Second, let’s talk about this Research Dearth.

One of the challenging parts of consulting about theatre with young children is not the consulting itself, but the dearth of substantial research about the topic.  We are expected, after all, to support our assumptions not just with our practices and working knowledge, but with the theory and statistics.  Expect, of course, they don’t really exist in this field.

Sure, there’s research about the use of theatre with adults, teens, and youths.  There’s even research about whether being involved in theatre (or any art, for that matter) makes them smarter or better people.  There’s research about young children and their developmental process and the joy they receive from the arts, the increased math potential from listening to music (thank you Little Einstein for taking that concept overboard and poisoning us with poor imitations of the real thing).  What doesn’t exist is research specifically correlating the developmental process of young children and their participation in process-oriented theatre arts.  Okay, that’s a little white lie, there’s some out there, but it’s really really hard to find and exists as one-liners in dense multi-chapter studies.

I’ve got this dearth particularly in mind today as I work my way through Theatre, Education, and the Making of Meanings by Anthony Jackson.  This text is not about young children, nor is it even about process-oriented theatre.  But it does offer some truly interesting perspective about the development of educational theatre over history, the progress of its theories, and the ongoing dichotomy between the “art” of educational theatre arts and the “education” of educational theatre arts.

I’ll keep you posted as I keep on (it’s rather dry so who knows how long it’ll take me!) but here’s my favorite quote so far.  It happens to be from Brecht, not the author of this text:

the contrast between learning and amusing oneself is not laid down by divine rule;…theatre remains theatre, even when it is instructive theatre, and in so far as it is good theatre it will amuse.

I think we educators of young children can concur…the best learning does indeed take place when learning is a joy.

When her teacher announces they will perform Peter Pan, Grace wants to play Peter.  Her classmates tell her she can’t.  First of all, she’s not a boy, and second, she’s black and Peter isn’t.  Her Ma and Nana are supportive, though, and tell her she can be anything she wants.  The story includes a trip to see a black ballerina playing Juliet on stage.  In the end, Grace does play Peter, and not just because her teacher casts her, but because her classmates vote for her to play the role.  She’s proven she can play Peter regardless of her skin color and gender.

This is an extremely important concept in PictureBook Plays: children can make their own choices about their own characters.  It is okay

• For girls to be pirates with scratchy beards
• For boys to wear tutus and tiaras
• For girls to be grandpas
• For boys to be mamas.
• For dark-skinned children to be white historical figures.
• For light-skinned children to be dark-skinned historical figures.

Educational Theatre, and especially PictureBook Plays, is about using your imagination to explore what you are not, even something simple, like my three year old daughter telling me the other day that she was pretending to be a Big Girl, and therefore started calling me “Mother” rather than Mama.  In her world, Big Girls say “Mother.”  It was not my place to “correct,” it was my place to respond as Mother and allow her to explore this new world as she saw fit.

Grace has a big imagination, a supportive family, and bravery.  This is a terrific book to have in the classroom not just on Drama days.

My colleague and I take this learning process for you, the teacher, very seriously.  PictureBook Plays isn’t just about creating an important opportunity for a child, it’s about helping you gain the confidence and the skills to bring about the opportunity.

I’ve been thinking about this a lot because I just finished reading The Girl with the Brown Crayon by Vivian Gussin Paley.  Paley is a talented writer and quite clearly a talented teacher (although it looks like she has retired as an in-classroom teacher).  Her talent stems not just from her ability to put into eloquent phrases her detailed observations of the children in her classes, but to look back into herself and actively learn as she teaches.  Her students seem to teach her just as much as she teaches them.

This particular book is about the interpretation of stories and their characters and how children (and ultimately herself) learn to develop an aptitude for using these same stories and characters as metaphors for their own lives.  These metaphors are a way of shaping understanding, of–to put it in art education speak–making meaning.

She focuses on Reeny, a brown girl (I write “brown” because she spends part of her days finding the perfect color brown crayon with which to draw her skin) with a quick mind and an aptitude for making insightful, unexpected, and honest observations.  As a class, they wrote to Leo Lionni, the author around whom their curriculum focuses but he is too ill to reply and the child is heart-broken.

Reeny has engaged in a major struggle with Leo Lionni.  First, she believes that he has reneged on the promise of her dream; she in turn denies the premise of his first book.  Magically, the air is cleared and Reeny resumes the task at hand in a more balanced position.  Ultimately, uh-huh uh-huh, it is the reader who interprets the writer.

Did you notice the “uh-huh uh-huh” part?  That’s a singsong phrase from Reeny that the classroom slowly adopts as their own, as does Paley.  It is a verbal heartbeat that thumps along with their friendships and learning processes.  The bolding is mine, because this insight is so important to PictureBook Plays.  Each play contains the potential for hundreds of interpretations because every child will see it from a new perspective.  It’s up to you to allow these interpretations.

Later in the book she writes,

I too require passion in the classroom.  I need the intense preoccupation of a group of children and teachers inventing new worlds as they learn to know each other’s dreams. To invent is to come alive. Even more than the unexamined classroom, I resist the uninvented classroom.

Paley has identified one of the keys to PictureBook Plays: giving space for invention and learning to “know each other’s dreams.”  It is only by takig the risk, placing yourself before your students and honestly guiding them through a self-discovery process that they beging to reveal their dreams to you.  And once you know their dreams, you can help them explore these dreams as they discover themselves in the world.

So, this brings me back to you.  Paley manages to regularly delve inwards, exploring her own struggles and successes as a teacher, and rejoices when her students teach her something new.

Rejoice in your own learning process; give your students permission to teach you.  And read The Girl with the Brown Crayon.  It will only take a couple of evenings for a worthwhile perspective.

One of my favorite parts is towards the end.  Amandina does everything she is supposed to do to put on a good show, but no one arrives.

Sometimes these things happen and nobody knows why.

is the apt and simple explanation.  So what does the little dog do? She doesn’t cry, she doesn’t give up, she doesn’t re-plan, she performs anyways.  And when she performs, the audience arrives on their own.  The very act of telling her story is what made her audience appear in wonder.

This is a really great book for introducing theatre concepts to your preschoolers.

George Hogglesberry is an alien.  The book is not about terror of aliens, or riding in space crafts, it’s about finding your place in a new home.  And fitting in.  The first sentance of the book makes that clear: “Before George Hogglesberry went into his new class, he put a nose on his face.”

Poor George thinks no one likes him because his feet sometimes float away and he regularly turns into random objects like tomatoes and light fixtures when, in fact, everyone likes him very much.  When it’s time to create the school play, everyone is concerned about his ability to perform without turning into something else accidentally.

In the end, George creates his own role that suits him perfectly.  And, at the moment of performance when he feels a little nervous, it’s not another child that tells him what to say, or a teacher that gives him a pep-talk, it’s George taking a deep breath and being brave.  I particularly love this book for this simple message: only you can do it.

Most books about theatre for children hold messages of stage fright, missing out on the part you think you should have had, or impressing friends and family.  But the true spirit of theatre is about accepting the people around you, working together to tell a story in the best way you can, and having confidence in yourself.

If you’re looking for easy stories to turn into plays and for some reason have never heard of such classics as The Three Little Pigs and Goldilocks then this is the book for you! Okay, yes, that was my poor attempt at sarcasm. Honestly, this book is not very helpful, even for beginners.

Each story is broken into sections, with each section interrupted by italicized suggestions like “Make sure Goldilocks puts on her hungry face and her tired face as she walks through the performance space.” And “Make sure she gobbles up the last one as ravenously as possible (it will usually make all the children laugh and will often help if you do it, too).” Similarly useless directions are in every story. In fact, this book is written in such a way as to encourage exactly those things which are neither effective nor educational in theatre with young children: dictating their choices and going for cheap laughs.

Even the section “End-of-year-plays” is a set up for a product over process experience. The author states that an end-of-year play “will give your students a sense of closure on the school year.” This is a false statement: it gives their parents and teachers a sense of closure, not the children. Students this young are perfectly happy–and will learn more–in an environment where they are encouraged to make their own interpretive choices, including how to show emotions and characters using their bodies. Should this lead to an informal “sharing” if parents arrive early for pick-up, children will then feel a sense of pride at sharing their new experiences with their families. But creating a play as a structured (and therefore judged), dictated, and inflexible event with such young children is not something I would recommend.

Here’s what this book will do for you:

• It will guide you through the major concepts of storytelling with children into some very specific examples of how teachers have taken this idea and incorporated it into their curriculum.
• It will offer up extended dramatic story ideas for 3-6 year olds (However, many of their examples are too complex for three year olds to understand intuitively.).
• It is a book you must read cover to cover before using.

What it won’t give you:

• Solutions for transitioning from story-telling moment to story-telling moment. I found myself picturing a flustered and overwhelmed teacher attempting to keep twenty 3 year olds calm and focused while spraying their faces for “feeling the ocean,” remembering what part of the story came next, and moving them over to another area of the room for listening to appropriate music while using finger puppets.
• Ideas for simplifying. Their dramatic stories have a high number of tactile props that could be overwhelming for someone who has never used drama. They fail to offer ways to address ideas without props. Plus, most of their dramas take place over several days with many chapters. They failed to offer up solutions for 20 minute one-shot deals.
• Techniques for moving beyond mimicry and repetition into interpretation. All the dramatic stories are set up in such a way that children mimic the same movements and use the same props to represent the same things. (Like a wall covered in identical works of art, but each stamped with a different child’s name.) There seems to be very little opportunity for children to interpret the stories through drama.

Several times, the authors bring up a program they created with grant aid called “Singing to the Monster.” This program clearly illustrates what they love above all: using dramatized stories to explore and discuss emotions. What worries me about their technique, however, is it does not seem readily accessible to a classroom teacher. I scribbled in the margin of page 30 (of this 165 page book):

“There is a lot of initial exposition in this book but little promise that it will teach me how to lead these sessions. If I had no idea how to lead drama, I would be pretty scared right about now.”

Let me emphasize that little note up there: as an experienced theatre teacher and early childhood educator, I would be very nervous about trying these extended dramatic adventures. They last for 3-5 sessions (that’s 20 minutes a day for three to five days!). And in each session there are multiple props, tricky transitions within the space, and potentially complicated emotional responses. Personally, I would want an expert drama therapist to conduct these sessions with my students along with the help of aids, and that’s coming from someone who is not shy about doing challenging work with children.

Teachers are frequently just as shy about performing as students. The Dramatic Difference is a wonderful resource for experienced drama teachers who want to take their story telling in a new direction or are designing artist-in-residence programs for preschools. But, if you’re new to including drama in your curriculum, you’ll be better off looking for alternative simpler resources.

One morning, a mother hen discovers one of her chicks is missing and stuck in the mud. She jumps in to rescue her but gets stuck as well. One by one, the farm animals jump in to the rescue, each getting stuck. Until, at the end, as we all hoped and expected, the little chick reveals that she wasn’t stuck at all. And out she hops.

The pictures are campy, but not too cartoonish, and the excitement level of the story is catching. The characters are clear, as is the story line. And, of course, it opens up a great discussion opportunity about responsibility, practical jokes, and honest mistakes. Not to mention, of course, farm animals.

This book is perfect for a round of PictureBook Plays:

• There are multiple characters who each get their own acting moment.
• The story is clear and to the point.
• There is one overall objective to the story.
• The use of animals means it is easy for actors to choose new and different characters, if they so desire
• The illustrations add to the story and offer additional interpretive opportunities

Happy Reading!

Sam Pig and his family are invited to a play on Midsummer’s Eve. They join the rest of the farm animals in the horse’s barn for a home-made performance of Cinderella. Now, here’s where it gets exciting. Unlike much of live adult theatre today, the audience gets to participate. In the ball scene, for example, they all dance. Sam Pig himself gets to dance with Cinderella, who runs away only to leave behind a little straw slipper. The Sow tells him he must try the slipper on everyone in the barn to find out who it fits. When he protests, she reprimands him that “This is theatre and it’s all pretence.” And so he plays along.

The book ends with Sam and his family trundling home.

“So that’s a theatre!” said Brock. “It was grand! And you, Sam Pig, were the Prince!”

Sam said nothing. All his thoughts were on the little piglet called Cinderella whom he had kissed my the light of the turnip lanterns.

“But it’s all pretence,” murmured Ann, and the others echoed, “Yes. All pretence.”

This, of course, delightedly explains how actors become actors: they fall in love with the cross between fantasy and reality. It may not be a picture-book, but it’s still a good read, and very appropriate for starting a discussion about theatre, pretend, real life, and stories.

We begin with, Beverly Billingsly Takes a Bow, by Alexander Stadler.

Beverly, a little gray animal that vaguely resembles a cross between a mouse and hippo, receives a box of dress-up clothes for her birthday. She loves them so much, that we are told, “Her parents never knew who would show up at the dinner table–jungle explorer, mad scientist, or tropical bird.” We soon discover that her teacher will be holding auditions for the school play. Beverly prepares “The Banana Song” which she practices diligently. But, after witnessing the amazing auditions of the children before her, she gets stage fright and can’t go through with it. She ends up being cast as “shrub” and “wall.” Her father eventually utters the famous lines, “there are no small parts, only small actors,” which causes Beverly to get to work contributing in other ways. In the end, she saves the day by whispering the correct lines to the leading lady who has suddenly suffered her own bout of stage fright.

Advertised for children ages 3-7, it read a lot like an Arthur book, with a little less gusto. The illustrations are cute, but add little to the story line beyond a literal interpretation of the words.  The sentences are short and descriptive, but leave the character of Beverly a little one-dimensional.  What I find disappointing about this book, though, are the adult assumptions that have been placed on a child’s world:

1. Beverly gets stage fright at her audition. Although Stadler describes Beverly looking out at the audience and feeling frightened by the number of people watching her, this moment is over-powered by the preceding descriptions of the other auditions: nothing short of impressive and fearless. As such, we can only assume that Beverly is scared not because of the audience, but because of her apparent lack of talent. In reality, children get stage fright not because they think they’re not as good as other actors, but because they have never stood in front of an audience before. Only with age do children begin to feel self-conscious of their performances because they have witnessed performances they believe to be superior to their own.
2. Beverly is sad because she only gets to say one line. In my experience, this sadness at not getting to play a particular part passes quickly. The cast has so much fun acting that they don’t even think about the relative size of their roles. It is only with age that we actors begin to covet others’ lines and need to be told, “there are no small parts, only small actors.”  If Stadler really felt he wanted to illustrate this point, then Beverly should have been given the ability to audition without fear and still only receive her two little roles.

All in all, this book at least covers what it is to be in a play, including helping with costumes, advertising, and playing a character. Due to the weakness of the storyline, it’s not a great read for circle time, but it couldn’t hurt to put it in your library for children to pick up on their own.