This page is for the complete Collaborative Project, with emphasis on creating the Collaborative Devised Performance. If you are looking for instructions on editing your video and writing your paper, please go to THIS LINK FOR PROJECT REPORT & VIDEO INSTRUCTIONS. 

PROJECT:

Students collaboratively create, stage and perform an original piece of theatre (lasting 7–10 minutes) created from a starting point of their choice. The piece is presented to an audience as a fully realized production. The audience is selected by the students.

Honors Students submit performance and writing during an exam for assessment, but do not do full portfolio paper.

Each IB student submits the following for assessment:

1. A completed cover sheet.

2. A project report (a maximum of 10 pages of written text and images*) plus a list of all sources used. **IB STUDENTS ONLY** Honors students will write shorter amounts on a final exam.

3. A video recording of the final piece (7–10 minutes maximum).

*To help define the scope of this portfolio document, the written text contained within the project report must not exceed an indicative maximum of 4,000 words. It is not expected that the submitted work will reach this upper limit and students should by no means feel under pressure to meet it.

The Collaborative Project is a 7-10 minute theater piece that you will devise as a collaborative ensemble of 2-6 collaborators. Your devised theater piece will be created by your ensemble  from a "starting point" and for a "target audience".  YOU DO NOT START WITH A SCRIPT, the script evolves over time through your devised rehearsal process and begins with your STARTING POINT.  The "starting point" may be an image, idea, issue, question, theme, non-dramatic text, object, person, piece of music, place, piece of street art, a graphic novel or comic strip. Sometimes a devised process turns results in a traditional script, but sometimes the script is more open or is  more of a movement script than a dialogue script. The TARGET AUDIENCE is a specific group of people for whom you are creating your piece of theater. You do NOT have to ultimately perform for your TARGET AUDIENCE, but you do have to create with a specific TARGET AUDIENCE in mind.

You will have a month to create your 7-10 minute devised piece of theater that will be presented to an audience with a talk back. Throughout your process you will keep a journal.  At the end of the process you will assemble/write a process portfolio of up to 10 pages.  IT IS ESSENTIAL THAT YOU REGULARLY WRITE IN YOUR JOURNAL, SKETCH AND TAKE PICTURES OF YOUR PROCESS IN ORDER TO ASSEMBLE AN ACCURATE PROCESS PORTFOLIO AT THE END OF YOUR PROJECT.   SEE BELOW FOR ESSENTIAL STEPS.

These are the major steps of the Collaborative Project

1. Watch this video on devising.

2. KEEP A JOURNAL THROUGHOUT THIS PROCESS.  YOU WILL HAVE JOURNAL ASSIGNMENTS, BUT, ALSO, MAKE A DAILY PRACTICE OF WRITING.

3. Whole class will do in-class explorations of collaborative devised work and research devising methods of professional collaborative companies

4. A variety of experiences including steps 1-3 that will help you to choose ensembles

5. Form collaborative ensembles

6. Ensembles decide on a starting point and target audience

7. Ensembles explore starting point and then write artistic statement as a group

8. Devise a 7-10 minute piece of collaborative theatre

9. Present the piece and do an audience talk back. Presentation and talk back must be videotaped.

10.  Create a Collaborative Project Process Portfolio of no more than 10 pages with an added Works Cited page (Works Cited page is not counted in the 10 pages).  YOU MUST USE YOUR JOURNAL THROUGHOUT TO BE SUCCESSFUL IN CREATING YOUR PROCESS PORTFOLIO.  IB students only, not honors. Honors students will do similar writing in a final exam, but in shorter form.

11. As part of creating your Process Portfolio, you will choose moments from the video of your performance that you will write about that best represent:

    • A moment of TEAM that best shows how you created TEAM as a PERFORMER (This can be tension, emotion, atmosphere AND/OR meaning).

    • A moment that best  shows YOUR specific artistic contributions to your piece as a creator, director or designer.

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FORMAL REQUIREMENTS OF THE TASK

• • Each student submits the following for assessment.

1. A completed cover sheet.

2. A project report (a maximum of 10 pages of written text and images*) plus a list of all sources used. **IB STUDENTS ONLY** Honors students will write shorter amounts on a final exam.

3. A video recording of the final piece (7–10 minutes maximum).

• • *To help define the scope of this portfolio document, the written text contained within the project report must not exceed an indicative maximum of 4,000 words. It is not expected that the submitted work will reach this upper limit and students should by no means feel under pressure to meet it.

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  • The starting point provides the inspiration for the collaborative creation of the piece of theatre. It gives a focus to the initial stages of practical exploration. For this assessment task, the starting point must be one of the following:

• an event

• an idea, issue, question or theme

• an image or photograph

• a non-dramatic text

• an object

• a person

• a piece of music

• a site (place/location)

• a piece of street art, a graphic novel or a comic strip.

• • Theatre-maker intentions: Students are required to collaboratively formulate intentions for the piece of theatre (200 words

  • maximum). These must be agreed by the ensemble and should include the following:

• the chosen starting point

• what the piece will address or explore

• the target audience for the piece

• the performance space and the positioning of the audience

• the effect the ensemble aims to have on their target audience.

• • Performance skills: Performance skills relate to the use of body and the voice. Skills relating to the body might include, for example, the placement and movement of performers on stage, the use of face, gesture, posture, body language or manipulation of objects. Skills relating to the voice, for example, might include pitch, pace, pause, tone, volume, accent, emphasis or intonation. These lists are neither prescriptive nor exhaustive. Overall, students should consider the effect their performance will have on an audience.

  • Project report

    • The project report (10 pages of written text and images, with written text not exceeding 4,000 words maximum) is a written account of the student’s involvement in the collaborative project, demonstrating the student’s ability to reflect upon and evaluate the process of collaboratively creating the piece and their own artistic contributions to the final performance in order to fulfill the ensemble’s intentions. A cover sheet is provided by the IB for this task and a completed cover sheet must be submitted for each student.

  • Moments in the piece: In the project report and on the completed cover sheet, students are required to identify moments in the video recording of the final piece.  A moment is defined as a short and concentrated theatrical instance that is chosen by the student to evidence their specific contributions. Each moment must not exceed 2 minutes maximum.

    • Moment chosen must:

      • evidence how they used their performance skills to effectively contribute to one moment of tension, emotion, atmosphere and/or meaning (“TEAM”) and 

      • evidence their specific individual artistic contributions as creator, designer and/or director. A moment is defined as a

• • GUIDELINES TO KEEP IN MIND IN CREATING YOUR PIECE

    • Although the process of creation and presentation is collaborative, each student should also individually contribute artistically to the development and staging of the piece to help achieve the ensemble’s intentions. These specific individual artistic contributions may be in terms of creating, designing and/or directing material and should directly contribute to effective moments that will be clearly visible in the final piece. Students need to be aware that, due to the collaborative and experimental nature of the work, not all artistic contributions will make it into the final piece. With this in mind, students need to be proactive in ensuring they make numerous individual contributions to serve the fulfillment of the ensemble’s intentions during the process and to support the cooperative realization of the final piece.

    • Each student should keep a record of the collaborative process of creation and of their own specific artistic contributions.

  • AUDIENCE & AUDIENCE FEEDBACK: The audience for this task can be fellow classmates, peers or an external audience selected by the student. Students will need to consider appropriate ways of gathering feedback from the audience following the performance of the final piece, in order to gauge the extent to which their theatre-maker intentions were met. Approaches to gathering feedback might include a talkback, a survey, a focus group or other methods as defined by the students and depending on the nature of their intentions.