Play in a Day: Artist in Residence

This is a practical, fun day(s) for primary age children, packed with learning and new experiences.

Working with an Artist in Residence, children are taken through the process of creating a theatre play, working with scripts, music, props, costumes and even masks. Plays are devised or written specifically for your children and can be focused on an issue, a topic, a class book or a curriculum area. Using physical, vocal and artistic skills, children learn to work as a team to create a unique play to present to parents and peers.

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“I had so much fun. I want to do it again and again. Can we do it everyday?”
— student, Oakridge Primary School

In these energetic, fun-packed days, children work together in an inclusive and absorbing theatre experience. The days always include games and group work, character development and storytelling techniques, working within a physical storytelling style. Sometimes a script will be used, sometimes a more loose narrative - each play is tailored to the group, to their learning needs, abilities and topics. We always use some simple props and costumes, often live music and masks, so that each group receives a full theatre experience, with rehearsals, preparations, costume changing and performance to an audience.

Level & Duration:

  • Primary school - EYFS/KS1/KS2

  • One day or multiple days (can be run as a series for Gloucestershire schools)

  • Maximum 35 children per group of one age group or mixed ages

Not available as an online workshop

Participants will learn:

  • Team skills: collaborating, sharing, supporting, working together to achieve a goal

  • Storytelling skills through use of words, gestures, movement, soundscape and mime

  • How to take a play from the page to the stage

  • Theatre conventions: the stage space, rehearsal, relationship to the audience, scripts, remembering and following lines and cues, characterisation, controlling focus.

two children acting as caterpillars in costume on stage

Key Skills:

  • Literacy: developing a love of stories, use of a wide range of rich vocabulary, contextual learning of words, internalising stories so that children take ownership of the narrative, for some groups creative writing can also be included

  • Confidence: reading aloud, channelling energy in a controlled way, presenting to an audience

  • Communication skills: vocal projection, physical and vocal expression, non-verbal skills

  • Emotional intelligence: experiencing emotions, working with characters, role playing, developing empathy, learning to infer meanings

Play in a Day: Artist in Residence can be run as a single day to produce a 15-20 minute performance with simple props and costumes or it can be delivered as a longer residency across a number of days, to produce a 45-60 minute production with costumes, props, set, music, singing, dancing and theatre lighting. With a longer residency, art and craft activities become part of the process with opportunity for children to learn simple mask making, costume making, prop making, script writing, stage management and even assistant directing.