Tag Archives: risk

The Great Fire of Guilden Morden (Part Two)

John Kirk specialises in drama workshops and theatre for young people.Time to bring you up to speed on The Great Fire of Guilden Morden project.

As you’ll recall from my previous blog on this three month project  last year I was contacted by Guilden Morden Primary School who were looking for a creative partner for a Heritage Lottery funded project.  Working over 12 weeks between May 2014 and July 2014 the school would devise and develop a creative response to The Guilden Morden Fire (22/5/1881).  This creative response would be documented using web based, digital technology.

The project has now finished so it seems appropriate to reflect on what we got up to in my final weeks in Cambridgeshire…

John Kirk is a storyteller and drama facilitator specialising in drama workshops and theatre for young people.Week Six

Polishing our story – I worked with the groups to consider the structure and language we might use in our poetry and scenes.  We explored atmosphere and how it might effect the urgency of our words (particularly as our story is about a fire).  We began rehearsing our scenes and thinking about how we could use transitive verbs to help a performer better understand character and events.  Elsewhere we explored the local legend of Jack o’Legs and the area’s connections to agriculture.

Week Seven

Staging a Chorus – The group continued to think about how vocal expression could bring the story to life.  Conscious of the looming deadline to create a piece of community theatre this week I also introduced some basic ideas about Greek Chorus Work.  With the youngest classes we set up a water relay race as we explored the difficulties the Fire Brigade might have faced in 1881.

Week Eight

Rehearsals – With two sessions scheduled this week we staged the main structural elements of our story; the scenes and poem.  It is worth mentioning that most of the ideas for the words and actions came from the children rather than from the teachers or myself.  It was very important that the children felt this was their project and that my role was to challenge and enthuse them.

John Kirk is a storyteller and drama facilitator specialising in drama workshops and theatre for young people.Week Nine

More Rehearsals – Working with each group for short bursts to ensure they didn’t disengage from the story we continued to rehearse the groups.  As we began to bring the different elements of the story together the process became very technical and I confess to confusing myself at times!  Despite this the group took things in their stride.

Week Ten

Show Time – For the first time we brought all 73 performers together and on two sweltering afternoons the children presented their story to their families and community.

The Great Fire of Guilden Morden is documented by the school here but this is a taste of what we came up with…

 

“It was a charming summer’s day in the year of 1881.

In Guilden Morden, the golden hill in the marsh,

the sun’s warm rays are dancing on the faces of children playing outside.

Birds sit amongst the fresh green leaves of silver birch trees

singing their beautiful songs,

and a gentle breeze carries cares and worries away.

Peace reigns over the village, fields and lanes.

None suspect what is to pass on that terrible Sunday.”

 

From start to finish this was a special experience.  The staff and all the pupils were wonderful to work with and I will truly miss being a part of the school.  I take away a lot of memories and a folder of thank you messages from the children which I will treasure.  Most of all though I leave this project inspired by the potential of young people and certain that creative practitioners have a future within education so long as schools remain willing to take creative risks, commissioning projects where the outcomes are more difficult to quantify.  So long as there are teachers like those at Guilden Morden Primary School creativity has a very bright future.

The Great Fire of Guilden Morden (Part One)

John Kirk specialises in drama workshops and theatre for young people.Three years ago it was my pleasure to be involved in two projects which were funded by the Creative Partnerships initiative.  The programme saw artists working with schools and exposing pupils and staff to new ideas of working.  In Stoke we worked to explore how we identify with urban spaces through stories and in Lincolnshire we created a story trail for the school and wider community.

Rather than doing a day in a school I was able to present a series of workshops as I took up residency in my partner schools.  The projects were very rewarding and I feel that I learned a lot about my practice from being involved.  I was supported by my partner schools to try out ideas (to take risks) and organise really memorable learning experiences for the children (we did a Q&A in Stoke with some local VIPs as well as a creative walk, whilst in Lincolnshire I organised storytelling experiences around the school to help the children’s imaginations).  Sadly (as is the way with these things) the programme came to an end just as I was discovering it.

Last year I was contacted by Guilden Morden Primary School who were looking for a creative partner for a Heritage Lottery funded project.  Working over 12 weeks between May 2014 and July 2014 the school would devise and develop a creative response to The Guilden Morden Fire (22/5/1881).  This creative response would be documented using web based, digital technology.  Remembering my previous Creative Partnership experiences I jumped at the chance.

At the time of writing we are approaching the midway point of the project.  I have tried to summarise what we’ve done below…

John Kirk is a storyteller and drama facilitator specialising in drama workshops and theatre for young people.Week One

Celebration.  Our first session fell on May Day.  In Cambridgeshire at the time of our story May Day would have been an opportunity for the community to celebrate the coming of Spring.  I want celebration to be central to our final presentation so I introduced a simple group dance to the children.  The dance will be incorporated into the final presentation and offer our work a communal spectacle.

Who are you?  Through simple storytelling games I found out more about the groups and we used objects to stimulate more personal stories.

Week Two

Who am I to you?  The pupils brought objects from home to tell their personal stories.  We then used the objects to build a map of their school community.  By spending two weeks focussed on identity we are better positioned to introduce the heritage aspect of the project (I have a better understanding of who I am but where do I come from?)

Week Three

The Great Fire of Guilden Morden Walkabout.  I lead walks around the village, introducing the children to the story of the fire in role.  Each walk took us on a 40 minute stroll about Guilden Morden stopping at the (assumed) site of the fire, The Independent Chapel, Old School, War Memorial, Church and Vicarage.  At each stop I role played a different character who had a part in the story of the fire.

Week Four

Commemoration.  This session fell on the anniversary of the fire.  To mark the date the school organised a fire drill and I read the newspaper report of the fire to the children in assembly.  Our commemoration was in sharp contrast to the celebration of Week One.

In their own words “The Guiden Morden Fire”.  The groups retold the story of the fire using drama games.  The groups used drama to structure their own version of the story.  These structures will be used as a starting point for building a narrative poem and dramatic scenes.

John Kirk is a storyteller and drama facilitator specialising in drama workshops and theatre for young people.Week Five

Acting Out the Events of 1881.  With the younger classes I appeared as a Victorian Schoolmaster and with the older classes we turned our version of the story into a series of scenes.  In the next week the classes will transcribe these scenes to form the basis of scripts and stories.

Over the next six weeks we have a lot of work still to do but I hope to be able to share news of our success, images and video here over the next few months.  Stayed tuned!

A Night at the Theatre

John Kirk is a storyteller and drama facilitator specialising in drama workshops and theatre for young people.Just before Christmas the ceiling at The Apollo Theatre collapsed during a performance of “A Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time” (see my previous blog on technology for my endorsement of this show). It was reported that audience members in the Upper Circle, Dress Circle and Stalls were injured by falling masonry and the theatre would be closed until the New Year.

My Twitter feed went crazy – I have many friends working onstage and front of house in West End Theatres – some people wanted to express their sadness at what was a shocking event, some people wanted to blame Theatreland for failing to invest spiralling ticket prices in the ageing bricks and mortar.

It got me thinking about the pitfalls of a night out at the theatre. Don’t get me wrong – I’m a big theatre fan.  In my opinion nothing is more spellbinding than the magic of theatre and I would encourage everybody to go more often but what are the risks when you are in charge of a large group?  I’m not going to take a swipe at the theatre establishment because the “incident” (excuse my pun on the name of the show) at The Apollo Theatre was a freak occurrence but taking a large group into any unfamiliar environment has challenges.

First there’s getting there. Sharing information and collecting ticket money can become a cycle of phone calls and letters. Once this is done you have to organise or navigate the transport. This can be a real headache.

Making it to the theatre is not the end of the logistical problems. Minding a large group in alien territory can be stressful and depending on the age of your group can involve anything from mass toilet runs to keeping teenagers out of the bar!

The quality of the show can also present a risk (see my blog about quality and storytelling).  When you book a show you are restricted to what’s playing. Can you guarantee that the production is going to be worth the entrance fee? Its easy to be open minded about quality when you’re spending your own money but with a group it’s a gamble.  Sadly, if your group aren’t engaged by the presentation (and sometimes even if they are) theatre audiences have little sympathy for young people who don’t understand audience etiquette.John Kirk specialises in drama workshops and theatre for young people.

Oh and don’t think that at the end of the show you can relax. When the curtain comes down and the lights go up its time to get everybody home.

When you present it like that it’s little wonder people contact me.

As a bespoke storyteller I am flexible enough to bring the show you want to your location. This means that you get a convenient, professional product at a much more reasonable cost.

I’m used to working with young people so there is an expectation that it will be an audience’s first experience of live performance. My classic and traditional stories are intentionally snappy and incorporate audience participation and other devices so as to engage even the youngest children. In your own environment the skill of listening and responding appropriately can be nurtured and your group remain free to enjoy live performance in their own way.  With older students I offer workshops to explore the themes, characters and ideas behind texts (“An Inspector Calls”, “Chatroom”, “The Crucible” etc).

John Kirk specialises in drama workshops and theatre for young people.A storyteller offers an alternative live performance experience. I believe in the value, power and legacy of quality storytelling and it is undoubtedly a privilege to share stories with young people be it in a theatre, a hall or a living room (see my Unbirthday blog).

In a way, although it was shocking, I’m glad those people were injured by the falling roof at the Apollo Theatre because it proves that live performance is still attracting big crowds.  It wasn’t very long ago that plays in the West End were reporting less than 25% houses and in some ways it would have been a lot more tragic if the ceiling had fallen onto empty seats.

It would be ridiculous if people stopped going to the theatre because they were scared a ceiling might fall down.  More realistically the greatest risks to a group attending the theatre are posed by the ever increasing cost of theatre tickets and the bureaucracy of organising trips.   Whilst I hope that theatre in the United Kingdom continues to flourish I also hope that to those put off a night at the theatre, booking a visiting creative practitioner is an attractive alternative.

Storytelling and Code Breaking

Can you crack the code to continue the story?John Kirk specialises in drama workshops and theatre for young people.

1911 1955 1912 1916     1937 1972    1920 1981 1951!

Where A is 1908, Z is 2000 CODE IS FUN!

You might be thinking, what has code breaking to do with storytelling? Well, my work is nothing if not varied and I was recently invited to launch a Homework Club at a Library.

The challenges of storytelling for informal settings are numerous: who will attend, how old will the participants be, how can we best use the time to deliver something which will be engaging and not patronising?

On this occasion I came up with the idea of creating a story around a fictional counter terrorism agency to meet the client’s brief.  The agents were told at an initial briefing that the unit had been infiltrated by an enemy agent.  It would be the task of the group to crack the clues and root out the villain before the unit was destroyed.  Jack Bower meets Cluedo – the game was afoot!

As well as the date cipher above, I used the Dewey system and the characteristics of books to disguise information (page numbers, line numbers, even the number of characters into a line!)

John Kirk specialises in drama workshops and theatre for young people.

Allowing the participants to approach the narrative in a free form way is a risky venture but attempting to crack my ciphers was an important part of the session.  Like homework, the ciphers required the young people to work for their reward using problem solving and research skills.  The pay off for the young people was revealing their role in the narrative which they were then able to use to complete the story, taking part in a further game of conspiracy and intrigue at the end of the session.

It was encouraging that the group saw the session through to its conclusion.  It would be quite easy to struggle with the puzzles and drift away from the exercise but the group persevered and the final game was a hail of accusations, bluff and enthusiastic double bluff based on what they knew about themselves from the previous games.

In the end the enemy agent was brought to justice and everybody seemed happy with my deviously vexing games.

As I basked in a job well done one thing was clear – I wouldn’t have got away with it without those pesky kids!