ECA 433 Learning Through Drama

1. ECA 433Learning Through Drama Self Efficacy

2. Self Efficacy To have optimistic beliefs in oneself in relation to worth and competency in achieving goals, and ability to deal with confronting challenges.

3. Background Scenario In the light of the well publicised ‘facebook murder’, among other similar incidents, the schools co-ordinators have been become more aware of the social health of the year 9 class. After calculating the results of a survey taken on issues to do with self esteem and efficacy, students were found to still be at an early level 5 stage of their Interpersonal Development. These results, along with assessing situations at school where students’ confidence within social affairs are a large factor, they have decided to implicate a two-day program called ‘Silver Linings’. The program is designed to increase the level of interpersonal development up to what is an acceptable level for year 9.

4. Background Scenario Silver Linings is a two-day program which involves a collection of workshops and seminars, sourced both internally and externally. These workshops will tackle issues with self efficacy in regards to both the students academic and social lives. There are multiple class sized groups that have been selected so that particularly exclusive or problematic groups are separated to increase student learning and sharing. One of the workshops is to be run by a drama teacher.

5. Purpose of activities used: • To promote confidence in students • Create awareness of stereotypical definitions of words used to describe people • Build rapport among year level • Encourage students to work collaboratively to achieve a common goal • To advocate the use of empathy to understand the motivating factors behind peoples’ actions. • To give students an arena in which to test and challenge themselves through different roles, without them seeing it as a risk. • Aid students in assessing what is appropriate behaviour in particular situations, and to adjust it appropriately

6. Purpose of activities used: Through the use of role play, students will evolve skills in: • Risk taking • Assuming responsibility • Employing empathy The use of story making aids students in developing skills in: • Interacting with others • Communicating • Planning By using improvisation in the classroom, students will: • Have to respond to their environment • Adapt behaviour so it is conducive to the environment (Goerecke, 1993)

7. Why use Drama? • Helps open up the students mind as they are able to get up and experience what they are learning, not just read or write about it. • Because they are learning about self worth and coming to terms with themselves, drama enables the students to take chances and challenge their own perceptions in a safe and risk-free environment, allowing them to experiment without the worry of what implications they might have. • Students are less likely to have their attention drawn to the fact that they are learning as it is a different platform to that which they are used to, allowing them to follow through with the activities, rather than groaning about the content • In a dramatic atmosphere, a student is able to take on a different persona than their own and explore their motivations in an acceptable way, as it is not the student that is acting in a particular way, but the persona that is taking the risks. • Appeals to different types of learners, drawing greatly on kinaesthetic learners and visual learners.

8. Workshop Firstly, students need to be aware that in this workshop, there will be no tolerance of negative behaviour towards anyone in the classroom. There is no such thing as ‘bad’ or ‘stupid’ or other similar words. Everybody here is equal and is given an equal chance.

9. Workshop Warm up • Throwing ball into air exercise: As a collective group, the students are given a ball (large, soft and bouncy) which they are to throw in the air and tapping it to keep it up long as they can. Each tap gives them a point. The objective is to get the highest score possible in one round. Any one student cannot tap the ball more than once in a row, and everyone is to participate and attempt to keep the ball in the air. • Hot Spot activity: Each person, in time, runs up to a chair that is placed in front of the groups of sitting students and says something about them (eg. What they had for breakfast, how many bones they have broken, what their favourite TV show is etc.) The class should always maintain to have the chair occupied at any one time.

10. Workshop Breaking down the Barriers • Students now form a circle. They are asked to run to the middle of the circle if they: • Are wearing yellow • Had toast for breakfast • Think Justin Bieber is totally cute • Have friends in this class • Have ever felt like they don’t fit in • Have ever felt unhappy about who they are • Ask class if anyone can give an example of what they may be unhappy about

11. Workshop Team Building/ Exercises • Groups and numbers game • Walk around the room by yourself, walking into the spaces (if you see a space, fill it up by walking into it). • When instructed, students immediately form groups of the specified number and are instructed to work together to form the shape of various things, e.g. particular letters, a car, a row-boat, a mirror, etc. • Continue 3-4 times.

12. Workshop What does it mean? • Continuing on from the groups and numbers exercise, students are to walk around the space by themselves and instructed to think about HAPPINESS. What does it mean? How does it feel? How does it look? Create a still image alone, to show what it looks like. Do the same for BEAUTY and for STRENGTH. • THEN- in groups of 3-4 students, choose on one of the three (happiness / beauty / strength) and create two freeze frames. The first is to show a stereotypical view of this trait, and the second is to explore an alternative meaning of this trait. • Go around to each group and get them to show the rest of the class- also ask them to explain what they were aiming to achieve.

13. s DOLLFACE video

14. Workshop Visual stimulus • www.youtube.com/watch?v=zl6hNj1uOkY • Discuss this with class- why did was this video shown? What was it about? What themes did you pick up on etc. • Using the themes just discussed, in groups of 4-5, create a short 1-2 minute scenario in which similar ideas are being explored-(eg- a person is trying to be someone they’re not, peer pressure, media pressure, trying to fit in, living up to expectations of friends / family / teachers / stereotypes etc.), but do not show what the result of those actions are.

15. Workshop Continued • Show these to class, and take the time to discuss what is happening in each scene. Get the group to do a freeze at the end of their scene, and see what the different characters are thinking at that point. • Discuss with the class and current group what the possible outcomes of this situation are. • Then ask how could they be manipulated or changed to have a positive outcome. • Ask if a particular student would like to come into the scene and help change it around. Allow the students to improvise how the new situation may turn out. It may be necessary to inform the group that in these sorts of improvised situations, it is best to employ as ‘yes and’ or a ‘yes, but’ answer to keep the scenario play out.