"We are doing a show." Part 4

After winter break, the Greenies are ready to get back to work on our show! The first backdrop, the castle, is done. Time to work on the second backdrop- a cave and woods as dictated by the Greenies- and ask a parent for some help creating a way to hold up curtains!

1.2

The Greenies are anxious to finish the backdrops as our stage space becomes more real. We revisit the idea of sketching our ideas for the second backdrop- a cave and woods. I receive many drawings of caves represented by arching lines and dark colors. We are also working on figuring out how to hold up curtains. I turn to a parent in our classroom who has helped us in the past. I share our ideas and he offers to help out.

BA runs through the new curtains!

 1.10

Andy, BA’s dad, builds a curtain holder for the play. I mentioned our need for this last week, he and BA built it over the weekend. He drills holes about 1/2 way down for us to us as puppet theater as well.

We meet again as a group to find out what is left to do.

JH- We still need to work on dinner (food for the families who come to the play.)

LL- We need to finish OM’s cave.

OM- We can buy costumes.

JH- we can move the chairs like when we did “Mortimer” this summer.

We also discuss needing to pick a date, making tickets, etc.

We plan to return the borrowed costumes and find the box of fabrics to encourage the Greenies to begin thinking about how to make costumes.

1.13

Second backdrop completed! 

OM and LL work on the cave painting. OM takes great responsibility of this backdrop as it represents the home of her character in the play.

 

Greenies help to add trees to the cave scene. I help by oainting basic tree shapes. CE reminds me of Picasso in her striped shirt but poses in a Pollack kind of way, using her whole body.

JMH adds his own trees using markers.

1.16

We take the borrowed costumes out and bring in a box of fabrics as a provocation for making their own costumes. We also pick a date: Friday Feb. 10^th for the play. The Greenies and parents are excited as it become real- or as they say, "for real life!" We also plan field trip to go to the local theatre to see what a real theatre with a stage and curtains looks like. 

 Next post- making costumes and finalizing plans for the big day!

"We are doing a show." Part 3

The Greenies have shared their ideas as a group and the ideas have been captured in the form of a language chart. We are ready to take these ideas and begin to bring them to fruition. We begin by redefining our space and making intentional changes.

"The week of 12.12 we clear out the dramatic play space and begin to plan how to assist the Greenies in making their ideas represented. We go to our parents as a resource and ask if anyone has extra bed sheets at home to use as backdrops. The Greenies also want a stage. We think about our resources and decide that a ‘real stage’ may not be one of the ideas we can fully accommodate. After some more thinking, a Greenie suggests we use boxes. We procure a few boxes from our kitchen and flatten them. The Greenies arrange them on the floor of our dramatic play area. A large group of Greenies come over and dance joyfully on their stage.

12.16 

We get two white bed sheets a coworker had from home. After some discussion the Greenies decide we will need a cave, woods, and a castle. We set out markers and ask if anyone would like to come and sketch some castles for us. A large group of Greenies eagerly gathers at a long table and begin to sketch. After gathering and reviewing all of the sketches the Greenies identify KW as the one who should paint the castle. 

On 12.19 KW, SS and Rebbecca paint the outline of the castle based on KW’s sketch. Over the next few days other Greenies add their touch in paint and marker.  We pin up the completed backdrop and borrow some fantasy related costumes from another classroom.  

We begin to paint the castle based on KW's sketch. He leads the way directing the project of painting the castle. 

RB paints the door of the castle pink, "Because it's the princesses castle and I know she likes pink."

 

We take a break from adding more as the holidays approach; we add borrowed costumes from another classroom. Parents begin to ask when we will be doing our play- the Greenies have been discussing this at home. We explain to the parents the importance of taking our time to get the most out of the project."

 

Greenies explore the space in costume, bringing a sense of reality to our project.

 Next blog- The Greenies finish the backdrops and we utilize our parent resources to build "curtains that work" for our set!