In musical theatre, music signifies heightened emotion. We can’t express ourselves with just words, we need music (and through extension, song and dance) to take it further.
This unit includes three lesson plans:
1. Acting the Song - “Musical Tactics”
2. Acting the Song - “Textual Analysis”
3. Introduction to Dance
A solo performance assignment is also included, and the unit includes assessment tools - rubrics, reflections, and self-evaluations.
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UNIT
Mock Audition
by Lindsay Price
In this Mock Audition Unit, students will start by discussing the audition process. They will make connections between their personal views and the process. Students will then apply the steps of auditioning from putting together a resume, to choosing a piece based on provided information, to audition etiquette, to the actual audition itself. A final reflection and rubric are provided for use at the end of this unit.
A short play is included that can be used as the source material. You can also choose your own play for this process.
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UNIT
Monologue Writing Made Easy
by Matthew Banaszynski
Join Matt Banaszynski in this dynamic unit designed to introduce students to the process of starting, drafting, polishing, and performing a self-created, stand-alone monologue.
This unit introduces students to writing their own stand-alone monologues. Students will learn the steps involved in going from a simple idea to a written piece to performing that piece. They will also provide feedback to others and give themselves a self-assessment.
This unit has been prepared for a middle school drama class but could be adapted for high school. It was designed as a way to get non-theatre students more involved in theatre.
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UNIT
Voice
by Anna Porter
In this unit, students will be introduced to a key element of performance: the voice. Students will explore how to thoughtfully communicate character, story, and emotion vocally. Students will begin by exploring articulation so that they understand the importance of clearly communicating their words onstage. They will further build on this with the following lesson on the different vocal varieties of pitch, tone, rate, and volume.
The final lesson helps students explore vocal characterization as well as the details and layers that can bring that character to life vocally. This unit study of the voice culminates in a final puppet show where students are asked to bring a story and character to life by using vocal variety, articulation, and characterization.
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UNIT
Puppetry
by Jenny Goodfellow
This unit on Puppetry is designed for middle school and up, to introduce students to the material and get them comfortable with performing in a safe and low exposure environment.
This is a unit that builds to a culminating experience for your students. Each lesson is designed to explore techniques, provide opportunities for creative collaboration among your students, and give them opportunities to perform. Some of the lessons require materials to build or create puppets. Puppetry can be as easy as drawing a face on your finger for finger puppets, to actually purchasing your own finger puppets for students to use.
While the focus of this unit is puppetry, your students will explore other skills as well. There’s the obvious ones of creative thinking, teamwork, and problem solving. They are also going to explore storytelling, performing skills, and playwriting.
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UNIT
Theatre of the Absurd
by Lea Marshall
WARNING: This unit is ABSURD. However, instructor Lea Marshall decided to do something really ABSURD with the unit, which was make it a bit more predictable. First, the unit takes two lessons to go over the Historical and Philosophical background of Theatre of the Absurd. It starts with just a visual exercise to really bring students into the emotional bleakness of the landscape and then group work to look at some of the other foundational elements that will drive the Absurdist movement into the Theatres.
Next, students break down absurd scripts into some “recognizable” elements of language, plot structure, acting choices, and storyline. With each lesson that introduces an Absurdist Element, there is an opportunity for students to “play” with the element. Then, students explore the element through an Absurdist text. This will help familiarize the students with the 4 Absurdist scripts used in the unit. These bite sized forays into the scripts will help students to choose a script to fully immerse themselves in for the final project.
As a final project, students will choose one script to work with, and choose the format of their project (performance, costume or set design, or playwright).
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UNIT
Agatha Rex and Ancient Greek Theatre
by Angel Borths
Help…It’s all Greek to me! Join Angel Borths in this unit that uses a modern adaptation of the Ancient Greek play Antigone to introduce Middle School students to Ancient Greek Theatre.
Have your students read Percy Jackson and want to find out more about Ancient Greece? Then, this unit is for you. This unit is designed for middle and high school students and will take you through the basics of classical Greek theatre and pairs it with a modern adaptation of the story of Antigone called Agatha Rex by Lindsay Price. Students will learn vocabulary, design, and basic theory surrounding classical Greek theatre. Students will also enjoy the mask building component of this unit, as they learn to disappear into the character of a mask, like the first actors did on a Greek stage thousands of years ago.
The unit culminates in a scene performance with masks.
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UNIT
Shakespeare Performance
by Anna Porter
In this unit by Anna Porter, students are introduced to the works of Shakespeare and explore how to bring a character to life in a monologue performance. Students are also introduced to the tools to help them unlock meaning in Shakespeare’s text. Through this eleven lesson series, students will participate in class discussions, activities and performance. Assessment tools include informal assessment, submission of textual analysis work and a final performance.
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UNIT
Unlocking Shakespeare's Text
by Anna Porter
Shakespeare’s text holds valuable tools that students can use to unlock and understand meaning. In this unit by Anna Porter, students explore how to use the tools of research, context, textual analysis, imagery and punctuation to help them unlock meaning in Shakespeare’s text. This unit is created for an Intermediate to Advanced drama class with a basic background in plot structure and acting technique.
Through this five lesson series, students will use journals, participate in class discussions, activities and performance to explore the tools used to unlock a text. Assessment tools include informal assessment as well as a final group presentation and performance.
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UNIT
Pantomime
by Anna Porter
In this unit, students explore how to communicate with their body by exploring elements of physicality and Pantomime. Lesson one helps students explore body awareness as well as the use of the senses and details in pantomime performance. In lesson two, students explore body language and how it is used to communicate by examining the art of flirting. Lesson three helps students create a distinct physical characterization. Lesson four introduces students to the quality of Pantomime – Consistency. In lesson five, students explore the quality of exaggeration in pantomime. In the final lesson, students prepare a pantomime story for performance.
Through this six lesson series, students will use journals, participate in class discussions and practice the elements taught by performing for their peers and as a class. Assessment tools include both informal assessment as well as a final Pantomime performance.
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UNIT
Part of the Drama Two Curriculum
Character Analysis - Part 1
by Matt Webster
The Drama Two Curriculum has been developed to expand and deepen students’ skills as artists. In this unit, students will explore character analysis, which is key to developing three-dimensional characters in monologues, scenes, and plays. In Part 1, they will start with Uta Hagen’s nine questions for character analysis.
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UNIT
Part of the Drama Two Curriculum
Monologues - Part 2
by Matt Webster
In Part 2 of the Monologue Unit (Monologue Project: Analysis, Writing, and Performance), students analyze an existing monologue to determine the criteria for a “good” monologue. They will then apply what they learned in Part 1 (Monologue Writing Made Easy), adding in the criteria for a “good” monologue, to write and perform an original monologue.
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UNIT
Part of the Drama Two Curriculum
Performing Shakespeare
by Matt Webster
In this unit, students are introduced to a series of lesson plans that explore non-traditional approaches to performing the works of William Shakespeare. By the end of the unit students will be exposed to a unique set of tools they can utilize as the foundations for analyzing, staging and performing a scene from Shakespeare’s canon. Students will then rehearse and perform a two-person Shakespearean scene.
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UNIT
Part of the Technical Theatre Mini Units Curriculum
Sound
by Josh Hatt
This is an introductory mini-unit to sound that you can use whether or not you have a sound system. Students will work toward being able to demonstrate their knowledge of sound effectiveness.
The questions of the unit include: What is effective sound? What sounds and music do we need in order to make our scene effective? How will we know our sound cues are effective?
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UNIT
Part of the Technical Theatre Mini Units Curriculum
Costuming
by Josh Hatt
If the costumes in a play are going to be effective, we need to be thoughtful about how we use them.
In this mini-unit, students will demonstrate their understanding costume effectiveness and address the following questions: What is the role of costume in the performance? How does color contribute? How does the style of costume affect a performance? How does costume indicate setting? Do you need costumes in a scene?
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UNIT
Part of the Technical Theatre Mini Units Curriculum
Staging
by Josh Hatt
This is a mini-unit on staging. Along with the driving question for the unit, students will explore about how staging affects the performance. Students will draw a plot design (ground plan) to emphasize the need to plan where scenic elements will be placed. They will also practice taking cues from the script, in order to create staging.
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UNIT
Part of the Technical Theatre Mini Units Curriculum
Free Play Makeup
by Josh Hatt
This is a student centred mini-unit on makeup design. Makeup is useful in transporting an audience to a different world.
The purpose is for students to understand that makeup is a tool that theatre technicians can use in order to contribute to effective performance aesthetics; to understand basic makeup rules and care instruction; to understand how to complete a makeup design plot; to look at a project and figure out for themselves what they need to succeed.
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UNIT
Part of the Technical Theatre Mini Units Curriculum
Culminating Project
by Josh Hatt
Once students have completed the five Tech Theatre Units (Lighting, Sound, Costume, Staging, Free Play Makeup), you can give them this culminating project.
Depending on how you structured your technical theatre unit, you can adapt this project to suit your needs and context.
Up to this point, all the work in the units have been exploratory. This is where students will apply their skills and knowledge.
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UNIT
Tools of Scene Work
by Anna Porter
Students are introduced to scene work performance through a simple, contentless scene unit. In this unit, performers will use exercises like “Show and Tell” to learn how to fill in the gaps of a story by creating scenarios and detailed characters with backgrounds.
Students will further fill in the gaps by exploring environmental and physical conflict as well as stage business. The lesson “Thou Shalts of Staging” will guide students through basic staging and performance technique.
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UNIT
Part of the Production Classroom Units Curriculum
Production Classroom Units Overview
by Karen Loftus
The overview lays out the all of the parts of The Production Classroom Units - which is divided into three parts.
In Part One, you’ll take your students through a series of pre-production units designed to help students gain as much comprehension as possible about putting on a successful production.
Part Two offers articles on each step in the process, samples and forms, a suggested pacing, role definitions and task checklists, an outline for a typical class, as well as performance duties. This section also outlines the assessment piece for The Production Classroom – the production binder.
Part Three provides a Post-Performance Reflection. Unpack the experience with students, reflect back on what went right and what could be changed for next time. A written Reflection is included as well as a Rubric for student production binders.
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UNIT
Part of the Production Classroom Units Curriculum
Part One - Pre-Production
by Karen Loftus
In Part One of The Production Classroom, you’ll take your students through a series of pre-production units designed to help students gain as much comprehension as possible about putting on a successful production.
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UNIT
Part of the Production Classroom Units Curriculum
Part Two - Rehearsal and Performance
by Karen Loftus
Part Two offers articles on each step in the process, samples and forms, a suggested pacing, role definitions and task checklists, an outline for a typical class, as well as performance duties. This section also outlines the assessment piece for The Production Classroom – the production binder.
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UNIT
Part of the Production Classroom Units Curriculum
Part Two - Documents
by Karen Loftus
This section provides samples and worksheets for actor forms, costume department, general binder, lighting and sound, marketing samples, scenic and prop samples, and stage management and production manager samples and forms.
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UNIT
Part of the Production Classroom Units Curriculum
Part Three - Reflection and Assessment
by Karen Loftus
Part Three provides a Post-Performance Reflection. Unpack the experience with students, reflect back on what went right and what could be changed for next time. A written Reflection is included as well as a Rubric for student production binders.
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UNIT
Theatre Etiquette
by Kerry Hishon
When teaching students who are brand new to theatre, it’s important to discuss and apply the expectations of the drama classroom and the theatrical world. How do you implement and instill theatre etiquette in your classroom and your rehearsals – before a show and backstage? A cohesive theatrical community starts with the rules and codes of behaviour both onstage and off.
Topics covered within the unit include: What is Etiquette, Real World vs Theatre World Etiquette, Audience Etiquette, Audition Etiquette, Pre-Show and Performance Etiquette. The unit ends with a culminating activity which included a rubric and reflection.
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UNIT
Improvisation in Musical Theatre
by Annie Dragoo
Understanding basic improvisation skills will help musical theatre performers understand that musical theatre is more than just singing and dancing. It’s about using all the tools (voice, body, and mind) an actor has at their disposal to create a character.
This unit focuses more on the improv aspect rather than the musical theatre aspects - in fact students need no prior musical theatre knowledge. Annie Dragoo, creator of the unit, uses this material as her first unit in her musical theatre class. It’s a great introduction and will get your students in the right frame of mind to approach musical theatre.
The lessons explore a variety of improv skills such as vocal responses, movement, character study, sensory awareness and culminate in an improv scene and unit essay.
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UNIT
Part of the Middle School Curriculum
Unit One: Ensemble Building and Class Norms
by Lindsay Johnson
This unit has six lessons that you can use in the first week of your middle school program. What do you do in the first week? The most important elements are creating routines such as journal prompts, opening and closing circles, and giving strong feedback; creating an ensemble and ensemble-building games; and introducing a Weekly Ensemble Rubric.
Students will define and build ensemble as a group, learning specific ways they can SAY YES and BE SAFE in class. They will understand the daily grading system and the basic routines of class. Finally, students will learn to give strong feedback by connecting specific evidence from performance to the Rubric language.
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UNIT
Part of the Middle School Curriculum
Unit Two: Improvisation Basics
by Lindsay Johnson
In this unit, students will learn, practice and apply three important rules of improv: accepting and building on offers, quick thinking, and strong offers. For each step, they will work with the Improvisation Rubric by both giving and receiving feedback. Students will also start to practice techniques to improve their vocal clarity. The unit culminates in a performance assessment in which students will play an improv game in front of an audience.
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UNIT
Part of the Middle School Curriculum
Unit Three: Building Improvised Scenes
by Lindsay Johnson
Students will understand the basic building blocks of a scene: The Who (characters/ relationship), the Where (setting), and the What (conflict – objectives/tactics). They will learn how to use both verbal and nonverbal (pantomime) clues to communicate these scene details to an audience. They will continue to work on voice clarity, while also learning to open their body to an audience. The unit culminates in a performance assessment in which students work in pairs to improvise a scene.
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UNIT
Part of the Middle School Curriculum
Unit Four: Intro to Scripted Scenes
by Lindsay Johnson
Students will be introduced to the most basic of scripts: the contentless/open scene script. They will use their knowledge of character/relationships, setting, objective, and tactics to add content to a contentless scene. Students will also learn the basics of set design and blocking, and will begin using voice expression to communicate clearer characters. The unit culminates in a performance assessment in which students will work in pairs to add content to and perform a contentless scene.
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UNIT
Part of the Stagecraft Without a Theatre Curriculum
Props
by Karen Loftus and Kerry Hishon
Students will identify categories of props and which people create or obtain props. They’ll analyze a script for needed props, use critical-thinking skills to problem solve prop issues, and create a prop.
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UNIT
Part of the Stagecraft Without a Theatre Curriculum
Lighting
by Karen Loftus, Josh Hatt, and Kerry Hishon
Students will be able to demonstrate their knowledge of lighting effectiveness. They’ll also be able to identify, analyze, and evaluate how lighting is used in a theatre production.
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UNIT
Part of the Stagecraft Without a Theatre Curriculum
Sound
by Karen Loftus and Josh Hatt
Students will be able to demonstrate their knowledge of sound effectiveness. How do we use sound to create a technically effective performance?
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UNIT
Part of the Stagecraft Without a Theatre Curriculum
Costume Design
by Holly Beardsley, Karen Loftus, and Josh Hatt
Students are exposed to research, concepts, and skill sets while they explore costume design and the different roles of the costume designer and the costumer. They will be able to demonstrate their knowledge of costume effectiveness.
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UNIT
Part of the Stagecraft Without a Theatre Curriculum
Make-Up Design
by Karen Loftus and Josh Hatt
Students will be able to explore the use of make-up as a theatrical tool and demonstrate their knowledge of make-up effectiveness.
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UNIT
Part of the Stagecraft Without a Theatre Curriculum
Culminating Project
by Karen Loftus
Now it’s time for your students to take everything they’ve learned and creatively apply those skills. The goal is for students to take what they’ve been exposed to, explored, and researched about each of the arts and crafts of technical theatre and apply it to a project.
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UNIT
Creating a Musical: Project
by Annie Dragoo
Want a fun project that has your students collaborating and creating? In this unit by Annie Dragoo, students in groups will write and perform an original musical by adding modern songs to a traditional fairy tale story.
The six lessons take students from writing their script, to choreography and planned movement, to rehearsing, performing and evaluation.
The Rubric will focus on student performance. That means vocal delivery, emotional delivery, blocking/choreography, energy, focus, and characters.
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UNIT
Creating Your Own Musical
by Laramie Dean
Instructor Laramie Dean uses this unit as the final project for his Drama 2 students. Drawing upon any of the skills students have developed throughout they create a product that could be used within a new piece of musical theatre.
Students start by analyzing three musicals, study guides included, and practice creating musical elements. They are then giving class time to prepare in groups as many elements as their can for a new musical using devised theatre techniques.
There are 24 lessons in this unit which culminates in a final assessed performance.
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UNIT
Part of the Middle School Curriculum
Unit Seven: Directed Scenes Take 2: A Variety of Scenes
by Lindsay Johnson
Students will have another opportunity to participate in student-directed scenes, only this time each director will be assigned a different script, and actors for each group will be chosen by the teacher based on individual strengths and challenges, rather than holding auditions.
Actors will take a deeper dive into character physicality and use of levels in staging this unit. Directors will continue to create a set design and block the scenes, adding props as well in this unit.
The unit culminates in actors presenting their directed scenes to the class.
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UNIT
Part of the Middle School Curriculum
Unit Eight: Theatre of the Oppressed
by Lindsay Johnson
Students will have a chance to merge their understanding of scene elements with their improvisation skills in this final unit based on Augusto Boal’s Theatre of the Oppressed. Theatre of the Oppressed is a style of theatre specifically created to highlight the injustices of power and oppression in society and to problem-solve ways to bring about change.
Starting with image theatre techniques to identify issues of power and oppression, students will then use forum theatre to create scenarios of oppression taken from their own lives and improvise realistic solutions.
The unit culminates in a performance in which students participate as both actors in a scene they create themselves and spect-actors in scenes created by their peers.
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UNIT
Aristotle's Elements
by Lea Marshall
Aristotle was a huge fan of the theatre. He philosophically believed in it and argued with other great thinkers at the time about the necessity and good results of theatrical pursuits. This makes him a great topic for a drama classroom unit.
Aristotle identified six elements that needed to be in a play for it to be worthy: plot, thought, character, diction, spectacle, and sound. This unit by Lea Marshall focuses on and offers exercises for each of Aristotle’s elements - from using fairy tales to examine plot, to re-imagining movie trailers to explore music.
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UNIT
Introduction to Musical Theatre: Movement
by Annie Dragoo
Musical theatre performers use their bodies to sing, to dance, and to act. We must think of our bodies as instruments and learn to use our instruments properly in order to be better musical theatre performers.
The overall objective with this unit, by Annie Dragoo, is for students to demonstrate an understanding of the use of good movement as it connects to musical theatre. Some of the activities include using action verbs, moving as animals and inanimate characters, nonverbal communication and situational movement. Students will then perform a scene that will allow them to put to practice all the movement techniques they have learned.
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UNIT
Our Town Unit
by Lindsay Price
This is a read, discuss, and apply literature unit. Students will study the play Our Town by Thornton Wilder.
Our Town is often referred to as “nostalgic.” It’s seen as an antiquated look at a moment in time. But this play is called Our Town, not My Town. What’s happening in Grover’s Corners happened in the past, the distant past, in our present, and even in the future. The themes of the play—the ordinary versus universality, the concept of time, the cycle of life, the ignorance of humanity to the eternal—these are just as relevant in the twenty-first century as they were when the play was written.
The purpose of the unit is not to have students recall knowledge about the play. Students will be able to identify, articulate, and dramatize text themes and concepts and compare/contrast these concepts to their own experiences.
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UNIT
Part of the Distance Learning Curriculum
Improvisation
by Lindsay Price and Karen Loftus
Students sharpen their listening and reaction skills through improv games, exercises, and scenes. They will learn five specific guidelines to apply to their improvisation: accept the offer, bring information to the scene, make active choices, make your partner look good, and don’t force the humor.
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UNIT
Part of the Distance Learning Curriculum
Pantomime
by Lindsay Price and Karen Loftus
In this unit, students will explore nonverbal communication. First through body language and gesture, and then through the specific art of pantomime. Students will learn hand position, tension, follow-through, and action/reaction/interaction with objects through warm-up games and exercises. The unit culminates in a one-person pantomime performance.
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UNIT
Part of the Distance Learning Curriculum
Voice
by Lindsay Price and Karen Loftus
This unit focuses specifically on the technical aspects of vocal production. By understanding how voice is created, students will be more aware of how to improve their vocal production. Students will explore posture and breathing exercises, as well as how to use the diaphragm, projection, and articulation. The final project will test students’ abilities to properly project and articulate a joke at a distance from a microphone
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UNIT
Part of the Distance Learning Curriculum
Theatre of the Absurd
by Lea Marshall
We included this unit in our Distance Learning Curriculum because if any group of students would understand how the world turned upside down and then apply it to theatre, it would be the students dealing with a global pandemic.
First, we take two lessons to go over the historical and philosophical background of Theatre of the Absurd. We start with a visual exercise to bring students into the emotional bleakness of the landscape and then group work to look at some of the other foundational elements that will drive the absurdist movement into the theatres. Next, we break down absurd scripts into some “recognizable” elements of language, plot structure, acting choices, and storyline. In each lesson that introduces an absurdist element, there is an opportunity for students to “play” with the element.
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UNIT
Part of the Distance Learning Curriculum
Mock Audition
by Lindsay Price
In this Mock Audition Unit, students will discuss the audition process and make connections between their personal views and the process. Students will apply the steps of auditioning from putting together a resume to choosing a piece based on provided information to audition etiquette to the actual audition itself.
A final reflection and rubrics are provided for use at the end of this unit.
A short play is included that can be used as the source material for your audition. You can also choose your own play for this process.
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UNIT
Pre-Lighting Design
by Kerry Hishon
The exercises within this unit are meant for students to explore the concept of lighting for theatre without the need for extensive tech or even a theatrical lighting grid.
This unit is useful for students with no prior experience with lighting or students who may be intimidated by the idea of theatre technology.
Each exercise is meant to build upon the previous one, as students grow in their confidence with thinking about lighting in different ways.
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UNIT
Part of the Distance Learning Curriculum
Scene Work: Part 1, Tools of Scene Work
by Lindsay Price
Students are introduced to scene work performance through a contentless scene unit. Students prepare and perform a contentless scene to demonstrate their understanding of characterization, staging technique, and working with conflict and stage business in a performance context.
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UNIT
Part of the Distance Learning Curriculum
Scene Work: Part 2, Student Self Staging
by Lindsay Price
In Part 2 of Scene Work, students take everything they learned in Part 1 and apply it to the staging of a scene.
Students work independently to block, build character, experiment and rehearse a scene. You can continue the scene work process from Part 1, or if your students have a grounding with scene work basics, perhaps they just do Part 2 of this unit.
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UNIT
Alexander Technique
by Ruthie Tutterow
The purpose of this unit is to acquaint students with the Alexander Technique. In doing so, and in practicing many of its principles, students will make discoveries about some of their habitual patterns of movement.
Students will be able to demonstrate and explain how to use Alexander Technique principles in an activity of their choice.
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UNIT
Character Creation: Superhero Series: Multi platform
by Lindsay Price and Kerry Hishon
This unit focuses on character creation: How do you create a character from the ground up? Use this unit as a precursor to a playwriting unit, to a devising unit, or to a class production.
Using the archetypes of the superhero, the sidekick, and the supervillain, students work on exercises to help them create unique characters through physical and vocal qualities, character profiles, and theatrical writing.
Because many of the exercises have an individual focus, this unit works in a distance learning environment or for your no-technology students.
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UNIT
Impowerment Improv
by Jennine Profeta
Taking risks, learning to see failure as a gift, finding courage when we don't feel it, and having the awareness that what we say has an impact are social and emotional skills students will take beyond the classroom. These are skills that can be built through improv exercises.
The exercises in this unit are designed to create a safe environment in which students can go beyond their old patterns to take risks, embrace failure, and be more confident and aware of the effects of their word choices. Improv gives you the opportunity to draw attention to these important concepts and to talk about them.
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UNIT
Decolonizing Monologues
by Nicholas Pappas
In this unit, students will write a monologue authentic to their unique voice rather than to a Eurocentric canon model. We are going to decolonize the monologue. The goal in decolonizing monologues is to be inclusive of all voices in the classroom and to allow those voices to grow out of the unique style and cultural background of every student.
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UNIT
Perspective Taking
by Lindsay Price
Perspective taking is the ability to understand a situation from another person’s perspective or point of view: What are they thinking? What are they feeling? How does their background influence their perspective? Perspective taking allows students to develop self-awareness, to recognize differences, to understand an opposing point of view, to assess nonverbal language, and more.
In this unit, students will practice perspective taking as they:
• Assess their own perspective.
• Demonstrate understanding of the perspective of others in specific situations.
• Analyze characters in a text.
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UNIT
Foundations of Acting
by Annie Dragoo
Students will demonstrate an understanding of the foundations of acting. At the end of the unit, students will be able to understand the value of making rich acting choices on stage.
This unit gives students an opportunity to explore and develop acting skills on a more advanced level, regardless of experience. They will explore skills, including voice, movement, emotional recall, memory, playing objectives, and character development culminating in a final scene.
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UNIT
Abstract Scene Performance
by Annie Dragoo
In this unit, students will create and perform an abstract theatre scene. Abstract is a genre that does not rely on realism and deliberately breaks the rules of a given form. In the case of theatre, this refers to the commonly presented rules of performance, acting, and the relationship with the audience. Movement is often stylized and symbolic. Ideas and themes are expressed visually and aurally with little dialogue using music, lights, costumes, and props.
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UNIT
The Dilemma Project
by Claire Broome
The Dilemma Project is based on a situation that requires a decision: push a button and get a great reward, but there’s also a great consequence. Don’t push the button and there’s no reward.
This unit will lead to a group performance including characters, costumes, set, acting theory, acting tools, and a student written script. The final script will be about ten pages in length which means roughly ten minutes of stage time.
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UNIT
30 Second Monologues
by Lindsay Price
A monologue unit is an excellent way for students to demonstrate learned skills: vocal skills, movement skills, memorization skills, and character development. It also touches on soft skills such as communication, confidence, and attitude. That being said, monologues are not easy. A typical monologue is two minutes long. That is a lot of text to memorize, block, and develop into an engaging presentation. How often have you sat through a bad monologue performance with little to no characterization, wandering blocking, and a tenuous grasp of the lines?
Performing a monologue is a learned skill. And the best way to learn a skill is in steps. Instead of starting with the end goal—that two-minute piece—start at the beginning. This four-lesson unit will take students up the ladder toward the goal of a longer monologue.
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UNIT
Absurdism: Beyond the Origins
by Drama Teacher Academy
In most units that cover the Theatre of the Absurd, the number of playwrights addressed are few and the time period is limited. While it is certainly true that the era identified as “The Theatre of the Absurd” was a reaction to the distorted reality of life after World War II, there are many environments that create distorted realities and many playwrights who use those realities as catalysts for absurdist plays.
In this unit, we will start with a traditional look at the Theatre of the Absurd and then expand our exploration beyond its origins.
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UNIT
Spoken Word Poetry
by Quincy Young
In this unit, students will create a performance of a spoken word poem designed to engage, entertain, and affect an audience. They will also write a poet’s statement in which they describe the purpose(s) or inspiration(s) of their poetry.
This is not a technical writing unit and is geared more toward students self-expression and engaging an audience. If your students are not skilled poets, this unit is still accessible.
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PD COURSE
From Audition to Curtain Call: Directing Youth Theatre
by Steven Stack
Directing youth theatre can be one of the most thrilling, rewarding, and exhausting jobs there is – because it’s not just about staging a play. It’s about creating an environment that fosters hard work, dedication, trust, and the willingness to take chances, to “play without fear.”
As a writer/teacher/director of youth theatre for over 15 years, I have developed tools and strategies that enable my students and me to focus on the process of creating theatre while fostering an environment that leads to creative freedom and a cohesive groups that doesn't act as individual “stars,” but as a community of one.
In this course, I will share with you these tips and strategies, along with the ways to implement them in your theatre environment.
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PD COURSE
Strong Ensemble = Strong Play
by Craig Mason
This mini-course will give you a toolkit to bring your shows to the next level by having an engaged, active, ensemble.
The ensemble is a critical part of a large cast show. But you can't leave them to fend for themselves. They need structure. They need exercises and activities.
In Strong Ensemble = Strong Play, you'll be given ensemble-building exercises. You'll also discover specific activities that will help your ensemble become three-dimensional characters who have something to do and something to play in every moment they are on stage.
We'll look at case studies that take the exercises learned in the course and apply them to specific shows.
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PD COURSE
Breath Control and Projection
by Elisabeth Oppelt
In this course, you will learn what breath control and projection are, how to breathe from your diaphragm and speak loudly without yelling, and how to teach these skills to your students. Led by teacher and singer Elisabeth Oppelt, this course will be helpful both in your teaching practices and in creating material to teach your students. This course also includes both formal and informal assessments for you to use in your classroom.
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PD COURSE
Yes, And... How to Teach Improv
by Jennine Profeta
“Yes, and…” is the guiding principle behind all improv. This course will teach you how to teach improv, and more importantly how to give feedback to your students. The course looks at making strong offers and also using gibberish to ironically improv communication skills. You will also see how feelings can safely be used to add flavour and get laughs in our scenes.
Jennine Profeta, Second City performer and theatre educator, leads this course with a clear methodology for teaching and giving positive nurturing feedback. This course will give you all the tools and the insight you need to teach improv with confidence.
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PD COURSE
Coaching Improv
by Jennine Profeta
Second City performer and theatre educator Jennine Profeta is back and ready to help you take your Improv classes to the next level. It’s all getting students to perform - and how to be a great improv coach who can keep them supported and grounded (and having fun!)
In this course, you’ll learn the golden rules of improv. You’ll learn a bunch of improv games (great for warm-ups, teaching tools, and even for competitions). You’ll learn Jennine’s tips and tricks for what to look for when coaching and how to troubleshoot common issues.
The course is designed to help you improv as an ensemble and give you the know-how to coach with confidence whether it’s in the classroom or on the stage!
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PD COURSE
Theatre Etiquette 101
by Kerry Hishon
Instructor Kerry Hishon is an actor, director, writer, and stage combatant with years of experience in youth theatre. Her course, Theatre Etiquette 101, is designed to help students be successful in their theatrical journeys.
When teaching students who are brand new to theatre, it’s important to discuss and apply the expectations of the drama classroom and the theatrical world.
This course starts by explaining "what is theatre etiquette", and then moves through every step in the production process from audition to post-show recovery.
Every module has tips for both you and your students, classroom exercises, rehearsal exercises, and reflections. There are also printable posters included to use in your classroom or backstage.
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PD COURSE
The Production Classroom
by Karen Loftus
In The Production Classroom, instructor Karen Loftus will show you how to explore ways that you can produce shows during your regular class time. The course gives you a series of exercises and reflections that help you determine everything, from the type of show you may want to do, to the way you can divide up your class and responsibilities, to specific assignments that will keep your students engaged and focused.
The Production Classroom is the ultimate in project-based learning. Students learn to work collaboratively while setting goals and working towards a successful finished project. The course includes exercises and strategies to use with students to help assure their success in the production. Multiple examples and anecdotes help you to envision what the production classroom could look like in your room, performance space or theatre.
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PD COURSE
21st Century Skills Through Devising
by Allison Williams
Allison Williams leads the course: 21st Century Skills Through Devising. This course covers what devising is, why to do it, how to do it, and how your students can master the 21st Century Skills of collaborations and cooperation, critical thinking, creative thinking through devising.
High school is a great place to try devising with your students. But it’s not something you want to throw at your students without any preparation. Framework is important and this course takes you through a number of exercises you can take into the classroom tomorrow to help build a place of physical safety, a place where students work at making a lot of choices instead of waiting for the perfect choice, and a place where students feel comfortable making creative choices. The material also reviews the process of putting together a show from the idea/research stage to editing, to giving feedback.
Your students have what it takes to create their own material, collaborate with each other, and have a unique theatrical experience!
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PD COURSE
Teaching Musical Theatre in the Drama Classroom
by Colin Oliver
Colin Oliver leads this introduction to teaching Musical Theatre in the Drama Classroom.
In this course, you will learn how to build musical theatre into your dramatic courses of study. “Why might you want to do that? Singing is scary! You want me to teach my students how to do it? I don’t even know how to do it.” This course approaches musical theatre preparation performance much as we would approach preparing a monologue in drama. If you use script analysis in monologue preparation in your class, you can teach musical theatre.
By the end of this course, you’ll have a great, full-body physical warm-up, a student-driven research assignment, character development exercises, a little bit of musical theory, and a performance assignment complete with assessment.
So, join us for teaching Musical Theatre in the Drama Classroom. It’s as easy as Do-Re-Mi!
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PD COURSE
Teaching Theatre with Divergent Students and Class Sizes in Mind
by Steven Stack
Have you ever wondered how in the world you can have a successful theatre classroom with so many variables that you have absolutely no control over? The two biggest ones being the size of your class and the students that you’re in charge of turning into some truly talented theatre geeks. This course by Steven Stack explores that wonderful and often ridiculous world of theatre classrooms while giving you the tools for you and your students to not only succeed but to flourish as well.
Lessons will include how to make any size class the Goldilocks class as in "just right", defining and working with all types of students you may encounter in your classroom, the seven must-haves of any theatre class, and the importance of structure in the theatre classroom by providing a guideline for setting up your day-to-day class time.
The course also provides tons of ideas, games and activities that you can use instantly in your classroom. So, if you’re a first-time theatre teacher or one just looking for new ideas, this is the course for you.
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PD COURSE
Tech for Non-Techies: Teaching Technical Theatre in Your Drama Classroom
by Josh Hatt
In this course, instructor Joshua Hatt shows you how to unpack your drama standards, articulate what you want your students to know and be able to do. The material explores how to incorporate lights, sound, makeup, staging, and costuming into your drama class at any grade level regardless of your school resources or unit structure. Bells and whistles? Awesome! Barely a classroom? We’ve still got you covered.
This 9 lesson series works from the basics and standards, though lighting, sound, costuming, staging, and makeup design, and culminates with a final project including rubrics, resources, and handouts.
A wise theatre technician once said: “the theatre mirrors life but technical theatre teachers us how to live.” Try to keep that statement in mind as you work through this course and see if we can make you a believer in all things technical theatre.
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PD COURSE
Marketing the Arts
by James Van Leishout
This course covers the four stages of creating and implementing a marketing plan. It starts with the question, what are you selling?, and goes all the way through to evaluation. The course covers both traditional and new media, with examples and opportunities to apply the learning to each teacher's own situation.
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PD COURSE
Preventing Pandemonium: Part 1
by Maria Smith
In Preventing Pandemonium Part 1, Maria Smith will share with you a classroom management tool critical to success. It’s called procedures. Procedures are daily classroom management routines that are the key to classroom management success. They are the essential element of classroom management.
This course will give you straightforward, practical “this is how you do it” information, as well as procedures catered specifically to the drama classroom, to help you maintain order from start to finish, even during that chaotic group practice time.
Imagine yourself in a classroom where you can spend most of your time teaching and keep students on track without the constant lecturing. If that sounds appealing, then start the first module.
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PD COURSE
Preventing Pandemonium: Part 2
by Maria Smith
In Preventing Pandemonium Part 02, instructor Maria Smith shares a classroom management strategy that transformed her class from a discipline zone to a thriving environment. It’s called positive incentives (or rewards) that make your students want to behave and participate positively in the drama classroom.
This course includes straightforward “this is how you do it” information, as well as posters, passes and rewards for teachers to print out and use in your classroom. Learn how positive incentives cut down the need for discipline,and find the joy in teaching.
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PD COURSE
The Process of Creativity in the Theatre Classroom
by Gai Jones
Gai Jones leads this course in establishing an environment of creative experimentation in the theatre classroom, in order to have a group of student actors who value the creative process.
Each lesson shares experiences to foster creativity without the stress of performance by student actors. For the creative process which honors out-of-the-box thinking, there is no assessment section included. There is no product or performance. The important thing is the student actor’s engagement. Their reflections and your observations are valued for positive learning.
This set of lessons includes Tips for the Theatre Educator, based on Gai's own Theatre practice. Scripts are also provided and contain text of what you can say to your students to facilitate their creative processes.
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PD COURSE
Beyond the Basics: Rehearsal Strategies to Grow Your Actors
by Julie Hartley
The focus of the teacher-director should be not only on the quality of the show, but on the value of the experience offered to student actors. This course takes you on this journey through practical rehearsal strategies that apply an ensemble approach.
This course starts with those all important first rehearsals, explores warm ups, and looks at character development. We examine specific types of plays, like classical texts and comedy, and conclude with strategies to solve common rehearsal problems.
Go beyond the basics!
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PD COURSE
The Empathetic Classroom
by Steven Stack
Why should you take a class on empathy? And why is theatre the perfect vehicle for empathy?
Empathy, the more sought-after and inclusive cousin of sympathy, is the experiencing of someone else’s experience in the world. What it would be like if you were wearing their clothes, their life?
Teaching students to understand the clothes that they’re putting on, the characters and their lives teaches students not how to act but how to be. It allows the students to feel what someone else feels and experiences, which can and should translate to their fellow actors and peers away from the stage. It will lead to a stronger class connection, stronger performances and stronger students who will seek out understanding instead of isolation and fear.
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PD COURSE
Story Theatre
by Matt Webster
Instructor Matt Webster believes that Story Theatre is one of the most creative, most imaginative, most unique forms of theatre ever to make its way to the stage. His course introduces the style of theatre called story theatre, explores the steps needed to choose the best stories to perform, explains how to adapt a story into a script, and demonstrates a variety of story theatre styles from simple and contained to complex and crazy and everything in between.
When you are finished with this course, you’ll be able to bring nearly any story to any stage and present it to any audience. That is the power and promise of story theatre. Learn how to bring the page to the stage.
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PD COURSE
Maximizing Your Ensemble: Shoestring 101
by Michael Calderone
This seven-part series is designed to transform that gaggle of actors cluttering your backstage from cumbersome extras into nothing less than the very center of your production.
Instructor Michael Calderone leads this course, through games and exercises geared to maximize your ensemble for your next production. These lessons are based on the ensemble technique that he's been using for the last 30 years, called the shoestring method.
The ensemble has a responsibility to work as one, and no role is more important than another. Without each actor playing their part, the other actors cannot tell the story to the best of their abilities. So join Michael in learning more about this exciting, practical and dramatic method.
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PD COURSE
Mindfulness & Wellness in the Drama Classroom
by Claire Broome
In this course, instructor Claire Broome shares what mindfulness is, and why it is so important in the Drama Classroom. The course covers how mindfulness and wellness can help both students and teachers.
Claire discusses how to prepare students for this kind of learning, and provides various activities to bring into your classroom, as well as a variety of extensions for these activities that can be applied to character creation and possible projects.
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PD COURSE
Hands-On Theatre History: Creating a Modern Day Morality Play
by Wendy-Marie Martin
Who says theatre history has to be boring? Hands-On Theatre History: Creating a Modern Day Morality play is an interactive course by Wendy-Marie Martin, combining hands-on activities with research and analysis techniques leading to a full performance of the popular medieval morality play, Everyman.
This course gives students an overview of the medieval period and the various medieval play forms and teaches students the key points of storytelling and adaptation.
It includes dynamic individual and group exercises leading students from the first steps of the adaptation process through a final, full-class performance of Everyman—and proves, once and for all, that theatre history can be fun and exciting to learn.
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PD COURSE
The Dilemma Project
by Claire Broome
Moral dilemmas are not only faced by characters in gripping plays, but are also faced by our students. The project outlined in this course will help students develop their critical thinking skills through the use of one of the dilemma questions to shape a student written production.
If you had the choice to press a button and earn $25,000,000... but a species (not of your choosing) would become extinct, what would you do? More importantly, what would your character do?
Join drama teacher and playwright Claire Broome through this course which includes role-playing, Stanislavski’s Magic If, character creation, playwriting and staging.
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PD COURSE
Impowerment Improv
by Jennine Profeta
Jennine Profeta, Second City performer and theatre educator, leads this course. This course was designed to give a teacher tools to create a safe environment in which students can go beyond their old patterns to take risks, embrace failure, be more confident and aware of the effects of their word choice. The course includes modules on risk-taking, creating a safe environment, failure, confidence, and positive/negative speak.
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PD COURSE
Empathy 2.0
by Steven Stack
Brought to you by instructor Steven Stack, creator of The Empathetic Classroom, this course looks at ways to move on from the worldwide pandemic, while honoring the past and learning from it. In the past year, students had many things taken from them: school, hanging out with friends, freedom, hope, and innocence.
With this course, each session will highlight one specific topic relating to moving on. There will also be activities for each session that will help your students own the past, embrace their own and others’ narratives and scars, create a stronger classroom community, find ways to be where their feet are planted, and learn to play again.
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PD COURSE
Soft Skills, The Tangible Value of the Drama Curriculum
by Matt Webster
This course is about the fact that so-called soft skills are sought after and highly valued in professional work environments, educational settings, and in everyday social interactions. They're valuable life skills, but we can't always identify these skills within a standard educational setting, and yet, they are incredibly useful in education and beyond. That's why it's important to be able to identify these soft skills in the classroom and in the educational process and to recognize that these soft skills are being taught every day in the drama curriculum. We need to concentrate our efforts into making sure that these skills are identified and utilized within our classrooms. They are built into every arts curriculum a school offers, especially the theater arts.
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PD COURSE
Tech Knowledge: Integrating Tech Throughout Your Rehearsal Process
by Claire Broome
This course will help you integrate technical theatre earlier in the creative process to help reduce the stress of tech week, and make sure you have what you need before choosing a show. We will explore how to include your technical theatre team from day one and will help you have an easier experience throughout the rehearsal process and final performances.
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