Unit 7 - Theatre in education

Deciding on the project

Over the past few weeks I have been looking for ideas which I can base my ‘Theatre in education’ piece around. I have decided that the piece will be performed to a group of children who are aged 4 – 6 years old who will be in reception/year 1 at school. The children will be from a local primary school and will come to college to watch the performance.

I have been carrying out research into what children at this age learn about at school. I found a good website that told me everything that children learn in this stage of their life at school. Here is the link to the website:

http://www.primarycurriculum.me.uk/year1

I have also been in contact with the local primary school to ask about what themes they think would be appropriate for a performance for the children. Here is a copy of the emails which I have sent to the primary school:

On Monday 11^th September:

“Dear Sarah,

It’s Charlotte here, one of the students from RNC who worked with the children on the River Project earlier this year.  

This year, as part of my performing arts course, I have to write, direct and perform a theatre in education piece.

After speaking to Cara, we have made a decision that we would like to devise and perform a piece to a group of primary school children in key stage 1.

So I was wondering if a group of your reception/year1 children would be interested in coming to the college to watch a performance? We were thinking of staging the piece around December/January time (we could be flexible to accommodate you).

I am looking for ideas as to what we could devise our play about. What are the children in key stage 1 currently studying/going to learn about soon? Would it be beneficial for the children to have a performance based on a key stage 1 theme?

Hope to hear from you soon,

Charlotte”

“Hi Charlotte, 

This sounds really exciting. Especially as you are giving us the opportunity to steer the creative direction of the piece. I wonder if we might also be able to get some funding for transport from the Sylvia Short Trust (That's always a big cost for us).

I have cc'd my Deputy Head into this email to see what she thinks about it. 

If you don't hear back from me straight away, it's just because things are busy in September! Please do chase me up if you don't hear back.

Best wishes,

Sarah”

On Monday 25^th September:

“Dear Sarah,

Following on from my last email, I have been thinking about possible subject matter for our performance.

I’ve listed the themes below and I would be very grateful if you could let me know which theme you think would be the most appropriate for the children (key stage 1).

·         Road safety

·         Healthy eating

·         The environment (this could include recycling, endangered animals and the impact of global warming)

·         Water safety

·         Countries and cultures

If you could let me know what you think about these themes or if you have any other suggestions I would be very grateful. The sooner the better as I need to plan our devising and rehearsing and need to put together a draft script by half term, so time is of the essence!

Look forward to hearing from you,

Best wishes,

Charlotte”

I have also spent some time in lessons collecting ides with the first-year students to try and get some ideas for the project.