Richard's stories, theatre, and English teaching

In this blog I will comment on things related to my work as an educator to students who are new to English, as a drama teacher, and as a storyteller. The views and information are my own and do not represent the English Language Fellow Program or the U.S. Department of State. To find shorter, more frequent postings you can follow me on twitter (@richardsilberg), or instagram (richardrjs)

Wednesday, September 28, 2011

Personalizing the Hagia Sophia

After discussion with my friend, theatre artist Amy Sass from the Berkeley based Ragged Wing Ensemble, it was clear that the next step would be getting the ensemble to personalize some of the issues that are present in the history of the Hagia Sophia.  I asked the group what they thought was sacred to me as a teacher.  They said the concept of Risk and Respect, which is the motto by which I run all my classes.  We came up collaboratively with a problem for me.  It went like this:  A new student came to class.  S/he is about to take a risk by performing something when I notice a few students snickering and pointing.   This is perfect as it really captures a conflict for me over what I deem as sacred.   Given this example we broke into groups of 5 and they created problem cards, like I did for them with the Hagia Sophia, except theirs were personal.   Then I randomly distributed  the cards and the students had to create movement sequences that showed the sacredness and the problem.
We didn't get to the performances of their work today, it will have to wait till next session (Monday).  Here are some of the cards that were created:



 

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