What could be better than imagining your partner (someone you don’t know – although I don’t really think it would have been any less awkward if you did know them) being a tube of toothpaste – and yes, you needed to gently squeeze their arm, or leg; while repeating some … shall we say ‘interesting’ words and sounds from our lead and host Tony?
Certainly it broke down inhibitions and combined with the other drama and dance activities throughout the day, we have gotten to know our cohort of teachers much better.
This was a day we told everybody to come in ‘comfortable’ clothing: a good reason for this, it was a hint of what would be involved as we aimed to build teacher confidence in delivery of learning through the arts. In this case our teachers were being led by dance and drama leads from our two NPOs, DanceEast and The New Wolsey Theatre. They skillfully use different games and tasks to focus on some key aspects from the vocabulary training in Training Day 1.
There was much laughter – as we certainly made fools of ourselves – but within the safety of being among colleagues.
They say a picture paints a thousand words. Well here are a few from our day:
It was a day for bending and stretching, reaching and curling, bursting and dropping. You can imagine how zombie like I felt the next day – hardly able to turn my head, but I certainly could drop into a soft comfy chair and slept well!.
Talking of zombies, who will forget the hilarity of a bunch of teachers not being able to grasp a relatively simple ‘get to know your team’ game. Loved how everyone participated though, no-one sat on the sidelines. For many this was a massive stretch out of their comfort zone. I take my hat off to them all!
Key moments of the day?
- The partner dance which we then combined with another pair of dancers and their dance.
- The word task – given twelve words we had to combine into a short drama piece. Well, fortunately I was part a group of like minded chums and we happily turned ours into nothing short of mini musical. It was very ‘Gleeful’! Loved it!
- Then there was the final celebratory piece where we danced as pairs between two rows of colleagues (picture a barn dance or ceilidh) – Adam and James’s rolls at the end of theirs was nothing short of marvelous!
- My activity of a ribbon matrix displayed the skills, gifts and curiosity that each person is bringing to the project.
Today was a day where each of us took risks, we were stretched out of comfort zones, appropriately being pushed into trying new ideas and as a result, testing the waters of a medium of unfamiliarity. This has given us something to build on when we meet with our artists at our next cohort training day January 25th 2019. Can’t wait!
Championing Learning Through The Arts 