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Mirror Exercise
Kids get up and act! To promote inventiveness, timing, and clowning, they pair up and act as though they are looking in a mirror. Child A does a move while child B attempts to mimic it as closely as possible. This is a fun activity that...
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Tug of War Exercise
Learners hone their acting and imagination by playing tug-o-war with an imaginary rope. Each group works together and pretends to pull the other group over the imaginary line with an imaginary rope. This could be a good improve warm up...
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Pantomime Exercise
Learners of any age can learn to communicate using gestures and their bodies. They create a pantomime of a specific activity without using any words. This resource includes a link to an Off-Broadway Workshop for kids.
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Theatre: Exploratory Techniques
Using various exploratory techniques, young actors work as an ensemble company to devise, perform and evaluate a piece of theatre for assessment. This outline provides an objective and a list of games and activities that stimulate skills...
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Immigration Debate
Students investigate the law recently passed in Arizona, "Support our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighborhoods Act." For this history lesson, students watch a video on immigration then work in small groups to prepare a debate on the...
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Alicia Keys, Songs in A Minor
Need a musical lesson for your drama or performing arts class? VH1 has put together a really neat lesson, in which learners use biographical information about Alicia Keys to write and perform a one-act musical related to her life. This...
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Small Group Acting: Enlivening Canadian History
Tenth graders research the elements of Canadian identity and history. They analyze and organize the information. They investigate the concept of Small Group Acting, storyboarding, and writing a good script.
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A Practical Experiment In Colonization
Role-play and simulation exercises are fantastic ways to help learners understand the reality behind many social and historical events. Pretending they are colonists, upper graders choose a location, create a history, establish laws, and...
Amnesty International
Respect My Rights, Respect My Dignity: Module One – Poverty and Human Rights
Creating an environment where learners feel both educated and empowered challenges any teacher when discussing a sometimes bleak topic. A respectful resource provides them with the details and permits them to make a plan of action....
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Coordination and Flexibility
Learners practice controlling their motion and reflexes by participating in different motor skill activities. For this physical education lesson, students utilize bean bags and hula hoops to help create flexibility and coordination...
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Fashion Recycles
Complete fashion design activities as a part of a study on protecting the environment. In this fashion and environment instructional activity, students discuss global environmental awareness and work in groups to list recyclable products...
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Shakespeare's Othello and the Power of Language
Students explore the basis of Iago's persuasive power by analyzing his astonishing command of rhetoric and figurative language. The diverse set of activities below include short group performances, writing exercises and the guided use of...
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How Characters Get What They Want
Sixth graders analyze the primary force that drives a character's actions in a character analysis lesson. In this character analysis lesson, 6th graders analyze how characters present their actions and participate in a group activity...
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Black Actors in American Cinema
High schoolers examine the contributions of a few African American actors. After watching different films, they work together to recreate the film and the struggles faced by the actors. In groups, they compare and contrast the acting...
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Baseball Memories
Students act as historians by, first, reading and analyzing oral histories of professional baseball players to become familiar with baseball figures. Then, they proceed to interview family members, relatives, or neighbors who have...
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Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Lesson: Immigration
Many of your class members will have heard of Executive Order 9066 and the Japanese internment camps of World War II. Some may even recognize the terms “Issei” and “Nisei,” but few will have heard of Enemy Alien Hearing Boards, of the...
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Daily Actings
Students view clips of Anna Deavere Smith's work. They interview people on video or audiotape to learn their lines, dialect, and syntax to assist them in theater. They create a play which emulates the people in which they interviewed.
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The Inanimate Speaks: An Exercise In Metaphor
Fifth graders read the poem "Second-Hand Coat" and then discuss objects as a metaphor.
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Walking the Line
Learners get an introduction to basic line drawing, including a definition, examples from art history, and three drawing exercises. They focus on drawing what they see rather than on drawing from memory.
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Persuasive Text: Vocabulary Charades
Students play charades to act out vocabulary words that have recently been introduced in class. In this vocabulary instructional activity students may work in groups or in pairs.
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Slide-Tape Dramatization as a Way of Teaching Literature
Students select one song and write the lyrics on the blackboard. They segment the lyrics into meaningful phrases or sentences and visualize each unit of meaning to convey the message of the song. They select a different song and act out...
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Building a Topographic Model
Students explore Mount Shasta and various locations on Mars to examine ways geographical data can be represented. They study topographic maps and translating data from 2-Dimensions to 3-Dimensions.
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What? Did Caesar Swoon?
Students discover the "dumb show," a scene that enacts a story silently while focusing on an example from Hamlet. Divided into groups, they act out the silent scene from the play. Again, in groups, they create a "dumb show" from Julius...
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The Elephant Ate a Banana in the Tundra
Students perform a scene with their small group. They identify an animal, act out what the animal does, where the animal would be found, and what the animal eats. They locate the animal habitats on a map.