Lesson 2

The following

Speaking with symbols and metaphors

Do the following warm ups to help you understand how to represent ideas symbolically.

Warm up 1

How many A’s in one A?

How Many As.mov

Form a circle. One actor goes in the middle and expresses a feeling or an idea using only the letter A in any of its possible inflections, movement and gestures. All the actors in the circle repeat this . Another actor goes in and the same is repeated for A E I O U then with a single word. In this case representing the word ‘power’ (with sound and movement only),

Warm up 2

Leapfrog

One person bends over with his hands on his knees. His partner jumps with his legs over his back and then bends over with his/her hands on his knees and so on. Students can continue playing so that there are a whole lot of backs to jump over. This game can represent a complex idea such as jumping over hurdles, or building resilience.

Warm up 3

The wooden sword of Paris

Wooden Sword.mov

Two students facing each other, with the leader in front of the group. They fight a duel with imaginary swords. The leader gives 6 different instructions on the following strokes.

  1. As if to chop off the head the opposing leader – in which case all the opposite team must duck
  2. As if to chop off the legs – all the opposing teams must jump
  3. A strike to the right – the actors must jump to the left
  4. A strike to the left – the actors must jump to the right
  5. A clear strike at the middle – the actors jump right or left
  6. A strike forward – the actors jump back

The leader can then decide to make two or three strikes at a time and then the pairs fight as they wish.

Using the same movement as in the game, try to symbolically present one of the following ideas: Hacking or identity theft, trying to fight off trolls, etc.

Focus questions

  • What levels of symbolic representations can be explored from the above activities?
  • How can symbolism be used to represent online experiences? (positive or negative).