Dancing in a garden

The particular garden in question is the spectacular Alnwick Garden and to be precise the pavillion of Alnwick Garden. Through the generous programme  run by the Alnwick Garden Trust I am able to keep a  group of dancers who are all over 50  meeting once a week. We have been going for over 15 years as a group originally at Alnwick Playhouse as 'Dance for Fun'. The name  has stuck although is not the best of names. All the women who come along on a Friday morning love dancing and the joy of the setting makes it quite unique. The floor of the pavilion is heated using  themal core heat and it is like an exquisite spa to lie down on at the end to relax. However it is not all about relaxing and we sometimes amaze visitors to the garden with the amount of fun we have getting into character for the dance. I must add at this point it is for our pleasure and wellbeing and we don't performe unless they just happen to be passing! Last year we enjoyed a sewing and craft theme called 'Thread  & Thrift' with the artist Mandy Pattullo inspiring the themes for the dance through the props, costumes and decor she and the sewing group created for us.To see more of her work http://threadandthrift.blogspot.com/  This was supported  by highlights rural touring scheme http://www.highlightsnorth.co.uk/ and last years Contemporary Craft tour.

The key to the contiued success of this group is a willingness to enter into the spirit of any dance or theme without taking ourselves too seriously and believe me this gives us lots of  freedom and pleasure.

In praise of teaching assistants

Motivation to be a Teaching Assistant must come from an inherent love of working with children. They come with life experience and often with skills and knowledge from an earlier career. I say this because I know it can't be the pay! Their role in our schools cannot be understated. Perhaps because they are so versatile and unburdened by the zealous demands of the National Curriculum they seem to be able to offer a common sense approach to dealing with children, understanding the need to look after the whole interests and where and why a child could be struggling (I do know good teachers do this as well and have much evidence to prove it).With this in mind it was my delight  and privilege to  run a PDT (professional development Training) in dance and drama for teaching assistants   in Northumberland last year. Northumberland Creative & Performing Arts Education Service (sorry for the long title but not sorry to give this great department a credit) initiated this 4 day course. It was spread through out  two terms which allowed us all a chance to try out ideas and notice developments. This was my chance to share ways to use story telling with dance and drama, music and props. We looked at Laban principles of movement , 'dancing the language' developing language through movement. In a nut shell all I believe in and share with children on a day to day basis. The bonus was the enthusiasm ,freedom of imagination and the fun we had sharing ideas. They got so much out of this study most of them went on to look at music in a similar course run by Jill Walker.  Now here is the rub! They want an advanced course this year to take their skills to a further level.  The appetite is there but sadly not the funds (a sign of of times). All is not lost we have one day on offer after half term which the schools are funding directly. So I shall report back and let you know. Watch this space to find out if the spark is still alive!

Discovering Tudor England

Last year I worked with a Primary School in South Shields to deliver  History through Drama. Year 5's topic was  The Tudors. The opportunity for drama work was great,  so we  organised  the  6 weeks work into three separate topics, one for each of the three classes in the year group. Each class had their unique contribution to a final performance day where all three classes could learn and be entertained by each other.

                                                      'Lavender, Candles & Chickens

Day in the life of  country folk''

One of the topics looked at rural Tudor life which meant an introduction to some unusual activities which told us about life in those time......a butcher pulling teeth, laundry using paddles,children being scare crows, hunting with a falcon. 

Then there was the interesting way they dealt with health hazards of the times. Taking the lid of Tudor life in this way makes every detail of research useful. We all know how fascinated children get about strange illnesses and even stranger cures so we devised a game of 'Doctor Doctor' with one half of the class acting out the demise while the others became the apothecaries and herbalists.

I introduced the idea of  the way disease could pass from town to country by with the character of Lady  Penelope's maid and news of 'the plague' in London

Rural life means also rural entertainment which lead to recreating market places and Tudor music and dance. Learning the 'Horses Brawl' ,an authentic dance of  times, gave the children a chance to see the other sides of peoples lives.

While this class  were concentrating on on rural life another took on the task of  life at sea on board one of Sir Drake's ships. This meant a lot of archetype characters and creating a dance drama of the historic 'Singing of The King of Spain's Beard'. This time the dance was a hornpipe and the song a sea shanty.

The third class took on high and low status life of London in Tudor times. Shakespeare's 'Globe' theatre was the natural setting to act out this theme where the division of class was so graphic.

We cast the characters of the  drama using a pack of cards which meant  boy's may get girls parts and visa versa which was true to the time and  the class loved all this playing with stereotypes. It particularly fitted the recreation of the melodrama of Pyramus and Thisbe from 'Midsummer's Nights Dream'

When you see young people getting so much out of learning this way it surely proves the necessity of making history into a physical story telling experience. This way you awaken an interest which could last beyond school years.

All this was made possible through the financial and administrative support of The Custom's House South Shields who I continue to be  grateful to.

                                                        

Discovering Victorian England

A recent  project which I enjoyed because of its success was finding ways to bring  history to life with 3 Year 6 classes in a South Shields Primary School. I was lucky to have a very supportive  school and enthusiastic classes to bring try out some ideas. It was funded by the Creative Partnership Programme (which we will soon have to say good bye to)

We used a whole range of drama exercises and investigative practice to involve the year group. Everyone in the class had a vital part to play and something new to learn about and bring to the class. The process covered a six week period  meeting one day a week. As there were three classes they took turns to have a day of drama with a different theme for each class so we ended up with a raft of knowledge which covered  the topics of  'Victorian Children' 'The life and times of Florence Nightingale' and 'Famous Victorian inventors'.

The  children really enjoyed presenting to each other sketches they had researched and written on the topics. We used everything we could think of from Victorian songs, adapting nursery rhymes and  becoming the characters from history but by far the post popular activity was 'Drama in the dark'  This we came upon almost by accident! Towards the end of the school day I set up a role play situation for the whole class when everyone became a character in a Victorian street with a space to imagine as their home and a role to play in the community (baker, maid, squire etc). They had a pile of cloths and some costumes to dress up their character then we created an imaginary day in the life of that Victorian scene. I don't like fluorescent lights so I turned them off and this then became 'Drama in the dark'. The rules were simple keeping in character  starting and stopping the role play together. It was a very natural way for children to learn through play and even the shy ones felt freer in the twilight drama exercise

                                       

It was summed up by a very earnest participant informing me  she used to to find History very boring and hard to understand " but this is different I will always love History now!"