Final Performance

For our performance final, my group decided to focus on average people’s interactions with social media, specifically why they hide or share what they do. When we first got together, things were pretty scattered in our brainstorming session, so I created a google doc where we could compile our ideas and plans. I took note of our ideas and then suggested that we pick our top three favorite ideas. We gave everyone two votes and I recorded the votes. Interestingly, once we narrowed it down and I led the voting for the number one idea, we kept getting a tie between social media and mental health. Amy actually came to our group just after that and asked what our idea was. We told her about the tie and she suggested that we consider ways to combine them. As we discussed that prospect, we came up with the questions: Why do we hide the things we do? Why do we share the things we do? How is this evident in social media?

As we continued to meet, I tried to maintain the organization of the project, taking note of the things we were deciding upon and typing out our script with the help of Mariah. It was a lot of fun, and a little stressful, to be able to come up with our very own piece of art. We decided the context, we decided the topic, and we decided every move we made. It was so free and I think that was the thing that was most stressful about it. I think that this very aspect is what could make it so powerful in my future classroom.

Were I to adapt this for my future classroom, I think I would do a lot of scaffolding work during the project. I would form lessons that incorporate creative activities that could help my students learn to trust their abilities to create, to make decisions, and to be artists. I would probably show them some examples of a devised, multimedia piece when I introduce the project. That was one thing I noticed when working in my group. There was a bit of a divide between the theatre and english students at the start because the three of us that were theatre education had either worked on or seen a devised multimedia performance before, so we had a fairly good idea of what was expected. The english majors, however, had to stretch themselves farther because they had never seen performance art. The only theatre they knew was very traditional. So, at first, they were imagining the project as a multimedia presentation with a tiny bit of theatricality thrown in rather than a devised piece of art.

This taught me how important examples can be. I don’t want my students to feel lost or on a different level than other students. I think a few examples could get their wheels turning and provide a solid basis from which to draw. It would possibly provide a new challenge of them feeling limited to the things they saw, but that could be when I could draw upon activities to help them devise. I could have them create frozen images in their groups, then add one word, then one action, then a sentence (similar to the work that Julia did with us, but I would probably do more of those activities over the course of two class periods). I would also continually remind them that there is no right way to go about this.

So, I have talked a little about how I want to the project to go, I guess that I should define what exactly the project entails. I think that for the project, I would divide them into groups of 4 or 5 as we were. However, instead of ensuring that there are both English and Theatre students in each group, (if I had a combined drama class like we did at my high school) I would ensure that there were both beginning and advanced drama students in each group. If I had separate class periods for the different levels of Drama, I would reserve this project for the Drama II or Adv. Drama class.

Their assignment could be as follows:

Alright, now that you have seen a few examples of devised theatre and practiced some devising over the last week, we are going to start a new project. In a little, I will divide you up into groups of 5. In your group of 5, you will pick a social issue that you feel is important to address. This social issue will be the foundation of a new devised piece. Here are some of the guidelines: Your performance should be 10-15 minutes long. You should each participate. There is no “right way” to create your project. You should work as a team and respect everyone’s opinions. You should incorporate at least one image and some sound and voice recording. As we work on this project, we will do activities along the way that might help you find new ways to engage with your topic. Any questions? Alright, once you get into groups, I will pass out the rubric and you can begin brainstorming your topic.

Game For Change

ADHD Quest

I decided to make a game about having ADHD and dealing with the social stigmas surrounding this particular learning disability. It is something that I have had to come to terms with during my life and one that I think still needs work within society. A lot of my game comes from personal experience, but I also reference WebMD and a news article. Here are links to them both:

http://www.webmd.com/add-adhd/guide/10-symptoms-adult-adhd#2

http://www.additudemag.com/adhd/article/12338.html

It was rather difficult to complete this game. Despite how excited I was about it, I was also a little overwhelmed by how large it started to become. I added little bits over a couple days, but had a lot of trouble completing it.

Almost every option in my game was actually a personal experience with some of the minor details altered. So, it required me to be very vulnerable since I'm putting a large part of my life out here for other people to experience and make meaning of. It was a big deal for me, but I want people to get a better understanding. I think I will continue to work on this project to refine it even more. I played Depression Quest while working on my game and it completely changed how I wanted to go about my game. It took it from a day-in-the-life kind of game to a larger time span that captures more of the bigger picture.

The political stance that this is pushing would be a greater understanding of ADHD. I do not believe that it is over diagnosed, but that it may be over-medicated. I think that there should be a wide range of help available for this learning disability. While I think that medication can be great on a short term basis to help people get on their feet and develop skills. However, I am nervous of long-term use of Adderall because research has started to hint at a possible link between heart disease and long-term use of Adderall.

Round Robin Story

The Story of Mr. Fluffytail

Fluffytail was usually punctual, but today his car got a flat tire. He tried to catch the bus, but it was full. So, he ran as fast as he could.

Fluffytaill ran and ran until he was breathless. The rain started to poor and his little feet gave out under him. This was not going to be a good day.

Fluffytail sat in the wet grass, ready to turn around, give up, and just go home. But then he saw a little mouse, struggling to walk through the heavy rain.

Fluffytail pitied the mouse struggling in the rain. After a moment’s hesitation, he hopped up to the mouse and offered to take him to his intended destination.

The mouse replied, “Yes, thank you so much!” and climbed up onto Fluffytail’s back. They hopped off together into the sunset as Fluffytail took the mouse home.

Artist/Teacher Statement

Textual Poaching - Remember your place

For this assignment, it took me a long time to come up with an idea. The aspects of myself that I felt were most impacted by media related to gender. I watched a lot of Disney movies as a child and found myself trying to act like the princesses I saw. After some research, I decided upon the 1953 version of Peter Pan. Here is the scene I chose:

I found this on google with the caption, "Yes Wendy, remember your place..." When I visited the site hosting the image, I found it was a blog pointing out the racism and sexism of the movie; however, there are still plenty of people in the world who share the sentiment that women should "remember their place." Once, on my mission, I was even told by someone on the street to let the men teach the gospel and get back to my kitchen. Thinking of all of the pressures put on women and the jokes that went around in high school about women going to make their man a sandwich, I decided to swap Peter and Wendy.

Wendy gets to be the adventurous one, sitting carelessly back while Peter is kneeling on the floor with a needle and thread, doing the work for Wendy. The chain around his neck represents the shame messages that women in society often receive, pressuring them to do certain things, dress a certain way, and be a certain person. I actually thought of the image of slave Leah as I drew the chain around his neck. In her skimpy slave outfit, the chain is found to be seductive and alluring, but around Peter it is quite disconcerting and dark. My position is that there should be no chain around either Wendy or Peter. Genders should be equal with freedom to be adventurous and the respect from others to be taken seriously.

I could use an assignment like this in my future theater classes to help teach my students about production concepts. An image and interpretation can change the way an entire show is directed. I want them to see that even plays that have been around for quite some time can be reformed with a new concept to say something new.

Process Piece - Sound

For this project, I originally thought of doing a timelapse video of me making dinner. Then, I realized, for one, my kitchen wasn’t clean enough for that and the example was the sound of washing dishes. Also, I watch Tasty videos all the time! I didn’t want to just copy something that I have seen someone else do. So, I was super original and decided to record the sounds of me making dinner. I actually really enjoyed this by the end and was thinking of tons of ways I could adapt this to my future classroom. For a technical theater class, I could first play this clip that I recorded and ask them to write down all the different sounds that they hear and what likely made those sounds. Then, once they have written all the different pieces that made up this whole, we can have a discussion about the complexity of sound cues, including the advantages and limitations.

Finally, I could give them the assignment to take a piece of a script (likely a scene that I will assign) and record sounds that they feel could fit the setting and environment of the selection. The recording should be 2-3 minutes and should include at least 3 different sounds. It should be something that could be in the background to add dimensionality to the scene. I could also ask them to choose something that they do regularly and record the process of that, ei. Brushing teeth, shaving face, making popcorn. They should not speak during this recording, or cut out their voice, however, they can catch the sound of another person speaking from another room. After this, they could write a reflection about the things they learned.  

#BeingAuntTay

I chose to make a video because I typically share and pin pictures on social media. Very rarely do I create or share a video. So, I wanted to experiment with compiling both videos and still images together to make a single piece of media that expresses a clear feeling or message.

As a teacher, I feel like this demonstrates that to create, you don't always have to start from scratch. The images and videos I placed in this were all gathered over the last year and a half of my nephew's life. I used things that I already had to create something new. Also, this illustrates how much of a difference music can make in a video or other source of media. If I had put a faster song to this, the feeling evoked in the viewer likely would have been very different. I had a clear goal when selecting the length of each video clip, the starting and ending of the song, what pictures hit what section of the song and the order in which I placed the pictures and videos.

I felt like I had a lot of freedom to mold this to be what I wanted. I want my students to be able to feel that same freedom. In order to make this easily transferable to students, I used an app on my phone, called Flipogram, to create this video. It was very straightforward to use and didn't require a lot of extra time to get the desired result. When I posted this video, I posted it with the following hashtags to further emphasize the point of the video: #BeingAuntTay #LiamAnthony #untilihavemyown

Ode To An Orange

This is my Ode to an Orange.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BPl0yc4hoJX/?taken-by=sunshine.poet

https://www.instagram.com/p/BPl2KCuB3WP/?taken-by=sunshine.poet

https://www.instagram.com/p/BPl3Ro8B9eh/?taken-by=sunshine.poet

There are so many things that oranges are good for. I wanted to make this project my own, so I chose the lines from the essay that spoke most to me. I had been drinking orange juice all weekend since I had a cold I was trying to overcome, so I chose to end my pictures on that note.

To adapt this to the classroom, I would likely have my students do an adaptation like this for a scene or play that they are working on. I would want them to create a Tumblr, Facebook, Instagram, Buzzfeed article/quiz, etc, based off of their character's role and interactions with others. 

Thinking and Writing about Digital Media

My personal media consumption used to have a heavy reliance upon Facebook. After some thought and self-reflection last semester, however, I deleted the app from my phone and have limited my Facebook use to once a week or every other week. Now, I use Instagram as my main source of social media. It is nice because I follow a lot less people on Instagram and I can actually keep up with my families posts without getting stuck in the endless scrolling that happens on Facebook’s news feed.

Another social media platform that I really appreciate is Pinterest. I spend a lot of time on Pinterest gathering recipes, gardening tips, hairstyles, date ideas, etc. I treat pinterest as a place where I can learn and get inspiration. Last week, my husband and I planned our date night off of some pins I had saved.

I also read a lot of articles on google. Whenever I am curious about a subject, I like to google it. Typically, I make a rule of finding three legitimate sources on a topic before taking that information to be sound. If it is a subjective topic, I try to find articles on both sides of the argument before deciding my personal opinion. I find that I’m able to gather a more complete picture that way. I think that this will be very useful in a secondary education setting. Checking sources for research is crucial, especially for students acting as a designer or dramaturg for a show. It is also crucial for me as a future teacher in making sure that the things I teach to my students are accurate and useful.

With my media consumption and creation, whether it be reading a book on my phone, watching a movie, or posting on my blog, I typically ask myself if it will encourage growth or learning. I have a hard time with media that doesn’t encourage or challenge me to expand my mind or understanding in some way. I have couple different blogs. One is for this class, another was for BYU’s Art’s Bridge and two others were started as a way to use my writings to uplift others. I never posted purely to express myself, but rather usually had a challenge or moral accompanying the poetry.

Other personal guidelines that I employ with my media consumption is that relationships come first. My love language is quality time, so if I am doing an activity with someone else, I try to limit my use of digital media. I try to be present in the moment to be able to really interact with those around me. I’m not always perfect at this; sometimes, I will answer a text in the middle of a conversation with someone if I feel the text is important. However, I do my best to put those I am actually with first.