Estimated Time:  80 minutes (2 periods)

In this lesson students will reflect on advice provided by professional theatre artists and demonstrate their understanding through tableau and characterisation.

Guiding Questions
  • What skills might be required for a successful theatre career?
  • What challenges do theatre professionals face?
  • Why might it be valuable to hear advice from professionals who have worked in theatre and the arts for the majority of their careers?
  • If you could ask one question to a theatre professional, what would it be?
Learning Goals

By the end of this lesson, students will 

  • Students will name and summarize skills, mindsets, and habits a theatre professional uses in their work 
  • Students will identify their own skills in drama and choose one they intend to develop further in class, and reflect on how the advice they hear might help them improve as collaborators and theatre artists
  • Students will identify how a theatre professional’s lived experience helps shape the advice they share 
  • Students will use tableau, dialogue, and poetry to present their understanding of professional theatre artists’ advice.
Readiness

This lesson could fall at any point in a unit on roles and careers in theatre. There should be a working knowledge of elements of effective tableaus and scenes.

Terminology
Materials
  • Legend Library Interviews: Suggestions: Linda Griffiths, Tantoo Cardinal, Christopher Newton, Christopher Plummer, Michael Greyeyes, Ardon Bess, Tom Hendry, Mark Breslin, Araby Lockhart, Michael Eagan
  • Chart papers displayed around the room each titles with one of the following roles : director, designer, playwright, actor, producer 
  • PDF #1 - Theatre Careers - Responsibilities and Challenges T-Chart
  • PDF #2 - Tableau Success Criteria
  • PDF #3 - General Assessment: Drama Performance
  • PDF #4 - Choral Speaking Checklist
  • PDF #5 - Elements of Voice and Choral Speaking 
  • Video Projector (or devices for students to use individually or in pairs)
  • Chart paper and markers
  • Sticky notes/ Post-It Notes
  • Journals

Minds On

Small Group & Whole Class > Responsibilities and Challenges in Theatre Careers

Options: 

  1. Provide students with PDF #1 Theatre Careers Responsibilities and Challenges T-Charts 

or

  1. Display 5 chart papers around the room, each labelled with a different theatre role: director, designer, playwright, actor, producer and a table underneath labelled “responsibilities” on one side and “challenges” on the other. 

Invite students to visit each paper and write down what responsibilities and challenges they think these careers hold.  

Bring the class together to discuss the ideas shared.

Key Questions for Discussion:

  • Who might each role be responsible for communicating with in the theatre?

  • Why might someone have difficulty completing tasks in their job? What obstacles might get in the way?

  • How does this role contribute to the success of a production?

  • What might someone in this role need to succeed?

Individual > Responsibilities and Challenges in Theatre Careers

Provide journals for students to write an entry responding to the prompt: What advice do you think a professional theatre artist might give someone who is just starting in their career?

Differentiation (DI)

Students may complete the chart paper task individually, in partners, small groups, or as a whole class discussion. 

Responses may be written or shared orally

Journals could be typed, written on a sheet of paper, or completed in a physical book

Assessment for Learning (AfL)

Observation and sidecoaching, as needed.

Action

Teacher Note

This next activity could be viewed by students using devices either individually, in small groups or in partners, or screened using a projector for the whole class.

Individual > Legends Library

Ask students to choose to watch two to four interviews from the CTM Legends Library. Ideally, they choose legends who work in different areas of theatre (not only actors). 

Invite students to use a Post-it note to write down words of advice from the artists. They should choose something that really resonates with them.

The following interviews are recommended:

Whole Class > Advice Gallery and Discussion

Bring the class back together for a discussion of their interviews.

Key Questions for Discussion

  • What are 3-5 pieces of advice you identified from theatre professionals? 

Invite everyone to post their words of advice onto an “advice wall.” Everyone may take time to read the different words of wisdom.

Key Questions/ Prompts for Discussion

  • Why did these comments stand out for you?

  • Do any pieces of advice surprise you? Why?

  • Does the advice apply to theatre jobs in particular or life skills (like inclusion, representation, collaboration, perseverance, resilience, adaptability, risk taking etc.)? What kind of advice do you gravitate towards?

Small Groups > Tableau & Scenes

Put students into small groups. Ask them to choose one of the pieces of advice from the gallery - to be determined amongst themselves-  to represent as a tableau and then brought to life in a short scene. 

Hand out PDF #2 Tableau Success Criteria & PDF #3 - General Assessment: Drama Performance to each group, or project it for all to see. The tableau should clearly depict the advice in action in the context of theatre. Encourage students to use:

  • Levels (high, medium, low) 
  • Facial expressions
  • Clear physical intention
  • They can represent living or non-living things
  • Be aware of where their audience is and angle their tableau accordingly

The tableau should be titled, and the group members will determine how to share that title with the class.

The tableau should be able to be comfortably frozen for 7-10 seconds, and then come alive in a short scene where the actors will use dialogue to share the advice in action. Perhaps someone is giving the advice, or completing a task using the advice, it is up to the students. Students may have a brief period of time to plan out what may be said in this scene, but invite improvisation as well. The scene should be no longer than 30 seconds long and then can end in a tableau once again.

Differentiation (DI)
  • Instead of titling the tableau and scene, the audience could guess the piece of advice based on a group’s performance
  • Students may watch as few or as many videos as they can and have the capacity for.
  • Students may collate their pieces of advice verbally, writing, or using diagrams or pictures.
  • Students may reflect on their chosen piece of advice in their journal, as a video response, orally to the teacher. 
  • Groups may choose either a tableau or a scene to share the advice. They may create more than one.
  • Students who may not want to participate in the tableau may direct their group mates on positioning, and/or create the script or text for their peers to act out. 
Assessment for Learning / Assessment as Learning (AfL / AaL)
  • Review PDF #2 Tableau Criteria and PDF #5 General Assessment: Drama Performance with the class before they engage in these drama conventions
  • Students may use their assessments to self-evaluate, or you, as the teacher, may assess the class. Both would be beneficial.
  • Peer feedback: invite students to respond with constructive critiques of each other’s tableau and scenes. They may respond to: clarity of the tableau, effectiveness of the advice in action, strength of the scene, use of space and physical performance.

Consolidation

Individual > Journal Response

Give students some time to reflect on the Advice Gallery in their journals. 

Key Questions for Reflection

  • Which piece of advice stood out to you most? Why? 

  • Which one would help you most in drama?

  • How might an artist’s lived experiences affect the advice they give? Did you see an example of this in one of the interviews you watched? Explain.

Small Group > Choral Speaking

Invite each student to review their journal responses and choose one sentence that they are most proud of, that they feel was well written, or that reflects their feelings on a professional piece of advice clearly and thoughtfully. Alternatively, they can choose the piece of advice itself.

Ask them to read over this line several times so they know it. 

Split the class into groups of 4-6. Ask each member to share their chosen text from their journal or piece of advice with their group. Instruct the groups then order the phrases in a way that connects. Let them know they can use the lines more than once.

Once the groups have created their poem, invite them to devise a choral speaking performance using the poem they created. Review PDF #4 Choral Speaking Checklist.

Go around the room and gesture to each group to share their choral speaking advice poems. Post them on the advice wall at the end to inspire students in drama class throughout the year.

Differentiation (DI)

Students have a right to pass

Turn out the lights or invite the students who aren’t sharing their poem to close their eyes (if they’re comfortable doing so) and listen to the other performances. This is meant to be an audible presentation, not a visual one. 

If students are not familiar with Choral Speaking, they can refer to PDF #5 Elements of Choral Speaking and/or you can do a mini-lesson on choral speaking prior to beginning this task. 

Assessment as Learning (AaL)

PDF #4 - Choral Speaking Checklist