We are gathering tomorrow to present our research at the end of year one with Critical Links.
I put together a 13 minute dvd with footage taken throughout the 9 week exploratory drama course. At the end, the class performed their poetry for the entire school and I videotaped that as well. I'm very happy with the results, as I was able to track the progress of individual students as well as documenting the process.
A month after the class was over, I gave the students a survey about their experience. Most of them felt their voices had improved, along with their confidence in front of an audience. I also queried the home room teacher who pointed to some specific student improvements she has witnessed in her academic classroom in terms of student vocal expressiveness.
As a final test, I asked five students from the class to come to the Little Theatre at lunch time this week to try a cold reading in front of the camcorder. I gave them another poem, verses from The Walrus and the Carpenter, to read out loud. When I paired these samples with their initial cold readings from the beginning of the course almost 4 months ago, the improvement is undeniable. They project, speak with greater articulation and confidence. Four out of five make contact with the camera throughout their readings.
The obvious reason that adding actions to the vocal exercises worked so well is that it helped them build up lung power. I never really had to prompt to improve projection. The more work we did in the space, moving and making sounds, the stronger their voices grew. Articulation became a very physical process for them.l A powerful moment can be seen on the video -- when I asked them to try putting their hands over their mouths and articulatory muscles and jaw while speaking. You can see them feeling where the sounds are shaped and realizing that muscles are involved in speech.
The actions also worked to release creativity. All the poems were staged by the students themselves. This gave them even more ownership of the process and also enhanced their collaboration skills.
Some areas I would like to learn more about would be finding ways to help students who have difficulty finding the flow in reading material out loud. One student who is in drama has great difficulty reading text outloud. She stumbles and stutters when confronted with written text, but once memorized, she delivers her lines with ease, projecting and articulating.
Another problem I'd never encountered was a student who clipped vowel sounds very short in all cases. Stretching vowels was something she had never considered. Her habitual mode is rapid delivery with very short clipped vowel sounds. The vowel stretching exercise helped somewhat. The biggest change is that she is more inclined now to slow down her rate of speech but still hasn't mastered the flexibility and emotional content inherent in lengthened vowel sounds.
Friday, May 2, 2008
Monday, April 14, 2008
Words and Actions and Warmups
Recently I've had occasion to observe some other folks warming up before rehearsals near and far. One thing I've noticed is a form of working in a circle that seems to be popular in college theatre. Student teachers have been using the game Zip Zap Zop for a number of years. It's the kind of game that requires strict attention and focus in order to keep the flow running smoothly. According to Wikipedia, it is folkloric in origin. If you know the original source for this game, I'd love to hear it.
Other similar games include passing words and/or actions along the circle in two different directions so that at certain points words and actions cross each other and give one person a very difficult task to handle them at the same time. My current student teacher has been working with our advanced acting class on this one and they are finding it quite the challenge.
Observing a rehearsal in NYC last week, I saw another form of this circle work in which one person ducks while the people on either side clap hands over the top of the ducking person's head. Then the clapper to the right must duck and the clapping is repeated from the person's on either side -- around and around it goes. The goal is to be precise enough to achieve unity in the actions and sounds.
The group I watched playing this game was comprised of high school students and they were very attentive. The focus was intense. It was quite clear that the few fluffs were not amusing or acceptable to the participants. In so many of these games, a miss is cause for merriment rather than renewed focus. I mus say, this group of teenagers were right on the mark with their warm-up.
They also did a neat sound and action vocal warm-up. They tossed invisible baseballs using a "huh" sound to power their actions. After a number of baseball tosses, they moved on to tossing shot-puts which required a stepped up physical action and deeper in the belly "huh" sound. Definitely an exercise worthy of incorporating into a warm-up.
For articulation, a group leader gave them ever-increasing-in-length tongue twisters. As they were about to run through a Shakespeare play, they definitely needed to wake up the articulators. I think they might try adding some actions to the tongue twisters as well. Perhaps walking their character and using the rhythms of the tongue twisters to propel themselves through the space.
What was missing from this warm up was just that -- actors moving in the space. Lots of the circle stuff which is very good for building focus and ensemble energy, yet most plays are not acted around the perimeter of a circle.
"Working the space" is an exercise that can be adapted endlessly for any particular needs. The first task of the actors is to keep the space balanced at all times. That means there are no gaps and no crowds, always bodies moving at approximate equidistant to each other. "Balance the space" is the coaching term that should always prompt actors to be mindful of their actions within the context of the group and the space itself.
Once the group is achieving balance, then coaching can take on the "how" of the bodies moving within the space. Oppositions of qualities are very useful: Thick/Thin; Tall/Short; Sharp/Smooth; Rigid/Loose; Angular/Curved; Heavy/Light and so on. One can spend an entire lesson on taking qualities and working them using a numeric scale. For example 1 being Most Heavy , 5 being Neither Heavy or Light, and 10 being Lightest. It is in this exercise that actors begin to work on nuances brought about by different levels of energy. One can point out the forms of theatre that practically demand extreme actions (commedia, circus) and those that work at more subtle levels (film acting).
There are many other qualities one can explore in the balancing of the space exercise. Younger actors quite enjoy animal qualities. You don't want them to literally act out an elephant, let's say, but rather find the qualities of elephant movement within their actions: heavy, majestic, trunk to tail follow the leader, swaying torso and head etc.
For more work like this, check out this recent book on Grotowski by Akron-based theatre artists James Slowiak and Jairo Cuesta of The New World Performance Lab. The Routledge series of great acting teachers and their theories features a biographical/ theory analysis in the first half and instructional techniques in the second half. Great stuff!
Other similar games include passing words and/or actions along the circle in two different directions so that at certain points words and actions cross each other and give one person a very difficult task to handle them at the same time. My current student teacher has been working with our advanced acting class on this one and they are finding it quite the challenge.
Observing a rehearsal in NYC last week, I saw another form of this circle work in which one person ducks while the people on either side clap hands over the top of the ducking person's head. Then the clapper to the right must duck and the clapping is repeated from the person's on either side -- around and around it goes. The goal is to be precise enough to achieve unity in the actions and sounds.
The group I watched playing this game was comprised of high school students and they were very attentive. The focus was intense. It was quite clear that the few fluffs were not amusing or acceptable to the participants. In so many of these games, a miss is cause for merriment rather than renewed focus. I mus say, this group of teenagers were right on the mark with their warm-up.
They also did a neat sound and action vocal warm-up. They tossed invisible baseballs using a "huh" sound to power their actions. After a number of baseball tosses, they moved on to tossing shot-puts which required a stepped up physical action and deeper in the belly "huh" sound. Definitely an exercise worthy of incorporating into a warm-up.
For articulation, a group leader gave them ever-increasing-in-length tongue twisters. As they were about to run through a Shakespeare play, they definitely needed to wake up the articulators. I think they might try adding some actions to the tongue twisters as well. Perhaps walking their character and using the rhythms of the tongue twisters to propel themselves through the space.
What was missing from this warm up was just that -- actors moving in the space. Lots of the circle stuff which is very good for building focus and ensemble energy, yet most plays are not acted around the perimeter of a circle.
"Working the space" is an exercise that can be adapted endlessly for any particular needs. The first task of the actors is to keep the space balanced at all times. That means there are no gaps and no crowds, always bodies moving at approximate equidistant to each other. "Balance the space" is the coaching term that should always prompt actors to be mindful of their actions within the context of the group and the space itself.
Once the group is achieving balance, then coaching can take on the "how" of the bodies moving within the space. Oppositions of qualities are very useful: Thick/Thin; Tall/Short; Sharp/Smooth; Rigid/Loose; Angular/Curved; Heavy/Light and so on. One can spend an entire lesson on taking qualities and working them using a numeric scale. For example 1 being Most Heavy , 5 being Neither Heavy or Light, and 10 being Lightest. It is in this exercise that actors begin to work on nuances brought about by different levels of energy. One can point out the forms of theatre that practically demand extreme actions (commedia, circus) and those that work at more subtle levels (film acting).
There are many other qualities one can explore in the balancing of the space exercise. Younger actors quite enjoy animal qualities. You don't want them to literally act out an elephant, let's say, but rather find the qualities of elephant movement within their actions: heavy, majestic, trunk to tail follow the leader, swaying torso and head etc.
For more work like this, check out this recent book on Grotowski by Akron-based theatre artists James Slowiak and Jairo Cuesta of The New World Performance Lab. The Routledge series of great acting teachers and their theories features a biographical/ theory analysis in the first half and instructional techniques in the second half. Great stuff!
Sunday, March 30, 2008
Voice and action catch up
I haven't had time to keep up with the blogging on my voice and action project, but the project itself kept moving along, despite fits and starts due to weather and unscheduled days off from school.
The class brought their work to performance level and presented it to the entire school this past Wednesday. I videotaped it from way in the back of the auditorium. It will be interesting to hear the results when I download the footage into iMovie.
Everybody in the class originally had a poem to perform. We couldn't perform all of them for the school due to time constraints, so I had the students combine their groups of 2 or 3 with another group of 2 or three. They could choose two poems, one from each group to work on as a performance.
The final presentation would also include the large group poems. The class had been divided in half for these poems, with two 5th grade drama students as directors. We started the show with Nobody and ended it with Twistable Turnable Man.
My initial reaction to the end result is that while my goal was to improve vocal quality and skills, my eyes were drawn to the originality and expressiveness of the student-created actions that sprang out of the text. I expect to report more as I put together a video time-line of the project. I also will be giving the students a survey to gain their insights as participants in the project. To gauge possible long-term improvements, I am working with the home room teacher to arrange a video taping in the classroom in which students read/recite out loud text connected to an academic subject.
I have one more section of 5th grade exploratory that just began this past week. We haven't begun training yet as their starting coincided with tech/opening of our spring musical. I am planning on using the same techniques I have refined in this past experiment.
The class brought their work to performance level and presented it to the entire school this past Wednesday. I videotaped it from way in the back of the auditorium. It will be interesting to hear the results when I download the footage into iMovie.
Everybody in the class originally had a poem to perform. We couldn't perform all of them for the school due to time constraints, so I had the students combine their groups of 2 or 3 with another group of 2 or three. They could choose two poems, one from each group to work on as a performance.
The final presentation would also include the large group poems. The class had been divided in half for these poems, with two 5th grade drama students as directors. We started the show with Nobody and ended it with Twistable Turnable Man.
My initial reaction to the end result is that while my goal was to improve vocal quality and skills, my eyes were drawn to the originality and expressiveness of the student-created actions that sprang out of the text. I expect to report more as I put together a video time-line of the project. I also will be giving the students a survey to gain their insights as participants in the project. To gauge possible long-term improvements, I am working with the home room teacher to arrange a video taping in the classroom in which students read/recite out loud text connected to an academic subject.
I have one more section of 5th grade exploratory that just began this past week. We haven't begun training yet as their starting coincided with tech/opening of our spring musical. I am planning on using the same techniques I have refined in this past experiment.
Sunday, March 9, 2008
Catching up with the work
Weather and personal days off have kept me from this diary, but the work has continued on with some starts and stops along the way. I did take two days to show the class a Charlie Chaplin film. I have made it my mission as a drama teacher to expose every student who comes into my Little Theatre to the work of Charlie Chaplin. This group watched City Lights and enjoyed it immensely.
The class now has two choral pieces and a bunch of individual Shel Silverstein poems that they have been working on. As we can't perform every single poem, we are going to combine pairs into quartets. They will pick two poems from their four possible choices and add in actions for all four actors.
One day last week, we worked with concept words (rough, smooth, bumpy, tall, thin, etc) -- moving in the space to the words, then applying that to the poems. Sometimes the concept words were not ones that normally would leap to mind when working out the actions to the poems -- but we found that these odd juxtapositions often added something delightfully new to the interpretation.
One observation I've been noting is how projection has increased among all students -- without any need for me to coach for that specifically. I'm hoping we can get into the auditorium this week for some work in the larger space. There are only three more weeks before this class ends.
The class now has two choral pieces and a bunch of individual Shel Silverstein poems that they have been working on. As we can't perform every single poem, we are going to combine pairs into quartets. They will pick two poems from their four possible choices and add in actions for all four actors.
One day last week, we worked with concept words (rough, smooth, bumpy, tall, thin, etc) -- moving in the space to the words, then applying that to the poems. Sometimes the concept words were not ones that normally would leap to mind when working out the actions to the poems -- but we found that these odd juxtapositions often added something delightfully new to the interpretation.
One observation I've been noting is how projection has increased among all students -- without any need for me to coach for that specifically. I'm hoping we can get into the auditorium this week for some work in the larger space. There are only three more weeks before this class ends.
Thursday, February 21, 2008
Choral speech
Four day work week, and only three of those days will be spent with my 5th grade group. Time to change it up. and move on to choral work.
I handed out a copy of Shel Silverstein's Twistable, Turnable Man to the class. Since everybody was looking at the poem as it was handed to them, there was no way I could capture a true cold reading -- but that was ok. A first time group effort is bound to be ragged, so I asked them to think up tactics that would help them in reading it cold. They talked about slowing down, about looking for punctuation, and about listening to each other as they read. All really good suggestions!
We read through it and it wasn't horrible, with only a few spots of jumbled voices and out of synch speech. We discussed what happened and the poem itself. What it was about. Which were the action words, the adjectives and nouns -- but in terms of performance rather than language arts quiz questions. Since we have been working on physicalizing words, they were quick to locate the verbs and visualize what possible actions could accompany them. The adjectives apply the colors, tastes and textures of the scene, while the nouns are actors and props.
I gave them another Silverstein poem called Nobody which we read through together. Again, the work was not bad for a first run through. I then had the class count off in twos, and gave the ones Twistable Turnable Man and the twos Nobody. I appointed a choral leader for each group, selecting two drama students in order to give them directing opportunities.
They practiced at either end of the room. I put two costumes racks as barricades, to keep them from distracting each other and to help buffer the sound a bit. By the end of the period, one group was well on its way to finding actions to match the poem. The other group was having some conflicts.
Today, the groups continued to work on their poems. I noticed that the Nobody group's leader was trying to make the process "democratic" by asking everybody for their opinion. They were getting bogged down in conflicts over suggestions. I talked to them briefly about how some works require a single viewpoint -- does an orchestra require ten conductors?
The Twistable Group had gone a long with its leader's vision, and was well on its way to creating a performance. Both groups will polish their work tomorrow and present to each other at the end of the class.
I handed out a copy of Shel Silverstein's Twistable, Turnable Man to the class. Since everybody was looking at the poem as it was handed to them, there was no way I could capture a true cold reading -- but that was ok. A first time group effort is bound to be ragged, so I asked them to think up tactics that would help them in reading it cold. They talked about slowing down, about looking for punctuation, and about listening to each other as they read. All really good suggestions!
We read through it and it wasn't horrible, with only a few spots of jumbled voices and out of synch speech. We discussed what happened and the poem itself. What it was about. Which were the action words, the adjectives and nouns -- but in terms of performance rather than language arts quiz questions. Since we have been working on physicalizing words, they were quick to locate the verbs and visualize what possible actions could accompany them. The adjectives apply the colors, tastes and textures of the scene, while the nouns are actors and props.
I gave them another Silverstein poem called Nobody which we read through together. Again, the work was not bad for a first run through. I then had the class count off in twos, and gave the ones Twistable Turnable Man and the twos Nobody. I appointed a choral leader for each group, selecting two drama students in order to give them directing opportunities.
They practiced at either end of the room. I put two costumes racks as barricades, to keep them from distracting each other and to help buffer the sound a bit. By the end of the period, one group was well on its way to finding actions to match the poem. The other group was having some conflicts.
Today, the groups continued to work on their poems. I noticed that the Nobody group's leader was trying to make the process "democratic" by asking everybody for their opinion. They were getting bogged down in conflicts over suggestions. I talked to them briefly about how some works require a single viewpoint -- does an orchestra require ten conductors?
The Twistable Group had gone a long with its leader's vision, and was well on its way to creating a performance. Both groups will polish their work tomorrow and present to each other at the end of the class.
Friday, February 15, 2008
Articulation and movement
This week has been truncated by weather and a day off for staff development (tomorrow), so I've only had this class twice, but both sessions went really well. I taped a lot of it, even though I didn't blog it. Days off mean that the subsequent days back are twice as hectic.
Basically, I used my usual articulation exercises but enhanced them with movement instructions. We built on the vowel work, which helps actors understand the power of lengthening vowel sounds in words. Lots of Word Tennis with vowels and then consonants. We start with sounds, then go to words, and then to a specific word from each actor's poem.
Today we moved to the initial line of each poem, using it as the only line of conversation in pairs, back and forth. "Try to make it a meaningful conversation, even though you can only use that one line over and over," I coached. "Physicalize it when you respond," was another coaching prompt.
I gave them ten minutes to go back to their original poem partners to work on their presentations. For the last ten minutes of class, we looked at volunteer performances as "works in progress." The improvement was manifest! I asked them at the end what they had noticed in the presentations in terms of change over time. "More expressive!" "Using articulation!" "Stronger voices" "Projection!" The latter has come about without any prompting! All the shy voices are noticeably stronger -- and I believe it comes from the physical work added to the voice training. Next week, we will go into the auditorium, a much larger space and do some deliberate projection work to build upon what they have already achieved.
Basically, I used my usual articulation exercises but enhanced them with movement instructions. We built on the vowel work, which helps actors understand the power of lengthening vowel sounds in words. Lots of Word Tennis with vowels and then consonants. We start with sounds, then go to words, and then to a specific word from each actor's poem.
Today we moved to the initial line of each poem, using it as the only line of conversation in pairs, back and forth. "Try to make it a meaningful conversation, even though you can only use that one line over and over," I coached. "Physicalize it when you respond," was another coaching prompt.
I gave them ten minutes to go back to their original poem partners to work on their presentations. For the last ten minutes of class, we looked at volunteer performances as "works in progress." The improvement was manifest! I asked them at the end what they had noticed in the presentations in terms of change over time. "More expressive!" "Using articulation!" "Stronger voices" "Projection!" The latter has come about without any prompting! All the shy voices are noticeably stronger -- and I believe it comes from the physical work added to the voice training. Next week, we will go into the auditorium, a much larger space and do some deliberate projection work to build upon what they have already achieved.
Monday, February 11, 2008
Meeting wrap up
The focus of this weekend's Critical Links meeting was to focus in our questions with the collective wisdom of our colleagues providing much additional insight.
Here are some notes from the weekend that will influence the direction of my continued research:
The video collection of student work is powerful stuff. I need to edit into a time-line one or two students to show their progress over time.
It was suggested that I also include video of "the teacher in action with the class."
Another great suggestion: to show that the work applies in academic areas, arrange to shoot some footage of this class doing some kind of oral presentation in their home room class. I would look for something in the final quarter of the year to see how much of the work has been retained and can be applied.
To make this a valid study, I would need to document a class that is taught in traditional voice-focused methods, along with a control group that has no voice training whatsoever.
Interview the students whose work I am collecting.
Observe how resistance to change may be overcome by the physical work.
We were not in school today due to sub zero wind chill temps. A big snow storm might keep us out tomorrow.
When I do meet with this class again, we will be working with projection and articulation exercises combined with physical actions. More "Word Tennis" and conversations with consonants.
Here are some notes from the weekend that will influence the direction of my continued research:
The video collection of student work is powerful stuff. I need to edit into a time-line one or two students to show their progress over time.
It was suggested that I also include video of "the teacher in action with the class."
Another great suggestion: to show that the work applies in academic areas, arrange to shoot some footage of this class doing some kind of oral presentation in their home room class. I would look for something in the final quarter of the year to see how much of the work has been retained and can be applied.
To make this a valid study, I would need to document a class that is taught in traditional voice-focused methods, along with a control group that has no voice training whatsoever.
Interview the students whose work I am collecting.
Observe how resistance to change may be overcome by the physical work.
We were not in school today due to sub zero wind chill temps. A big snow storm might keep us out tomorrow.
When I do meet with this class again, we will be working with projection and articulation exercises combined with physical actions. More "Word Tennis" and conversations with consonants.
Sunday, February 10, 2008
Meeting Two Cincinnati, Feb 9 - 10
Day one went by so quickly, I need to stop and reflect upon it before the next day dawns.
The first hour was spent sharing our teaching and personal lives with each other. The depth and breadth of theatre teaching knowledge round our table is a powerful support for all our individual goals. We come at theatre from all directions: our programs range from elementary to middle to high schools, and include vocational, parochial, and performing arts schools, in the form of either co-curricular or extra-curricular. We teach in urban, rural and suburban landscapes, and our populations are varied in terms of socio-economic backgrounds, ethnicity, and special needs students.
Most of us are solitary dwellers within our school districts. While music and visual art are usually found in every building of a district, drama/theatre remains a sporadic specialty. Even though there are now state standards in theatre, with benchmarks and indicators of theatre knowledge that every student should achieve at levels K - 12, there is no state funding to implement them.
To be together for these meetings, with time spent in intensive focus on what we do and how we can do it better, is invaluable. We are learning how to look at our work with the eyes of a researcher in order to solve specific problems and/or to refine methodologies or prove long-held assumptions.
Today's work was all about our individual inquiries. We took our guiding questions and asked more questions of the question. Others also asked questions as we worked in small groups to sharpen our focus while expanding upon the initial inquiry. Multiple perspectives and points of view came into play as a result of the small group work.
Personally, I felt very glad that I had changed my initial inquiry from a general nebulous concept to one that is very concrete. The climax of the day for me was the moments when the other in my group began asking questions and one said, "Why are you doing this? What is so important about voice training?"
I talked about wanting to help non-drama students develop their projection and articulation. But it was Mary who put it best. She said, we must develop our voices to initiate change. (I couldn't help but think of Barack Obama when she said that!) She is right, without the ability to speak clearly and reach others, we will never be able to articulate ideas that can reach others.
Tomorrow, we are practicing presenting our findings, as preparation for the final meeting in May.
The first hour was spent sharing our teaching and personal lives with each other. The depth and breadth of theatre teaching knowledge round our table is a powerful support for all our individual goals. We come at theatre from all directions: our programs range from elementary to middle to high schools, and include vocational, parochial, and performing arts schools, in the form of either co-curricular or extra-curricular. We teach in urban, rural and suburban landscapes, and our populations are varied in terms of socio-economic backgrounds, ethnicity, and special needs students.
Most of us are solitary dwellers within our school districts. While music and visual art are usually found in every building of a district, drama/theatre remains a sporadic specialty. Even though there are now state standards in theatre, with benchmarks and indicators of theatre knowledge that every student should achieve at levels K - 12, there is no state funding to implement them.
To be together for these meetings, with time spent in intensive focus on what we do and how we can do it better, is invaluable. We are learning how to look at our work with the eyes of a researcher in order to solve specific problems and/or to refine methodologies or prove long-held assumptions.
Today's work was all about our individual inquiries. We took our guiding questions and asked more questions of the question. Others also asked questions as we worked in small groups to sharpen our focus while expanding upon the initial inquiry. Multiple perspectives and points of view came into play as a result of the small group work.
Personally, I felt very glad that I had changed my initial inquiry from a general nebulous concept to one that is very concrete. The climax of the day for me was the moments when the other in my group began asking questions and one said, "Why are you doing this? What is so important about voice training?"
I talked about wanting to help non-drama students develop their projection and articulation. But it was Mary who put it best. She said, we must develop our voices to initiate change. (I couldn't help but think of Barack Obama when she said that!) She is right, without the ability to speak clearly and reach others, we will never be able to articulate ideas that can reach others.
Tomorrow, we are practicing presenting our findings, as preparation for the final meeting in May.
Thursday, February 7, 2008
Actions - sounds - words!
We started today by working in the space, moving to various words:
Big, small, bumpy, smooth, stupendous (had to define that one for them), super-heroic, etc.
They were to find actions to express the adjectives. No sound.
The second time through, we did the same sounds and actions and they could add sound effects.
Third time through, they did the actions to the words and sounded the words at the same time: Biiiigggg! BIG! I encouraged them to play with the sound of the word as they explored their actions, explore the sound as well.
Next, in pairs, they conversed with oppositional words. One is Big, the other is Small. Back and forth playing with the sounds and actions, conversing, responding.
Finally, in the same pairs, they were instructed to each pick a word from their poem and use that to converse with, playing with sounds and actions. That took about 15 minutes. For the next 15 minutes, they went back into rehearsal of their poems with their partners, with the instruction to apply what they'd learned to their poems.
We looked at several examples during the final ten minutes of class.
Confidence is deepening. Projection is improving. Not everyone managed to enhance more than one or two words, so I asked them to underline words they thought might work in their poems for homework.
Next week, we will get into some articulation work.
Big, small, bumpy, smooth, stupendous (had to define that one for them), super-heroic, etc.
They were to find actions to express the adjectives. No sound.
The second time through, we did the same sounds and actions and they could add sound effects.
Third time through, they did the actions to the words and sounded the words at the same time: Biiiigggg! BIG! I encouraged them to play with the sound of the word as they explored their actions, explore the sound as well.
Next, in pairs, they conversed with oppositional words. One is Big, the other is Small. Back and forth playing with the sounds and actions, conversing, responding.
Finally, in the same pairs, they were instructed to each pick a word from their poem and use that to converse with, playing with sounds and actions. That took about 15 minutes. For the next 15 minutes, they went back into rehearsal of their poems with their partners, with the instruction to apply what they'd learned to their poems.
We looked at several examples during the final ten minutes of class.
Confidence is deepening. Projection is improving. Not everyone managed to enhance more than one or two words, so I asked them to underline words they thought might work in their poems for homework.
Next week, we will get into some articulation work.
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
Tuesday's work -- the warm-up
I took them through the warm-up I use with my drama students and play casts. It starts with the spine and then works all the joints from neck to toes. I was careful to include breathing and sounds with the warm-up, before going on to the breathing exercises. We worked on breath awareness and resonating sounds from various points of the body. The sounds were timid at first, but gradually the volume in the room began to pick up as they discovered how to power their voices.
After the warm-up, I sent them off into their pairs again, this time giving them two additional tasks.
1. They could change their actions if their poem called for it. Both could act and both could speak-- it was their task to figure out how to distribute things best for the poem.
2. They were to try finding different ways to resonate their words based upon the warm-up work.
At the end of the class, I asked for volunteers to share their work. It was quite exciting to see and hear the improvements. All of them found a way to enhance the sounds of words within their poems by using resonance. They also developed their actions much further and added sound effects in some cases.
On Thursday, I will begin with some articulation exercises. There are a number of students in this class who mush their speech or tumble the words out too fast.
After the warm-up, I sent them off into their pairs again, this time giving them two additional tasks.
1. They could change their actions if their poem called for it. Both could act and both could speak-- it was their task to figure out how to distribute things best for the poem.
2. They were to try finding different ways to resonate their words based upon the warm-up work.
At the end of the class, I asked for volunteers to share their work. It was quite exciting to see and hear the improvements. All of them found a way to enhance the sounds of words within their poems by using resonance. They also developed their actions much further and added sound effects in some cases.
On Thursday, I will begin with some articulation exercises. There are a number of students in this class who mush their speech or tumble the words out too fast.
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