Speaking skills: a series of drama workshops
The following series of workshops is designed to ‘liberate’ students from the strictures of their limited use of voice and physical expressiveness in their daily lives. What underlies the approach is the assumption that we under-use our voices and our physical expressiveness in our everyday lives.
Conventional behaviour and interaction both in our working lives and in our social relationships focuses on a very limited use of our vocal and physical expression.
I have used poems written for children as the source material for these workshops because they are particularly rich in dramatically vocal possibilities for students. In addition they are also full of alliteration, assonance and word play, which encourage sharp vocal delivery.
It is important to make sure that the background atmosphere for these workshops is clearly established by the teacher at the outset. The students need to be told that these lessons will demand their response to unusually ‘silly’ activities which may seem so to begin with but will make more sense as the work progresses. If the teacher participates her / himself in the exercises then this will set an example which will encourage the students to make the required leap of faith more confidently and positively!
In the course of this series of workshops students will learn:
- How to speak up much more confidently
- To pick up their cue much more quickly and with greater sharpness and concentration
- To speak much more expressively by highlighting the meaning of words and idioms with more versatility and imagination
Number of lessons: 3