Curriculum

programs

Curriculum

The Opening Act Acting Program is series of 24 2-hour workshops – broken into two semesters - that are designed to give students a strong foundation in acting technique and an opportunity to create and perform two ensemble pieces. The program gives students a weekly space where they can feel safe to have fun and develop their own skills as actors and performers, and to give those students the powerful and unique experience of creating a true ensemble performance.

To achieve the goals of the program, each workshop depends heavily on group exercises, theater games and improvisations as well as acting exercises and playmaking activities. Toward the beginning of the year, workshops will use extensive group activities, theater games and improvisations to establish an environment of trust and fun so that students can feel free to explore and take risks (i.e. be able to be goofy and ridiculous in front of their peers). As the year progresses workshops will focus more on using acting exercises that will both give students the skills they need to approach performing a scene and will lay the foundation for the creation of original scenes and plays.

A downloadable Word version of the Opening Act Teaching Artist Manual is available, which includes our first semester day by day curriculum. While we encourage individual teachers to print out and use our materials, this manual should under no circumstance be reproduced or distributed without the written consent of Opening Act.

This manual starts with the mission, vision, and goals of Opening Act. It then presents an overview and understanding of the elements of each workshop: creating an atmosphere of trust and fun so that students can feel free to openly express themselves and develop their “acting instrument”, understanding and developing acting technique, and creating and performing original works. It then discusses important aspects of teaching and leading a voluntary after-school program. Finally the manual provides a week by week curriculum that can take the workshop leader from week 1 to 12 of a first semester program. Opening Act’s second semester program relies much more heavily on student and teaching artist input, allowing the playmaking process to be devised around each individual ensemble’s interests and goals. The Curricular Appendix provides a reference to exercises, games and activities that are used in the curriculum, as well as a wealth of additional activities that can be substituted into daily lesson plans.

Click to download:

Opening Act Teaching Manual

Curriculum Appendix (additional exercises and activities)

Additional suggested reading:

52 Pick-Up: A Practical Guide to Doing Theater with Children

by Willie Reale

Theatre for Community, Conflict & Dialogue: The Hope is Vital Training Manual by Michael Rohd

Playmaking: Children Writing and Performing Their Own Plays

by Daniel Judah Sklar

Improvisation for the Theater

Viola Spolin