Not only do I like the idea of an online audience, but I like a place that I can be reflective and express what I'm feeling. So here's my idea for my theatre classroom...we do a reflective wiki. I'm still learning about wikis, but I do know that they are collaborative and changeable. I think we use this Web 2.0 tool as we study a particular playwright or a different technique or style of acting. As we learn about a certain concept in the classroom, students go home and reflect about it on the wiki or blog we've created. And on the wiki they add knowledge and contribute information about the current topic. Theatre is project-based learning, so collaborating not only in the classroom, but also online takes this ancient art form into the 21st century in the classroom. It's already gone technological in the theatre itself, but I have not had any experience teaching theatre using these tools. I also like the idea of podcasting to do a radio drama with sound effects or even having groups of students teaching via podcast about different genres of theatre.
Okay, I know I am speaking to .00001% of the population...the first year theatre teacher. But I know you're out there and you know how to hang lights and build costumes and mount a beautiful set and help students find their beats and objectives, but what are you doing in the classroom? How are you helping those students who aren't connecting with the material? Or those students who are sitting around because they are waiting to do their monologue for you? As interactive as theatre can be, there can be a lot of hurry up and wait time. Don't let this happen. Get those students off the floor and into a corner recording a podcast or adding to wiki or creating a video that advertises the school production.
Now for the English Language Arts teacher, our worlds collide. You teach more from the author's side of the table and I teach from the character's point of view. What if we collaborated and the characters interviewed the author using digital media? What if our classes Skyped with each other to discuss the a play like Romeo & Juliet? What if your writing class wrote scenes or monologues for my students to perform and they blogged about it? I'm telling you the possibilities are endless and I'm just now realizing this.
I have attached a clip of a student made video that explains the characters of Romeo & Juliet. I felt like this was a great idea for Language Arts as well as Theatre. I love that students created it and it was sent in as a contest entry which is another venue for our students to have an online audience with our content...contests.
So, I've settled it. Technology in the Theatre Classroom...it must exist. Just like all the other content areas, these tools will add to the students' experience and raise their expertise. So get your fingers ready to type and let the show begin!
Romeo & Juliet Video
Here's a little tidbit on Spider-man the Musical as well!
Thank you for honestly sharing some of your concerns about mixing technology with the dramatic arts. I get a little queasy sometimes thinking of all the machines that are attracting and seducing people today. My love for face to face interaction makes me weary at times about all the interaction we do today via machines. This really isn't a new issue though, is it? TV and motion pictures took stage performance and broadcast it for a larger audience. Some of my favorite TV shows are those performed in front of a studio audience. While I couldn't be there live in the studio, technology allowed me to be there in another way. Today, my students watched the 2004 movie version of Phantom of the Opera. I chose to show them this performance because some of them will never be able to or will ever go to a live performance of this kind. The DVD, its player, and projector allowed my students to have a cultural experience some of them would never have had. As I was reading your post, I thought of another way you could (and probably do) use technology in your classroom...by video taping acting and then allowing the actor to view him/herself. And finally, you talk about the human condition in your post. In the 21st Century, part of the human condition is how to react to and are affected by technology. Why not have student act out scene that involve their interaction with technology, with cell phones, iPads, computers, ATM machines, etc. I'd love to see a one-act that ends with someone murdering a computer or throwing it out the window. I have wanted to do something destructive to a computer numerous times when it wasn't cooperating with me.
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