Teaching Theatresports?

Does anyone have any theories or tricks to teaching theatresports to high school students?

Maybe a few games or skills that can be included?

Has anyone here tought it? or perhaps even performed it live for audiences, or through Impro-Australia?

Any help/advise would be greatly appreciated.
you can either post it here, to email it to me (cpooge@yahoo.com.au)

Cheers

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See if you can find anything on Who's Line Is It Anyway which started of as a UK Theatre Sports TV Show and was then taken over by the US.

Great way of teaching theatre sports is to watch others doing it.

Jeff.

I suggest you get a copy of "Theatresports Down Under" by Lyn Pierse. Subtitled 'A Guide for coaches and players', it is an invaluable teaching resource.
It may be difficult to get hold of now. (My copy is a 1993 edition), but you could try contacting the publisher Improcorp Australia - PO Box 688 Kensington NSW 2033 or the associate publisher ish production and design, 43 Moverly Rd Kingsford, 2032.
I have a very kind bookshop (here in Kalamunda WA) who can find almost anything, so asking a small bookshop locally may be the way to go. I notice that you have a NSW email - Is the theatrical bookshop still in Pitt St, Sydney ? They would be my first stop.
Remember that "Theatresports" as a concept/brandname etc is copyright in many parts of the world. In WA held by Angela and Michael Sanderson-Green and I imagine Belvoir St Theatre or an associated company in NSW. I would definately ask them before staging any sort of competition.
I've played theatresports and taught the games to children as young as 4 (Lyn Pierce suggests 8+ on most games...but I've found that some concepts are useful/valuable even with language disabled 4 year olds). I wouldn't want to go into great details about how to teach it here, but will share my favourite tip from the book, which is "Doing is better than watching it if you want to teach it." Try to do a course in your area.

Good idea, Jeff.
I hadn't read Jeff's post before posting my own... My point about doing not watching is not supposed to be a reply to Jeff's suggestion. :)

Kim

The Big Hoo-Haa! plays at the Freo Hotel every Friday except the first Friday of the month (i.e. not this Friday!). We play some short form impro games that are very similar to those played in TheatreSports... come down and have a look!

You can find more details about The Big Hoo-Haa! on this website by going to the what's on section.

In the mean time... from experience I've found that it is essential to make sure the students are know the basic impro skills (offering and accepting, no blocking, yielding, etc) before you implement any formal structure to their classwork (like games structure).

Definitely get hold of the TheatreSports Downunder coaches guide as mentioned above- it is truly invaluable for high school impro teaching.

The DramaWest website is always a good place to start when looking for help with teaching Drama... http://dramawest.iinet.net.au

Good luck- it's a very worthy area to teach!
Libby

Hey thanks people.
I know what you mean, you see, where i'm going to be coaching is my old school.
I was actually a student there and left last year. I did theatresports/circus skills as a sport, and all the teachers who did this have now left, so i'm going back to become a coach there.
i've also see a great deal of impro out @ Belvior St, and scared scriptless.
and have been told, by cranston cup players that the team that i was in last year should try out in Scared Scriptless and go for cranston.
apparently we were alright.

anyway
Cheers peoples

Libby wrote:
>
>from experience I've found that it is essential to make sure the students know the basic impro skills (offering and accepting, no blocking, yielding, etc) before you implement any formal structure to their classwork (like games structure).
>


Yep, definitely agree. I can't count the number of times I've had kids ask 'can we play Space Jump?' ...only to find they really don't fully grasp the necessary skills for what's actually a complex game to do well, and it just becomes really bad impro.

Games like that are still fun even when played badly, so it's hard to refuse their request and take them back to more basic exercises..but unless it's done all that's occurring is the reinforcement of bad habits.


Even though there's often no 'right or wrong' in performing impro, and often the point is to let it take you wherever it's headed; I've often found in class exercises that it's useful to interrupt improvs and 'direct' them...maybe rewind a few seconds and explain why something didn't work...(a dropped offer, being vague by not naming something, steamrolling by not allowing the other person into the conversation, etc)...and then picking up where you interrupted to see the effect of the better choice.

Gotta be careful that you are tactful and specific in your criticism, and that it's always on technique and not content...it's hard enough to encourage new improvisers to lose their internal critic, and all teaching needs to be encouraging.


Rather than standard performance games, there is a lot of value in coming up with exercises that develop specific skills. You can often make up these exercises on the spot - they're simpler than games and you probably wouldn't do them in front of an audience, but they're still almost always hilarious to the observers in the class (who DO learn by watching, but also ought to get up and have a go themselves).
The skills to break down and develop are wide and varied, but include: making physical offers, justification, describing an environment, advancing a story, shelving ideas and reincorporating them, going with the obvious, rhyming skills, raising lowering or holding status, avoiding questions, listening and yielding to new offers; as well as general mime skills, storytelling, and character development....etc !!!


The Cutsnake Comedy group don't go onstage for The Big Hoo Haa without having a 'rehearsal' - a skills development jam session - during the week beforehand. Because 'games' are often focussed on entertainment of an audience, it's important to practise skills separately, without worrying about the need to be funny.


Good luck with it all.

Cheers,
Craig

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Hi,

I've been trying to get a copy of TheatreSports Downunder (lost my original one) and now it appears to be out of print. The bookstore has told me that a new edition is on its way, but when it keeps being put off. Do you know have any ideas about how to find the book?

Ta.

If you are in Perth try Elizabeths Secondhand Bookshop - any of them they will search all their stock for you. Lovely people and support theatre.