Luckily she was available and we sat down for around 20mins to discuss what projects the Borderlines group were running at the moment. Firstly she explained a bit about the theatre itself, we sat in the backstage area and she talk me through the 'in the round' setting which the theatre has. She then asked me several question about my background, and the reason why Applied Theatre was my particular area of interesting. I told her about some of the experience I had undertaken before whilst at University working with the children in care, and from the pupil referral unit, and I explained how I found it so rewarding when you see a difference and change in a person and in a group through drama.
Borderlines uses drama for a way to people to feel differently about their lives and themselves and how they feel about certain things. They are very well established in the community and have worked on numerous projects. Sue said she was going to email me the timetable for the Borderlines groups so I could go in and take part in some of the things they do, about a week later I received the timetable and set up some more sessions:
- Tuesday 13th March 10.30-1 Young parents group ( this luckily wasn't going to clash with Home Ed as they meet every two weeks)
- Tuesday 13th and 20th March 1.30-3.30 Stratchcross, adults with learning disabilities. (usually I work on a Tuesday afternoon but had two weeks off so set up two sessions with this group)
- Thursday 15th March 10-12.30 Daytrippers, adults with learning and physical disabilities.
Then I had my first taste of the youth theatre here at the New Vic. It reminded me very much of my time spent in the L.B.C.T (Leighton Buzzard Children's Theatre) with some of the games and exercise they were doing. As stated before there are 5 sections of the youth theatre, two for 10-12 years, two for 13-15 years and one senior section for 16-18 years, there is also a separate drama club for 4-10years and just like with the group I was in many youngsters join at a young age and stay up until they are 18.
This session seemed to go rather quickly as it was only an hour and a half, which by the time everyone arrives and chats, and gets settled can quickly turn into just an hour. This group is very different to the younger ones, I think when people reach a certain ages, although they still enjoy the subject they take a little more encouragement to do certain tasks as they often feel silly and embarrassed. There was quite an even number of boys and girls in this group which is nice as in most drama situations the girls largely out number the boys.
This was there fifth session for this term, and they only had four sessions left before their end of term showcase where they put together a small performance for their parents. They were exploring a theme of ' I thought it was, but I was wrong' looking at coincidence and how certain events can affect you.
They started by playing eyes up which is a simple game based on focus and concentration where by the group stands in a circle with there eyes down, and when eyes up is said each person must look at someone, and if that person has also chosen you to look at and is looking back at you you are both out, the game continues until there are two winners. They then picked an exercise which they would like to do, the one rule being that if they suggested it they had to be willing to lead it, the winning game was wink murder which is very popular as a drama exercise.
After this they were spilt into groups to create a short scene about the theme, and think about coincidence and fate. As they were rehearsing I walked around the groups and was able to speak to them a bit about their ideas, and overall there were some really interesting concepts being explored.
I found this another successful and useful session, and David said I was more than welcome to go along again. So far so good!
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