Week 3: CRITICAL MOMENTS

    In this Drama workshop, we learnt about critical moments in a drama. We learnt how voice and pause       can  express someone's motive. Being able to recognise changes in mood and emotion in a script is important as you need to convey this to your audience.
      In pairs, we tried to act out as a daughter who wants to get the car key  and Mum who does not wanther daughter to do so. The daughter said " Yes". The Mother said "no". But the change of volume, tone and pace of voice creates different effects. I think this is a meaningful activity to teach the children seeing how your body, face and voice change with each emotion. Children can try this with other emotions, eg surprise, excitement, happiness, sadness. agreement, disagreement.

 

      We also formed small group and chose a fairy tale to work on. When we chose the fairy tale, we would be working collaboratively to produce a 1 minute short film. This film will be evaluated by other group and our Media Arts tutor.

 

    According to Ewing (2013), drama helps children learn about the world.  They learn about actions and consequences, about customs and beliefs, about others and themselves through performance, the imagined and enacted world of human beings. Unfortunately, there is not enough time for teachers to implement this due to the overcrowded curriculum. Teachers should provide students with high quality drama performance as it is important for lifelong learning.

• We chose to focus on the fairytale of Aladdin, traditionally from the story book One Thousand and One Arabian Nights. We choose Aladdin because it has an interesting story/plot, and many interesting characters, that we would be able to draw on in our creative process. Aladdin is also not a traditionally western fairytale, and this aspect appealed to us also.
  
  

  §  Scene One: Flash back (Jasmines Father was a sultan and was overthrown by Aladdin’s family)

  §  Scene Two: Jasmine is poor and for money gives taxi rides on her magic carpet left to her by her sultan father

  §  Scene Three: The evil sorcerer, disguised as an old man asks Jasmine to help him, in exchange for payment, retrieve an old family heirloom (the lamp) in a cave in the desert (Jasmine must use her magic carpet)

  §  Scene Four: Jasmine fly’s the sorcerer out to the cave. As soon as Jasmine grabs the lamp the cave collapses. Jasmine is not harmed by the cave collapsing, but the evil sorcerer is trapped and killed.

  §  Scene Five: Jasmine is stranded in the cave with the lamp. She eventually discovers that the lamp is magical. She rubs it and a Genie appears. Genie explains Jasmine the wishing rules. Jasmine wishes herself out of the cave.

  §  Scene Six: The Genie zaps himself and Jasmine in front of the sultan’s castle. That’s when Jasmine sees Aladdin, her nemesis, and confronts him. Genie asks Jasmine what she wishes for him to do. Jasmine wishes for power and revenge on Aladdin. The Genie thinks and casts Aladdin in to the lamp forever!

  §  Scene Seven: Jasmine becomes the sultan of the land and she and Genie rule the land together forever. Jasmine uses her third wish and wishes the Genie be free. The two of them live happily ever after.

  
  
  
  
  
  

 References

http://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/ks3/english/speaking_listening/drama/revision/6/

Ewing, R. (2013). Creative arts in the lives of young children: play, imagination and learning. Camberwell: ACER Press.