Volume 1 Number 25


Hi Folks,

Kim's Drama Blog  

Well, the year forges on relentlessly.   Another busy week.  My Year 11 students performed a couple of one-act plays on Tuesday and Wednesday.  We had a full day of doing dress and tech rehearsals on Monday - I was concerned that they weren't going to pull it together.  But they did.  There was a marked improvement and the spectre of dying in front of an audience seems to have amazing motivational qualities.  I'm always astounded that we have to go through those nightmarish days leading up to the performances.  Next week my Year 12 class will present their original solo productions... quite looking forward to seeing their ideas fully realised.  

On the career front... I had an interview at a Catholic college near me for the position of Head of Arts.   I was in the interview for nearly an hour and there was a comfortable atmosphere.   I have no idea how I fared and will hopefully know the outcome in a week or so. Everyone finger-crossing, silent prayer, and wishing is appreciated.    I was a little concerned prior to the interview but after sitting watching the students drifting in and out of administration I began to think it was a place I could comfortably work.

My younger students are still working on their original issue-based dramas for the Youth on Health Festival.  Our biggest difficulty at the moment is the shocking rate of absenteeism... two major factors - several students have signed onto a Structured Workplace Learning program that takes them out of the school for up to 2 days per week and they miss everything on those days, and there is a nasty flu/gastric illness taking kids down in droves.   Most classes have less than 4 hours of contact time before they present at the festival...  none are costumed yet, and only one group has had access to the stage...  more as things develop.

Discussion List Issues

Its been a little quiet this week.  I did notice that National Drama in the UK have got their list off the ground.   Great to see that the value of these forums is being realised.  I'm not certain but I think the original list I created in 1997 was the second Drama Education list to come into existence.   I'm hoping that people are still finding the Drama Ed list useful - a bit hard to tell sometimes as discussion gets quite limited some weeks.  This past week has largely been announcements about support services and events - I'm wondering what are the real issues of drama teachers around the world.   With the IDEA World Congress reconvening next year it would be great to initiate some positive actions about the status of Drama and the reality of the benefits of Drama in Education.   There seems to still exist the general belief that the Arts are still the frilly decoration - not real education.

LESSON/ACTIVITY IDEA

Unfortunately this term is normally associated with MSB policies in schools.  However, I have recently been looking at an initiative used by the English Schools Foundation in Hong Kong.  And I think is has great merit and is something I've not seen used in my part of the world.  The idea is that just as we attend to professional development by attending and presenting at conferences so too can our students.  These could be organised in a variety of ways but I'll refer to the structure I'm familiar with.

You would need to organise with other Drama teachers in your district to discuss the scope and content of the courses taught. As we operate on a Common Assessment Framework here in WA it is relatively easy to address scope of the course.

Then, find who (in terms of experts and professionals - and this includes the expertise of the teachers involved) will be available to run workshops, seminars, present papers and keynotes.  Organise a program.

Next you'll need to find an appropriate venue - one that has a good variety of spaces to accommodate the activities of the student conference.

Encourage students to register.  (This is much easier with the structure in WA as we can utilise the District Offices to facilitate this type of event)

Present your conference.  Really pull out all stops to make it dynamic and challenge for students.  Allow them to see the scope of the subject, experience other teachers, see the work of other students....  to really learn.

In your second year you'll of course make it a student-run initiative!!

RECOMMENDED WEBSITES

ArtsJournal.com - The Daily Digest of Arts, Culture and Ideas is a weekday digest of some of the best arts and cultural journalism in the English-speaking world. Each day ArtsJournal combs through more than 200 English-language newspapers, magazines and publications featuring writing about arts and culture.

Direct links to the most interesting or important stories are posted every weekday beginning at 5 AM PT on the ArtsJournal news pages. Stories from sites that charge for access are excluded. If you encounter a registration screen after clicking an ArtsJournal link, try logging in as either 'ajreader' or 'ajreader@artsjournal.com' with the password 'access'. 

You can subscribe for a daily digest to be sent by email.  A great way to get an eye on the world of Arts and Culture.

PROFESSIONAL NEWS

IF YOU HAVE AN EVENT YOU'D LIKE INCLUDED PLEASE CONTACT ME.

This conference is organised by the Department of German, UCC
in co-operation with the Board of Drama and Theatre Studies, UCC
and the Drama Section at Cork School of Music
(A Constituent School of Cork Institute of Technology)

January 8 - January 11, 2004
Renaissance Ilikai Waikiki Hotel in Honolulu, Hawaii
Submission Deadline: August 18th, 2003
humanities@hichumanities.org

June 15-18, 2004 PSi 10
Singapore
proposals due Sept 30
c/o Lee Weng Choy
The Substation
45 Armenian Street
Singapore 179936
tel: (65) 6337 7535 fax: (65) 6337 2729
papers@singaporepsi.org

Nov. 14-20, 2003
Traders Hotel, Manila, Philippines
aims to raise the consciousness of international women playwrights on the plight of Asian, African, Latin American women in the 21st Century through drama sessions on: Spirituality and Tradition, Loss and Legacy, Shifting Borders and Boundaries, Writing in a Period of War and Political Turmoil, Gender and Sexuality, and Racism and Justice.

13th - 17th April 2004
University of Canterbury

This innovative, international Conference sets out to provide an important forum for drama educators, researchers and practitioners to come together and consider drama practice in relation to recent brain research and thinking for learning. This Conference will be of interest to not only drama educators but to all educators with an interest in actively developing a pedagogical and aesthetic understanding of drama.

RECOMMENDED RESOURCES

I've recently found the Broadway Theatre Archive.   It is a great source of video performances of many great plays.   One of the regular difficulties in a Drama class is to bridge the gap between students experiences and the scope of theatrical performance.   Its fine if you live in a major cultural centre and can afford to attend a wide range of performances - Broadway, London's West End, etc... all offer a wide range of styles.  What happens though if you don't have access to this?   Well, the BTA can help.  The link here goes directly to their catalogue and you'll soon see they have a wide choice.   Recently they have started adding DVD format to the catalogue.   I was pleasantly surprised at the affordability of the product - I've often been expected to pay over $100 for video of a theatrical performance.  Do yourself a favour and check them out.

This is a new initiative.  The site taps into the Amazon catalogue.  The search engines are tweaked to find the best of the available resources.  The real bonus of the site is that it allows you to explore without the undue clutter and distractions of the Amazon.com site.   If you like a clean and stylish shopping environment that focuses on the task at hand then dramabooks is the site for you.

 

ALSO AVAILABLE 

eBOOKS - Can be downloaded immediately - A full listing of available eBooks.

Kim Flintoff

Copyright © September, 2004