What did you think about the overall performance? 

I really liked our overall piece. I feel it worked well with our stimulus, and it was fun to perform and hopefully fun to watch.

Was it suitable for the target audience? 

I think it was suitable for our target audience, because visually it was nice to look at, there wasn’t many words therefore it wasn’t too complicated to understand, and we often used physical theatre to communicate with the audience.  Also because our costumes were bright and colourful hopefully that really grabbed the children’s attention and made them want to watch our piece.

Which piece of our show worked the best and why?

The part where the ‘toys’ say “I wanted to be…A robot / A racing car driver / A fairy....”, worked the best because we used  simple language which the children can understand, along with music and images (the cloud). I think this worked because it looked really interesting from a young person’s point of view. I think that the fact that the timing of the triangle and cloud were in time worked really well as I feel it created a sort of magic feeling for the little children.  Also, the movement that we performed after the lines were said were clear and appealing for young children. It also gave us time to interact with the audience.

Which devising skills were used to make the piece?

Devising skills that were used to make this piece were, rhythm, physical theatre, music and audience interaction. I think this skill was well suited to ‘an awesome book’ because throughout the book it used rhyming. It is also a good way to communicate with small children.  

What character(s) did you play and how had these been developed? 

I played a doll and an office worker who couldn’t dream. For the doll, in the beginning of the unit, I developed my character by thinking about typical clear toys the children play with and pick the one most suited to me. I gave myself personality traits, which helped me pick a voice and body language. I also feel that picking a costume helped as it was really bright and colourful, which helped me develop my character into a bubbly, high, energetic character. For my office worker character, I imagined myself to be an overweight character, in a dirty office suit, I got this inspiration from stereo-typical characters from TV. This helped me develop my walk, facial expressions, and actions.

What have you learnt about devising? 

I have  learnt that it is easier and more effective to go away and devise pieces in small groups because then you get a variety of different ideas, and the creativity level doesn’t drop, because there is not just one person giving the ideas.

What could have been developed further and why? 

I feel like more practice of call and response with the audience because during hey world, no one spoke in the audience. I feel this was because we probably came across as intimidating from the children’s point of view.  Therefore,  I feel like this needs  development because it didn’t work when we tried it out, so, I think we need to work on communicating with children through theatre to make them  feel more confident and less intimidated.  

Log questions:

What activities did we do today?

For the whole lesson we worked as a whole class to combine each groups work together, to create a 10minute ensemble piece for little people’s day.

What ideas did you/your group come up with? 

In today’s lesson we didn’t so much as come up with new ideas, but we developed existing ones, what I mean by this is;

Ø  Have Rory as one of the boys on the bed, that are dreaming

Ø  Intertwine lines from his piece with mine and Connor’s group

Ø  Use the triangle and cloud when a ‘toy’ thinks of dream

Ø  Add in Rosebe’s group after the ‘toy’ section

Ø  End with the song, hey world

Ø  Dance around while singing, hey world

Why have you chosen some of these ideas to develop further? You need to EXPLAIN WHY?

We decided to develop certain ideas because it makes the section long, but still keeps it interesting and captivating for young children. For example, we decided to add in Rosebe’s groups half way through the piece, because it contrasts the first section and it portrays boring adults as opposed to energetic characters. Therefore hopefully the children will not lose interest.   

Why did you reject some of the ideas? You need to EXPLAIN WHY?

 We didn’t reject too many ideas this week due to the fact that there was less production of new ideas. However, we did decide that in hey world to try and dance on the spot or like a small circle, otherwise the space got really inbalanced and made the scene look messy. Also, instead of us all running in from the corner, at the end of Rosebe’s piece, to come in small groups, because a burst of movement and sudden noise may be a bit too over powering at such a young age.

What acting skills/performance skills are you using? EXPLAIN WHY these are suitable for the piece and the target audience. 

Some of the acting skills that I am using are characterisation and audience interaction.  Characterisation is an important skill for our piece and children theatre, because throughout most of the piece I do not say much, so I have to make sure I stay in my character physically and use expression, otherwise the children will lose interest and it will take the magic out of the performance.  Audience interaction is suitable because, in children’s theatre it is important to try and keep the audience interested.  This means perform to them, more than you would in normal theatre. We also use songs in our piece and our aim is to get the children to join in.