Lesson 3: Repetition and Woodsman

Objective: Students will demonstrate their understanding of Anne Bogart’s Viewpoints of Time by engaging in movement activities and discussing The Woodsman.

Standard: L1.T.R.7: Identify and explain why artistic choices are made in a drama/theatre work.

Essential Questions

• How does the way we move convey meaning?
• Where does meaning in performance come from?

Enduring Understanding(s)

• Movement conveys meaning
• Artistic differences between symbolic and didactic movement
• The way we interact with time tells a story 

Materials: 

• 2 Hi-Chew candies
• The Student Spotlight Response Sheet
• Whiteboard and markers
• The Woodsman Recording
• Projector & HDMI cord
• Presentation

Spotlight 

• Pull up the Student Spotlight Responses Sheet and choose a student who has not been spotlighted yet.
• Without reading their name, go through all of their answers. After reading all their answers, have students guess which student is the spotlight for today. Once correctly guessed, give the guesser and the student spotlight one Hi-Chew each. 
• Allow the class to ask a few questions of the student spotlight to get to know them better. 

Expectations Review 

• Review of phone policy: “it needs to be in your bag, or I will take it and keep it until the end of class. If you continuously cannot be trusted with your phone, I will take it to the office, and you won’t get it back until the end of the day.”
• Give students a minute to put their phones in their backpacks before starting class. 

Hook

Walking Name Game (students have played this before)

• Ask one student to remind us the rules of the game (when someone walks towards you, you need to say their name and then walk towards another person in the circle)

• If needed, remind students of the rules by asking:

  • What do you do if you don’t remember the name of the person walking towards you? (ask them, “What is your name?”)
  • When do you start walking across the circle? (as SOON as you say the name of the person walking towards you!)
  • How fast are we moving? (speed walk!)

Pass the Applause (new game)

• Explain that the goal of this game is to keep the energy and speed up as we go around the circle

• One person will start the clap, and other players take turns clapping in a clockwise direction until the leader makes the final clap.

  • You can play this game in other variations. For instance, the participants can start the clap slowly and gradually increase the tempo over several rounds.

• What skills are going to be important for this to be successful/fun?

  • Pay attention
  • Move with energy
  • Keep the pace up!
• Start the game

• Side Coaching:

  • Keep the pace up! Pay attention to where the clap is! Speed up the clap!

Transition 

After a few rounds, ask the students what this game has to do with what we’ve been learning in class. After a few students have answered, instruct them to sit in the middle, with NO ONE sitting against the walls.

Review

• Have them review with a partner the three Viewpoints of Time we have learned thus far:

  • Tempo
  • Duration
  • Kinesthetic Response

• Introduce the final Viewpoint of Time: Repetition

  • Write it on the board with simple definition: Repetition- how many times you do an action (repeating)

  • Ask: 

    • How does changing this change a story?
    • What did our warm-up game have to do with this Viewpoint?

Viewpoints 

Exploration

• Play Movement Telephone

  • One person starts and comes up with a movement accompanied by a sound. The person to the side of them should try and copy exactly the first person’s movement and sound, continuing around the circle for multiple rounds. 

  • Side-coaching:

    • Don’t do what you remember the first person doing, or even what the person a few people ahead of you did. Only copy the person next to you. Do exactly what they do (keep track of intonation, posture, etc.)

• After playing for several rounds around the circle, ask:

  • Why are we playing this game? 
  • How did our “story” change, even though we were all meant to be repeating each other exactly?
• Have a different student start the round, creating a movement and sound, and encourage the students to be more attentive to the person directly before them, working to perfectly mimic and repeat their action. 

Transition 

• “We have learned a lot about movement and how we can use the viewpoints of time to change the stories we tell with our actions. We’re going to watch the first half of a production of The Woodsman. I want you to focus on how the performers use the four viewpoints we have learned, and what story that tells.” 

Video

Pull up The Woodsman on BroadwayHD.

• Ask a student to read the short description about the show. Ask another student to give a short summary of the Tin Man’s character from the Wizard of Oz. 
• Start the video at 1:54. Ask the students to review what it is they are looking for while viewing this production. (How the four Viewpoints are used and what story it tells). Remind students to have phones away and to avoid talking while watching.

• Pause the video at 5:15. Ask students what uses of the four Viewpoints they have noticed thus far, and whether or not they were effective at telling the story of the show. 

  • You may also answer any questions the students may have about the production thus far. 
• Resume the video. 
• Pause the video at 19:12. Have the students talk to a neighbor about where they saw the viewpoints being used (tempo, duration, kinesthetic response, repetition). While they are talking, pull up the presentation
• Come back together as a class, and ask the students to share something their partner talked about. 
• Have all the students stand up and walk around. Call Freeze! Then go to the next slide and have the students talk with a partner close to them around them about the questions on that slide.
• Call the students back together, start the video again, then watch until 35:32. 

• Have the students turn to a different partner and talk about where they saw the viewpoints being used.

  • What did you like/not like?

  • What story is being told?

    • How do you know?

Discussion

Come together as a class and discuss initial responses to The Woodsman. Ask about what stands out to the students, what they like/don’t like, how Viewpoints tell the story