Stage Play

Applied Acting Games and Activities

STAGE PLAY WAS DESIGNED AS AN ACTING CLASS FOR CHILDREN WITH AUTISM SPECTRUM DISORDERS (ASD). This program was created as a collaboration between The Scottish Rite Clinic for Early Childhood Language Disorders and The Duluth Playhouse Children's Acting Program. It was intended to provide an inclusive community program and to implement an intervention method which is called Applied Acting or Applied Theater-meaning the use of acting for the purpose learning rather than for the purpose of performance. Two speech language pathologists, often with graduate student therapists, one or two acting teachers and many youth volunteers facilitated this program. There was one adult or youth volunteer per student. Parents and other family members stayed for every session and provided the students with an audience to clap.. Stage Play was funded by a Minnesota State Arts Grant.... More

The Video clips below are examples of Video Models that were created to pre-teach many acting concepts prior to children attending the weekly class. Other video clips are representative of the sessions where you can see some of the students and some of the youth volunteers during the weekly class. We also provided ample visual supports to help student understand concepts and you can see similar visual supports below. All of these elements were important to the success of this program. Of particular importance was the inclusion of an acting "Buddy" for each student taking the class. The Buddies were a youth volunteer and a more experienced community actor. At anytime, a student could choose not to participate in an acting exercise up on the stage and ask their Buddy to do it instead. They could also take their Buddy up onto the stage with them and do various exercises together. This level of support proved to be enough to persuade nearly every student to try nearly every acting exercise described below.

ACTING AS THERAPY: Professional acting teachers know how to teach such as the intentional use of body language and vocal intonation and many other communication skills. Improving these skills is very helpful for children with ASD. Acting is also a form of social pretend play, which for many children with ASD, is very difficult to master....More

Social pretend play, created spontaneously by human beings from about age three and on, is a wild swirl of developing skills such as imagining, communicating, storytelling, negotiating, emoting, directing, following directions, waiting, coordinating and acting. Acting classes explicitly teach these skills and provide an opportunity to practice in a structured manner.

Theater Vocabulary

As we explicitly taught children acting, we needed to teach them the vocabulary of acting and Theater. We did this at over the eight-week acting program at few words each session.

To see all the vocabulary that we taught and how, see Theater Vocabulary

Popcorn Attendance Routine

In this Video Model Buddies and teachers are demonstrating the routine for taking attendance. The goal of this activity was to get children familiar with being on stage, teach everyone each other's names and get students to start ACTING as if they were popcorn.

Actors Introduction

Volunteer Acting Buddy's and the Community Theater Acting Teacher, Kate Horvath demonstrate an activity called Actors Introduction. Right after this demonstration, actors taking the class, will try Actors Introduction for the first time. If a student actor does not want to do Actors Introduction or any other activity in Stage Play, the student can "Just Watch" and an Acting Buddy will do his or her Introduction instead.

Cookie Jar Name Game

Learning all the Actor's names in the Acting class. This game works beautifully to teach children all the names of their classmates in the classroom as well.

Walk Across The Stage

Speech Language Pathologist, Tamara Pogin directs an Acting warm-up exercise of walking across the stage "as if..." where acting buddies and students act out various ways of moving.

Learning Stage Locations

Learning Stage Locations On Stage and Off Stage with an Acting Buddy.

Curtain Call

Curtain Call is the ending activity to an Applied Acting Lesson in a program called Stage Play. In this eight week, once a week, program, young students with Autism Spectrum Disorders were paired up with young actors from the community theater program to take acting lessons.

Slow Motion Race

Stage Play Acting Class Video Models. This Video Model was used to prepare young actors with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) for an acting lesson where there are two acting roles. In one role, the actor gets to trip while running. Tripping was generally considered the more desirable role. The acting lesson also helped young actors act out losing since the role of tripping was also the person losing the race. Losing is often very challenging for youngsters with ASD but it is easier to practice losing when enjoying the drama of tripping and falling.

Real Props and Stage Locations

Stage Play Acting Class Video Model. This Video Model was used to prepare young actors with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) for an acting lesson where the actors were directed to stand in different locations on the stage and then act out a scene that involved a real prop.

Pretend Props and Stage Locations

Stage Play Acting Class Video Models. This Video Model was used to prepare young actors with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) for an acting lesson where the actors were directed to stand in different locations on the stage and then act out a scene that involved a pretend prop.

Giving a Present Skit 1

Stage Play Acting Class Video Models. This Video Model was used to prepare young actors with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) for an acting lesson was a skit about giving and receiving a present.

Angry Sponge Bob

Sponge Bob Square Pants Angry Script. Stage Play Acting Exercise for practicing using a happy voice and facial expression. These words were used to highlight the emotion elements and because the Sponge Bob cartoon was familiar to many children.

Look and Sound Happy

Stage Play Acting Class Clip for practicing making your body look happy. One acting student is helping another acting student make her body look happy and she is making her voice sound happy. Note that the mask is used because 1) it was fun for the students to wear and 2) the students could pick the emotion that they wanted to act out.

Learning Stage Locations: Stan Game

Learning Stage Locations Up Stage, Down Stage, Stage Right, Stage Left, and Center Stage with an Acting Buddy.

Sponge Bob Imitation Game

Sponge Bob Square Pants Clip of Model for student prior to weekly Acting Lesson. This game was adapted from an activity in Acting Antics by Cindy B. Schneider

Making Your Body Look Scared

Stage Play Acting Class Demonstration for practicing making your body look scared. A video model of how to make an actors body look scared. Note that the mask is used because 1) it was fun for the students to wear and 2) the students could pick the emotion that they wanted to act out.

Making Your Body Look Sad

Stage Play Acting Class Demonstration for practicing making your body look sad. A video model of how to make an actors body look sad. Note that the mask is used because 1) it was fun for the students to wear and 2) the students could pick the emotion that they wanted to act out.

Making Your Body Look Happy

Stage Play Acting Class Demonstration for practicing making your body look happy. A video model of how to make an actors body look sad. Note that the mask is used because 1) it was fun for the students to wear and 2) the students could pick the emotion that they wanted to act out.

Look and Sound Scared

Stage Play Acting Class Demonstration for practicing making your body look and sound scared.

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