The Performance Day / Evaluation

How performing in a professional theatre helped me to develop my skills as an actor

• Helped me to understand the rules of theatre
• Helped me to become more confident with working and acting in a theatre 
• Helped me to work with others 
• Helped me to realize that in a theatre it is important that you make you actions obvious because there are a lot of people in the theatre that need to see your movements.

What I learnt as an actor

• Not all acting has to be voice related, sometimes it is better to show your acting through your body language and your facial expressions. If you use your body as your advantage in acting you can make drama more interesting and captivating, rather than using your voice for everything, otherwise it can get boring.
• Making children;s theatre is an important thing. You have to try and make it as good as you can as it its most likely a child's first experience of acting. Children's theatre has to be quite obvious, it is good if you can make things less complicated as possible so that they can understand more easier.

What went well? 
Our performance went so well! Each group performed to their best ability and gave it their all. I think that the young audience loved it. I could tell by their reactions during the show and the feedback I received. We all committed to our roles making the show ten times better and very child-friendly.

Even Better If?

• Better communication behind stage as sometimes we could be quite loud and the audience might have been able to hear us from their seats and this wouldn't have been very professional.

Did our sections of drama relate well to the section of the book?
Yes, we made sure that the audience could tell that our piece was dull and not meant to be lively. This was a good chance for the audience to have a break from all the excitement that was open the stage previously. Also, our seen did relate to our piece of the show where we were in a world where "dreams did not exist" so we had to act miserable. We didn't use much words because we thought that our target audience would necessarily need words to understand what we were trying to portray. Young kids read emotion through facial expressions and body language, because most under 4's do not understand all of the English language. This means that we didn't have to use our voice as much, and our decided to use physical theatre because it would give the performance a change.

Did the whole piece relate to the book?/ Was our performance suitable for our target audience?
Yes, overall, the whole show related well to the book of "An Awesome Book". We showed the stages of dullness and excitement, and the piece came together really well. The audience liked our performance and it explained the story really well. I think that the book and the performance had a lot of similarities and it was very clear what our show was trying to tell the audience. "Always dream as big as you can, don't stop dreaming because someone tells you to, you can dream whatever you like, so achieve your goals in life". This was a good theme for our audience of under 4's because it let them know that they can have as many dreams as big as they like, it was a nice theme to our show because we want children to have creative minds, we as BRIT students think that everyone should be creative! We decided to teach this moto through theatre, hopefully it persuades some children to pursue this career when they are older. The show was suitable for our target audience because we made it simple to understand and exciting. We also used music to engage them as well.

I loved "Little People's Day" and it has helped me to realize that later in my acting career, at some point I would like to do children's theatre because it is very exciting and interesting to perform. I absolutely loved it and I can't wait to do a similar show like that in the future!

Dress rehearsal in The New Theatre with all the Strands

Today, in our lesson, we went into the space in which we will perform our piece for "Little People Day". The New Theatre. We done this so that we could rehearse how everybody was getting on and off stage.

It was really good because we got to see how our show would end up looking like, we also got to experience performing in one of our school's theatre.

Why it was good for me to work in a professional theatre
It was beneficial for me to work in a professional theatre as it allowed me to understand the environment that professional actors work in and the level at which professionals have to work at to achieve good results. It also allowed me to see what working at a professional level would entail and the standards I would have to live up to. Working in the professional theatre also allowed me to see how theatres work in general such as entrances and exists. It also taught me that your voice isn't your only source of acting and you can use things such as body language to express and show your emotions and feelings.

How could I/ we as a group improve?

• To have faith in acting that our section was boring but interesting and captivating.
• To fully commit to roles to make more effective and show off our skills to our full potential.
• To not make our piece boring, but to make it captivating and alive. 

What I learnt?
I feel that I learnt how mature you have to be to be able to work in a professional theatre and how important team work is. I also learnt that it is more beneficial when performing to young children you need to use more body language and less complicated language as young children remember actions better than complicated language. I learnt that for children theatre doesn't always have to be musical and exciting. For example our classes section of the book was more dull and boring as we were exploring and performing life where dreams didn't exist therefore our piece was not intended to be happy. My class still had to commit to our roles as much as the other groups however we had to portray to the young audience that our scene was about life with no dreams so in this case it was okay for our scene to come across "boring". During this dress rehearsal I learnt how to develop my confidence in acting.

What went well?
I feel as though this dress rehearsal went really well because everyone cooperated relatively well. I also feel as if everyone put in effort to perform our show and this made me really look forward to performing to the children next week.

How it developed my acting
I developed my acting by learning how to co-operate better with a large group of actors, dancers, musicians, and theatre crew. It helped me to understand how to work in a theatre like a young adult and it made me more confident in acting.

Check out the Book we're responding to for 'Little People's Day....

An Awesome Book by Dallas Clayton

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vGQ3Nl1ZFy8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZMFE_V7xEw

What is your first opinion on the book?
I really enjoyed this book- I liked the story line very much, it was nice because, the book let children know that they can dream whatever they would like to dream  and that they can dream however big they like. I think it is a good book for children because there are many interesting pictures that are very captivating. Some children may not understand the book, as the book is made for and adult to read to the children (preferably just before they go to sleep) however once you explain the book to the young children they will kind of understand this message of the book.

Why has it been selected for our 'Little people's Day' audience?
It has been chosen for our 'Little People's Day' because it has a great message for young children and also it can be portrayed in many different ways that will make it a interesting, good piece of quality theatre for our young audience of under 4's.

Session 1- An Extremely Focused and Committed start to the project

Sleeping Bunnies - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V9J_DqEwZdc
Sleeping Bunnies was an exercise we took part in as a group. It was a interesting task and also quite weird but fun because we got to act like young children. Sleeping Bunnies is a kids game. When you hear the music start you have to fall asleep and pretend to be a 'sleeping bunny'. When you hear the voice say "wake up little bunnies" the whole class gets up and hops around the room like bunnies. This was a good exercise for our class because it made us become more comfortable acting weird together. Also it gave us the opportunity to let our minds become free and feel like we are little children again. Therefore we can think like a child so we know what our audience will and will not like.

Remembering a vivid dream
We were then given the task to remember a vivid dream from when we were a small child. This was a good task to help us to remember what we liked as a young kid. Remembering our dreams gave us the chance to remember how imaginative and creative we were as children and we realized how big of an imagination young children have, so therefore we could incorporate our thoughts and ideas into our piece we will be showing for 'Little People's Day'.

Imagine you are in the dream, moving around the room: making it bigger; slow motion

This task was good because it helped us to understand how we would act out our dream, giving us a chance to think about how we could make 'An Awesome Book' into a piece of theatre. However making it interesting and exciting for our young audience.

Describe your dream to a partner

This was helpful to us because we got to listen to another person's dream from when they were younger. This helped us to widen our imagination even further and understand the creativity and imagination of a child.

Describing your dream to a partner from a distance, where you have to be physically bigger
This was a good exercise because it helped us to think of way to communicate to our partner and let them know what we are trying to say with other people talking in the background. This was a good task because it helped us to try and communicate through our body language without having the power of our voice- which is a key skill in theatre. Little kids do not understand everything you say so doing this exercise was a way of finding ways on using your bodies so that children can understand what you are trying to say to them as they do not understand all of English. 

Creating a sound/movement machine

This was an exercise where we individually had to think of a movement and sound to do. Mr Crowther then told us to one by one get up and add to the machine, joining each movement so it looked somewhat connected. This was good because it got us to focus as a whole class and it also got us to be able to work together as a professional theatre company. It built trust between us. Also the machine gave the idea of different dreams. There was so many different sounds and movements going on that could represent so many different dreams. Constructing: this represented different dreams coming into the picture and the idea that you could have as many dreams as you like in your own personal dream machine. Destructing: Representing that dreams fade away but it is wrong and they shouldn't fade away. You should pursue your wildest dreams. Slow motion: Gives the effect of time passing or your dreams lasting for a long time or 'forever'. Speeding up: could represent the idea of your dreams being so fast that people can't keep up with you and that your dreams can be whatever you like.

Moving around the room and then in numbers creating elements of different dreams. The elements fed back by the group were:

• Money
• Bull dogs
• Dinosaurs
• Stepping stones
• Flying
• Medieval
• Giant Frog
• Sweet food
• Princesses
• Concrete Jungle
• Night into Day
• Super Powers
• Marshmallow clouds
• Butter icing quicksand
• Tropical Tightrope 
• Caramel filled chocolate iced hedgehog 
• Heroes and Villains 
• Fire breathing shoe 
• Sunbathing aliens 
• Swimming under water 
• Mermaids

Lesson 1 Homework Tasks

Devising Skills

What skills did we discuss today?

• interpretative skills
• technical skills
• interactive skills

Children's theatre

Why is theatre so important and valuable for children?

Theatre is important for children because it is most likely their first piece of theatre they have watched and therefore they will get their first chance in judging whether they like theatre or not. If children's first piece of theatre they watch is terrible, they will have a bad idea on theatre, however if they see a good piece, it could possibly be a trigger of them having a passion for theatre.

The Polka Theatre 

1. Who are they? They are a theatre company in the UK who put pieces of theatre on for children of young ages- aged 0-14. They have been open since 1979 and it is a fact hat over 90,000 children a year come to the Polka Theatre and are inspired, stimulated and engaged by theatre, often for the fist time.
2. Who do they make work for? Children aged 0-14
3. What's on at the moment?Dot, Squiggle and rest
   World of Stories and Music
   Gorilla
   What to do when you find a dinosaur
   Claytime
   Thumbelina
   Hurricane Boy
   Beasty Baby
   Beauty and the Beast
   The Bear
   The Sagas of Noggin the Dog
   Not now, Bernard
   The Paper Dolls for Toddlers
   The Paper Dolls
   The Tigers bones and Other Stories
   
   4. How might this company help us with the work we are devising? This company can help us to understand what young children like and enjoy. Watching and studying this company can give us ideas on how to introduce theatre to our young audience.

The Unicorn Theatre

1. Who are they?
   It is a company who produce theatre for young children. They think it is very important to "give children a valuable, and often first ever experience of quality theatre".
2. Who do they make work for?
   For young people of all ages. They welcome families, schools and young people.
3. What's on at the moment? 
   The longest ride
   Far from the Madding Crown
   Frozen (singalong)
   Enchanted
   Mary Poppins
   Zarafa
   Frozen
   Labyrinth
   Willow
   The Never Ending Story
4. How might this company help us with the work we are devising?
   They will help us to expand our minds to incorporate good, quality ideas to add to our piece so that it is a good experience for our young audience.

What activities did we do today?/ What ideas did you/ your group come up with?/ Was your piece suitable for the target audience?
Today, we got into groups of 5 my group was: Amaia, Jake, Michelle, Antonia and myself. We had to create an atmosphere where "dreams were dead" but we had to include animals in our piece. Amaia was a caterpillar, Antonia was a Sloth, Michelle was a bunny,  I was a frog and Jake was the human. We decided to portray the "world where dreams were dead" by using a human who had no imagination, and everything he/she touched would turn into something lifeless, where dreams did not exist. For example when Jake came and touched me (the frog) i turned into a re-filled water machine, when he touched Amaia (the caterpillar) she turned into a bench. I suggested that this would be a good idea to show the world as lifeless, because it was a visual way of showing exciting, energetic life, turning into dull lifeless objects. We also took into consideration of our target audience and thought that our piece would be simple and quite easy to understand because it would look as if the animals died once the person came in contact with it. The young people, would get a sense of death.

Why did we reject some ideas?/ Why did you chose to expand on some decisions?
We decided not to make our piece to complex and too hard to understand with a complicated meaning because otherwise it wouldn't be simple enough for our target audience to understand. We decided to keep our ideas as simple as possible so therefore, it would be easy for the under 4's to understand. We expanded on our idea of showing the death of animals. We used a person to show them killing the animals, making them die. This was a visual way of showing our audience how the life became lifeless.

What acting skills/ performance skills did you use? EXPLAIN WHY these are suitable for the piece and the target audience.
We didn't use our voices to talk in the piece, instead we used our voices to make different animal noises to make the piece more child suitable and more interesting. Using animal noises made it clear for our target audience what we were acting, as animal noises are one of the first things you learn when you are a young person. Once the noises stopped it was a way of communicating to the audience that the animals had died.

Also we used our body language to communicate that we were not humans but animals. Body language is a very important thing in acting. People use it to show how they are feeling or what they are. We used our body language to show that we were animals.