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I Used to Hate Teaching Theatre Sports, but now I love it

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I think because as a student of drama myself I had always felt terrible doing improvisation in class or Speech exams, I approached Theatre Sports as a teacher with heaps of trepidation. As a new fledgling drama teacher at a girl’s college, I was surprised to find a group of very enthusiastic Theatre Sports competitors who I was supposed to coach toward the local competitions. They LOVED it, and I hated it. They were fabulous at it and I knew I was hopeless at it (or I thought I was). For those first few years I battled through. Thankfully these four girls had been well trained by the previous teacher and basically looked after themselves. They had also been set up as the leaders of the junior teams in the school. Awesome student-lead work going on. A little lesson there in cutting teacher workload, by the way. So, for a while, though I didn’t like it, I could get away with it being a part of my life because it was all sorted for me. The seniors trained the juniors and the I gave a few ...
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How I Sell Drama as a Subject in my School

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How to Justify Drama Class   Or  How to talk parents into letting their talented student do Theatre Studies Not long ago an ex-student of mine got in touch. She'd seen herself as I'd made a Facebook REEL where I'd flicked through Sit Down Drama which she had featured in. It was lovely to hear from her, what she’d done with her life, where she was, what she’s doing next. During the conversation she reflected on her time in drama and she said “You know, what you said is true. You always used to say”  ‘Drama might not get you the job, but it will get you the promotion.'" She went on to say that although people, bosses, universities might see that she took Drama in school and just gloss over it, that later all of the skills she’d learnt in Drama really helped her stand out as a student or employee. She wouldn’t be phased by doing a presentation, she’d improvise quickly in any situation, she could find an interesting way to tell a story or get a point across and ...
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An Introduction to Tess and Sit Down Drama

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Hi I'm Tess: Mum, wife, now part time drama teacher, and creator of awesome drama teaching resources.  It is my mission to share teaching resources with Drama teachers to make their lives easier. I started teaching in 2005 alongside the best, most amazing Drama teacher you could have ever have had the pleasure of working with (well apart from that she pretty much worked 24/7 and it was hard to keep up with her that is). She had been teaching at the start of Drama as a subject in New Zealand and played some part in the curriculum and in pushing for the acceptance of Drama as an important subject in schools. She had a wealth of knowledge, understanding and the best classroom manner. It was a privilege to work with Catherine Ryan and I must acknowledge her place in my teaching career, especially since the world has lost this amazing person in the last year. RIP Cathy. I quickly came to realise in my career that I LOVE making resources; coming up with easy ways to approach students wit...
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