Objective
The students will demonstrate their understanding of repetition and kinesthetic response by participating in a series of viewpoints activities.
Materials Needed
The following food items: spicy pepper such as serrano or jalapeño, goat cheese, lemon juice, a few ice cubes, something sweet like chocolate kisses, fresh garlic, and salt
a blindfold
Lesson Directions
Anticipatory Set/Hook
Have the food set out on a table in the middle of the room but not revealed to the students yet. Ask for a volunteer to come up and be blindfolded. Ask them if they have any food allergies then tell them that you are going to give them a taste of a very common food. Tell them to stick their tongue out. Drop a few drops of lemon onto their tongue and let them respond for several seconds. Remove the blindfold. Invite a student to come up and do a mini-scene and tell the lemon juice student to react exactly the same way they did to the lemon to whatever the other student says to them.
Keep repeating the same exercise with all of the other foods. If they don’t really respond much to something such as the chocolate, ask them to vocalize their feelings about that type of food.
Instruction
Step 1: Kinesthetic Response
Tell the students that what they have been doing is called kinesthetic response and it is the same principle as in the physical viewpoints just applied to the voice.
One of the most important parts of Kinesthetic Response is the timing.
It is not about what you say in response but when.
Have the students sit in a circle with their chairs. This game is a focus game and REQUIRES silence from the students when you are not speaking.
(Anne Bogart’s The Viewpoints Book pg. 110 Exercise 9)
Four students will come into the middle of the circle and sit with their eyes closed. Each chooses a word, either gibberish or not, as per the leader’s discretion. The leader also may give one word or phrase with which the whole group works. By excluding the option of variety in words, and by wholly focusing on the stimuli provided by others, each individual concentrates not on what sound s/he produces but on when. The timing is determined by responding kinesthetically to the sounds of others.
The participants might need to be reminded to include and trust the silences in a proactive, creative fashion rather than a passive one. Silence becomes less an inactive period of waiting than an Expressive field of sound all its own.
Switch new students in until all have had a chance to participate.
Step 2: Repetition
Have the students find a partner. Have them assign who is partner A and partner B. Partner A will start by saying “A-B-C” altering the pitch of each letter as they may. Partner B will then repeat exactly the pitch that Partner A does. This will continue a few times. Then switch roles.
The next time they switch partners A will do the same thing but add in the elements of speed/tempo and dynamic. When Partner B repeats it, they will match two of the letters exactly but change one of the viewpoints of one letter. For example, if A’s word is “X-Y-Z” and s/he says it : X (high and quiet), Y (high and quiet), Z (low and loud); B might repeat the pitch but change the dynamic by uttering: X (high and loud), Y (high and loud), Z (low and quiet).
Have them continue with this until the person following is able to respond spontaneously and playfully.
Closure: Discussion
Take the things we did today and think for a minute about how they relate to their physical viewpoint counterparts.
When do you think it might be better to use a vocal kinesthetic response vs. a physical one?
Is one more powerful than another?
Can you do a vocal response without doing a physical?
How can the vocal viewpoint of repetition play out in a scene? When might one choose to utilize vocal repetition?
Explain to the students that they all work together and sometimes it happens simultaneously and sometimes a single viewpoint works on its own. Instruct them that we will continue next time with incorporating all of these into architecture.
Assessment
Assess participation in viewpoint activities.