Open Forum

Hello all,

I was asked to do a summer theatre camp for my city and I have no material or idea about what to do. I have some ideas, but I would like to know about some things others have done. Did you follow a curriculum? How did you structure the program a special way? Did you add activities or remove activities for this particular age group?

I am working with second through fifth grade and I have limited costumes, set and props. And of course, limited funds. I've done some great things with cardboard, so I'm not too worried. I'm hoping I can get some ideas to do a small show with some great activities. Any ideas will be appreciated.

Thanks in advance!!

Hi Kimberly,

I like to take childrens' books and convert them to scripts.  Robert Munsch has done that already with some of his book.  They make wonderful plays.  I prefer to convert them myself to accommodate the number of kids I will have.  He gave our group permission to do that, but you may want to check out his scripts first.  We did a summer camp called MUNSCHAPALOOZA where we had adapted five of his book for casts of 25- 50 middle schoolers.

Another great play for young kids is MAGIC THEATER.  It is written for only 6 performers but I have seen it done with much larger casts.

In terms of costumes...I usually do jeans and a show shirt with other pieces they can pull from their own closets.  I like to keep it simple so they understand that they can create theater on their own at home with what they can find in the closet.  Creative is always one of my main objectives for a summer camp.

Hope this helps. 

I teach a summer improv and acting class for 6th to 12th grade.  We do a lot of improv--they kind of guide the types of scenes they want to do.  We do real basic acting exercises--I don't want to get too heavy--it is summer after all--we always have tons of fun.

I run a camp where we have 60-70 kids each year in Indiana. We found that putting on a show draws more campers! We then incorporate improv, technical theatre and other elements in the camp. I use Juniors and Seniors to help run the camp. I am able to pay those students as well. 

How wonderful that your city recognizes your abilities! Congratulations!

Improv workshops are a wonderful idea, they are fun and the activities really help kids to forget about the "performance" and enjoy working together and watching each other. Once they have gotten into the comfort zone of being in front of a group of people and playing "games," you can jump to how it easy it is to do the same for an audience. I like to point out that the body responds the same way to excitement and fear, it's the brain that interprets the response. If you can train them to interpret the feelings as excitement to perform instead of fear to perform at such early ages they will have learned a wonderful lesson that will be with them as they grow up!!!!

There are lots of fun things you can do with them that are tech theatre related. You might try:

1. making sock puppets - dollar store socks, googly eyes, felt scraps, pipe cleaners, fluffy balls and glue
2. Costume design coloring pages - there are some really cool costume coloring books (Amazon is a quick, easy source)
3. giant paper doll costumes - foam board (Home Depot 4X8 sheets) cut outs of boy and girl, butcher or poster paper, paints/markers. Designs could be of fairies, monsters, pirates, space explorers, characters from popular movies, traditional clothes from around the world...(use coloring books for ideas)
4. paper mache props - rocks, food items, giant heads...props to support a play you are doing
5. masks - premade mask forms (half masks are pretty cheap at Oriental Trading or Amazon), feather, sparkly things, lace, ribbons, jewels...

Movement/Dance workshop

I like to start by lining student up have them walk across the room/stage as I give them prompts that would make them change the way they move; walk through waist deep water, mud, glue, jello. Animals are always fun. I also use prompts like "how would you walk if you stubbed you toe?" - leg fell asleep, back hurts, had to go to the bathroom, and so on.

Dance can be simple/basic dance steps that once taught can be organized into choreographed numbers. With a young group I might teach the basic steps to the large group and then break them into smaller groups and choreograph a section for each group and then combine all the groups to have a complete number from a show. 

Good luck! Have fun :)

PS - I attached the PowerPoint I use for Parent Night that explains why theatre classes are important (it accompanies my Improv class, but the concepts are pretty much universal).Some of the info might be useful when building a flyer or brochure...or when sharing with parents at a parent meeting or before the culminating performance :) 

Attachment(s)

Parent night improv ppt.pptx   3.62 MB 1 version