Content Standard: Artisitic
Creativity, Performance and Expression
Level: Intermediate
Specific Statement(s) from the Standard:
D. in theater, interpret, perform, or interpret and
perform a story based on an existing piece of literature by adapting
plot, characters, and language for theatrical purposes; and evaluate
plot, character, theme, language, sound, and spectacle; and create
characterizations based on fiction or life experience.
Product(s):
Task Description:
Overview: You will investigate
and gather information about a local character (real or fictional),
event, or situation to create a theater production that will communicate
some significant aspect, insight or information about your community,
region, or state. Keep all of your individual work on every aspect
(theater, visual arts, music, dance/movement) of your theater
production in a file folder.
Selecting the story:
1. Your teacher will help you arrange yourselves
in groups of 5 or 6 members. Each group will brainstorm events,
situations, and people (or fictional characters) in your community,
region or state that might be interesting to investigate and around
which it would be fun to create or more fully develop a story.
Some examples to help you start brainstorming might be:
fictional characters such as Paul Bunyan and his Blue Ox, Babe, or the Jolly Green Giant
real people such as a famous fur trapper or explorer or a local hero/citizen who has been recognized for contributing to your community
events such as the Hinckley fire, the tornado that swept through St. Peter and Comfrey, or the sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald on Lake Superior
physical features or regional resources such as iron
ore mining on the range, the bluffs in southeastern Minnesota,
Minnehaha Falls in Minneapolis, Lake Pepin on the Wisconsin border,
or the Red River Valley.
2. From the list of ideas your group has brainstormed,
chose one idea for your group to begin investigating. Remember
to select some person/character, event, or situation that will
communicate something significant about the area in which you
live. After your group has selected a person, situation, or event,
each member should agree to search out information to develop
the story. This may include reading stories or newspaper accounts,
interviewing local people who might have information, or visiting
the local historical society. If you cannot find enough information,
you may need to go back to your brainstorming and choose another
idea. Information you will need to develop or create your story
will include:
A. The time period or time span of the person's life, event, or situation (days, months, years, season of the year, or time of day which will be the time frame for your story).
B. The physical setting of the person's life, event, or situation (description of the town, land, environment, weather, and other events surrounding your story).
C. The people, animals, or other characters important in the person's life, event, or situation (description of who they are and their relationship to the person, event or situation).
D. The actions or happenings that occurred during the person's life, event, or situation (description of what happened, why, for how long, who was involved).
E. What changed or what was the result of the person's life, event, or situation (description of how the community, region or state was affected by the person, event, or situation)?
F. Why is this person's life, event, or situation
important (description of what makes this person's life, event,
or situation significant and why other people will want to know
this information)?
When your group has gathered all the information
each person can find, organize the information into the six areas
above. One way to organize all the information is to color code
each person's notes using a different color for each area, A through
F. You then need to decide if you have enough information to create
a story. Remember that since this is a theater production, you
can "fictionalize the account" the way television producers
do in "docu-dramas." This means you can "make up"
some information to fill out the story if you cannot find the
exact information. The information you "make up" should
be reasonable, based on what your group discovered about the actual
person, event, or situation. You are now ready to begin developing
your story. Put your individual notes into your theater production
file folder.
Developing the story:
2. You need to think about how to start your story,
what happens to make the person, event, or situation different
than it was in the beginning, and how the story of the person,
event, or situation ends. Each individual student should use a
Summary Sheet to think through
the information and decide the beginning, middle, and end of the
story. Be sure to include elements of the setting, the time frame,
the people or characters, costumes and props necessary to tell
your story. Remember you are trying to convey something significant
about your community, region, or state as you develop this story.
When each group member has completed the Summary
Sheet, meet together and decide which beginning, middle, and
end is best suited for your story. Once your group has decided
on a beginning, middle, and end, you will want to share them with
the other groups in your class to get feedback about whether the
starting point, middle, and ending makes sense before you go on
developing your story. When you are satisfied you have a good
beginning, middle, and end, you are ready to start building scenes
for your theater production, place your Summary Sheet in
your file folder.
Your story will have several scenes. The beginning
will become the "Balance" scene. The middle will include
both the "Disturbance" and "Crisis" scenes
and the ending will include the "Climax" and "Resolution"
scenes. You may need to invent more action and characters as you
fill out the scenes to make your theater production. Each individual
group member should develop the story by completing the Elements of Story/Scenes Summary Sheet.
When each group member has finished his/her individual
Elements of Story/Scenes Summary Sheet, meet together as
a group and choose/combine scene ideas from each individual sheet
into one new sheet for the whole group. Determine all the characters,
the setting, the actions that need to happen in each individual
scene for the story to make sense. Share your scenes with the
other groups in your class to get feedback. Make corrections,
additions, and changes based on the feedback from other groups.
When your group is satisfied that the scenes create the whole
of a significant story about the person, event, or situation,
you are ready to begin creating dialogue to accompany your story.
Place your individual Elements of Story/Scenes Summary Sheet
in your file folder and work with the group sheet.
Creating the dialogue:
3. The scenes you have created to tell your story
in a theater production need dialogue. Remember that you use dialogue
when the action isn't enough to let the audience know what is
happening in the scene. Use the Dialogue Sheet to
begin to create the dialogue necessary to communicate the story.
When each group member has finished the Dialogue
Sheet, meet together as a group and choose/combine the dialogue
ideas from each individual sheet into one new sheet for the whole
group.
Either in a group or individually (your teacher may
direct you or let your group choose how to proceed) write a script
on the Scene Script Sheet for
each of the scenes you have developed so far using the Elements
of Story/Scene Summary Sheet and the Dialogue Sheet you
have created for the group. If each person writes one scene, go
through the dialogue scene by scene together to make sure the
action flows and the people, objects, and animals remain consistent
in character and speech/sound from one scene to the next. You
will need one Scene Script Sheet for each of the five scenes.
When you have created and edited the script for each
scene, share it with at least one other group in your class to
get feedback. Make corrections as necessary so your story makes
sense from beginning to end. Make adjustments in dialogue and
action so your characters remain consistent from beginning to
end.
Developing your character:
4. Your group has now finished developing a story
and the dialogue to make it a theater production, and each of
you is ready to choose the character (person, object, or animal)
you wish to play in the theater production. You need not all be
people. If you have a lake, wind, or a thunderstorm in your play,
you may wish to characterize that inanimate object. If an animal
is important to the action of the play, you may choose to play
that animal.
Ask yourself these questions:
Which character acts most like me in this play?
Which character thinks most like me in this play?
Which character probably feels the most like I would feel if I were in the situation?
Which character would I like for my friend if this play "came to life"?
Which character would it be the most fun to be
in the play?
One of the characters in your answers will probably
be the most fun for you to imagine yourself being and for whom
to develop an autobiography.
Select TWO characters from your list of answers and complete
an autobiography for each of them. Place your character autobiographies
in your file folder.
Becoming a character
5. When you have completed your character autobiographies,
select one character and memorize a few lines of dialogue/sounds
this character has in one scene. Practice the voice/sounds, movements,
emotions this character uses in that scene of the theater production.
When you are ready, perform your lines/sounds/movements for your
class. Members of your group will ask you questions about your
character's role in the community and your relationship with other
characters in the theater production. Be ready to answer questions
(inanimate objects, such as the wind, or animals, such as dogs,
will need to create a voice) and remain "in character"
as you talk and move about as your character. You may want to
practice answering practice questions with other members of your
group before you perform in front of the class.
Special Notes:
1. The standard does not require the student to create
or develop a story. The standard only calls for the student to
interpret or perform (or both) a story based on an existing piece
of literature. However, the particular purpose for which this
package was developed included sharing information about different
cultures in various communities or regions around the world. Therefore,
developing a story about the students' particular community or
regional area seems the most appropriate way to share that information
without allowing or encouraging students to engage in stereotypical
thinking. Teachers need to help students create characters based
on authentic actions and not allow stereotypes to be acted out
in the theater productions.
2. The process of selecting and developing the story
may meet part of the Intermediate Inquiry standard, and the actual
work of creating the story may meet part of the Intermediate Writing
standard, depending on the story the student selects and how information
to develop the story is researched. Check requirements of those
standards and create additional checklists for each as necessary,
if you would like to include one or both of those standards in
this performance package.
3. The Script Scene Sheet cannot be an assessment
in this performance package unless the student individually creates
dialogue. The assessments in this first task are the pieces each
student creates or develops alone before taking his/her work to
the group. Group work that is based on individual creation is
authentic in this setting, but should not be used for "group
grades." Each student must be assessed and receive feedback
on his/her work individually.
4. Students may videotape each other's individual
character performances both for practice sessions and for the
final performance if you do not wish to have each student perform
for the entire class. Questions for the individual characters
in each theater production may be created by that entire group
in advance, and group members may randomly draw two questions
for a character on the day of the performance. Students may practice
with questions before the performance. More than one student may
be the same character for these individual character performances.
If you have groups doing character performances at the same time,
you will need to videotape each student performance so that the
student receives individual feedback to improve his/her performance
before the actual theater production.
5. In the final production more than one student
can play an individual character if students change characters
from scene to scene for each of the five scenes. Students may
dance in one or both of the dances, sing or play instruments in
one or both of the musical accompaniments. Each student should
have his or her first choice of character and role in music and
dance at some time during the final performance.