FREE THEATRE GAMES

Repertoire of Games

Lesson One. 7-11 years olds
The games this month come in the form of exercises that were used in two education drama lessons to prepare children for a role-play interactive drama. The workshops aims to introduce drama to children who have little or no experience as well as develop skills of observation, listening, and cooperation. Each lesson lasted 1-½ hours. The games are in no particular order; they simply represent a repertoire of games presented as seemed instinctively appropriate to the particular conditions of the classroom and responses of the children. You might select three preparation Games of a couple of circle games and assess what communication and interpreting exercises you give them - leave at the very least forty five minutes for these.

Preparation Games

The Bomb and the Shield:
You need a hall or big empty space for this game. The class is asked to spread out evenly around the hall. Individually everyone is to secretly choose someone in the room, they tell no- one not even the person they have chosen. You tell them that person is a bomb. Everyone then secretly choose a second person, that person is his or her shield. On a given cue they are all to move as far away from their bomb as possible and keep their shield between them and their bomb. They are to freeze and stand still when you tell them to stop. "The aim of the game is to have the shield between you and the bomb when I stop you."

King of the Street
Again you need a big space for this game. Select someone to be The King of the Street. That person stands at the far side of the hall touching the wall. The rest of the class are to stand against the opposite wall. The game is played like this: The main class are to secretly agree a place that they come from (China, India, France etc) and a job or activity they do there (eat with chopsticks, wash elephants, eat snails etc). The facilitator may have to help them with this initially. Once the decision is made they all approach the King of the Street. They should stand close, perhaps all having to cross an agreed line. There is then a little routine dialogue.
The group say - "We want to speak to the King of the Street" The King of the street says - "I am the King of the street, where do you come from?" The group say, "We come from China" or whatever their chosen place is; It should be a clue to the activity.
The King of the street then says - "And what do you do?" The group then mime the activity with no talking or sound. The King of the street will call out what s/he thinks it is when they call out the right activity the group rush back to their 'home' wall on the other side of the hall avoiding being tagged by the King of the street who chases after them. Any of the group who were caught by the King of the street joins his palace to become chasers. A new place and activity is decided and so the game continues until one person is left.

Sound Houses
The class divide in half. The easiest way to do this is to ask them to get in pairs and call themselves A and B. Ask the A's to spread equally about the hall so they can turn slowly with their arms out without touching anyone else. They are to be the 'sound houses' and should make a very quiet "beep, beep, beep" sound. It should be barely audible. The B's are then asked to spread around the hall in amongst the sound houses. They are to close their eyes and move slowly round the hall very softly whispering their name. The moment a 'B' collides with anyone else they become a sound house by standing still, opening their eyes and 'beeping'. The aim of the game is to survive for as long as possible.

The Line Game
Divide class into two or three equal groups. The starting point is standing in a line one behind the other. They are then told to re-order by a given attribute (Birthdays, first letter of their Christian name; surname, middle name, Mother's first name etc) They race to get in line in a given order and finish by sitting up straight and still on the floor)

Group Instinct - Walking and Stopping
To start, say to the class that you are going to ask them to walk around the room in every direction, however they are to stop walking as soon as they can, but they must all stop at the same time. That is they must collectively 'find' the moment to stop together. Stress that no-one should lead but sense the whole group is slowing and follow that trend till everyone stops. Then they should all sense the moment to start moving again. Continue for a few turns.

Circle Games
All these games are with the whole class standing in a circle.

Yachting Pond
The facilitator chooses someone from the group and stands directly behind them. Imagine that the space within the circle is a pond and you are about to launch a toy yacht across it. Ask the chosen person to close their eyes and tell them that you are going to push them gently across the circle and they should walk across with eyes closed, maintaining the same steady speed all the way across. As they reach the other side of the circle, whomever they are walking towards should receive them gently by holding their shoulders. They then swap places, the one who has just travelled launching the person who received them. Once they have this going and the trust has built up you might try sending a second yacht ensuring the two crossing the circle don't collide. The 'yachts' are the responsibility of the person who launched them until they reach the other side of the circle. The atmosphere for this game should be concentrated and gentle.

Eye Contact Crossing
The facilitator selects someone from the circle and instructs him or her to get eye contact with someone on the opposite side. They are then to walk towards them. The person they are walking towards should be aware they have been chosen and instantly get eye contact with someone opposite them; they should have left they space before the person walking towards them gets there. And so the exercise continues. It demands that everyone in the circle pays attention, and be 'available' to the person looking to make eye contact. Once they have established concentration you could instigate another person to play, so two people will be crossing at any given time.

Find the Leader
Someone is chosen to be the 'leader'. They are to move slowly, always facing the centre of the circle. Everyone else is to 'mirror' the leaders movements. The leader should move slowly to enable them to follow as accurately as possible. Ask the followers of the movement to look ahead. Those opposite the leader are in a position to see him or her but those standing on the same side of the circle as the leader have to rely on following a follower. Once they have established how it works select someone to be a detective and ask them to leave the room. While they are out of the room point to someone to lead and get the movement going again; then invite the 'detective' into the centre of the circle where they have to identify the leader. I generally warn people I only allow them one guess so they should take their time to be sure they have the right person. If they identify the leader ask how - their answers often teach us to become better followers and leaders.

Changing Poses
Choose a 'detective' to stand in the middle. Initially they are to close their eyes. While the detective's eyes are closed everyone in the circle is asked to 'strike a pose'. They should be sure its comfortable and they hold it still for some while. The detective then opens their eyes. The people posing should try and change position by a tiny margin. The detective catches people out by a) seeing them move, at which point the person caught sits down or b) identifies how they moved ("your hand was flat now it's a fist" for example), in which case the person being accused of moving either sits down if the detective is right or stands perfectly still. They do not defend themselves, if they do or they move they are out anyway.

OBSERVATION SEEING

Find the one with the coin
Get the group to mime passing a coin surreptitiously while walking about the space, when everyone is moving around passing a mime coin slip in a real coin. Stop them. Tell them there is now a real coin moving around and select a detective to watch as the passing continues. They have to catch the person with the coin among the fakers. I generally ask the group to stop so the detective gets the chance to ask individuals if they have the coin - the person with the coin should lie, of course. The detective can only accuse once.

The Kim Game
Set out a table of fifteen to twenty objects, some recognisable others less easily identifiable. Let the class look at it for a minute, then cover the items or ask the group to look away and remove or change the position of one or more. The class is to try and identify the changes.

Who is Missing?
Ask everyone to run around the hall. Then ask them to stop, stand still and close their eyes. Secretly select a child to hide or leave the room, by tapping them on the shoulder. The class is then to open their eyes and run again. When they freeze again they have to identify who's missing.

LISTENING
Chinese Whispers
In a circle, the facilitator whispers a phrase to someone and it gets passed around the circle. People can only whisper it once and people simply pass on what they heard or think they heard. Compare the first statement with the second. The famous WW War phrase was the order sent along the trenches "send reinforcements we're going to a dance" ending up as: " send three and four pence we're going to a dance"

Listen to sounds inside and outside
Ask everyone to find a space where they can lie quietly on the floor with their eyes closed. Ask them to listen to the sounds outside the room. The facilitator can then click their nail and move around the room and ask them to listen and stay in touch with where it's moving. Then ask them to cup their hands over their ear and mouth (so the 'shell' made by their hands enclose their ear and mouth within the same hollow). They should then listen to their listen to breathing now that it's amplified. Ask them to breath so quietly they can't hear themselves. Ask them to whisper a story to themselves so only they can hear. Say: "Careful I'm coming round to try and hear you," and do.

Whispering in pairs
Following on from the previous exercise get them to whisper stories to each other in pairs. Again, creep round to try and overhear them.

Greetings your Majesty
Select someone to play the King or Queen and have him or her sit on a throne blindfolded. Someone is selected to approach and say "Greetings you Majesty" The King or Queen has to guess who it is. Children should be encouraged to disguise their voice

Communicating & Interpreting

Back Writing
A simple warm up communication game: Work in pairs, one standing behind the other; the person behind writes a message on the back of the one in front. There should be no talking; capital letters are easier than lower case. It should also be taken slowly, a letter at a time; you can use punctuation marks and wipe the back with a flat of the hand at the end of each word. You play a form of Chinese whispers if A writes on B's back and C copies it onto C's back etc, any number of people standing in a line.

How do I use this?
This exercise is about giving instructions. The facilitator plays the student and the class become the instructors. The facilitator presents an object and says 'How do I use this?' When the group then start explaining, follow the instruction as literally as you can but wherever possible different to the correct way. If, for example you present a telephone and they say you pick it up and put it top your ear, pick up the entire telephone and put the base to your ear. An old BT telephone with a dial is a great object but you might also try putting up a deck chair.

Drawing This
Have one person to draw and another or other's to instruct. The instructors are given a simple line drawing of say a house, a cat, a camera, an open envelope etc. They then have to describe the picture to the drawer step by step without telling them what it is or using words associated with it. The instructors shouldn't be able to see what the drawer is doing until it's completed.

Incident Room
Two people look at a photograph of an incident. I like to use a slide in one of those small hand held viewfinders; it somehow adds status to the picture. These two people then describe what they see to the others who can ask questions to draw out as much information as possible. The group ask questions, imagining the two viewers are witnesses to the event. The witnesses will have answers that are factual (describing what they see) and speculative (interpreting what's going on). When everyone feels they have a true idea of the event the photograph can be revealed, and compared to people's imagined picture. I often use a photograph/ slide of young girls trying to push through a row of policemen; the clues suggest they are excited about seeing a celebrity. I would then prompt them by asking questions like:

• What is the picture about? Describe it.
• What is the situation, what's happening?
• When and where is the situation?
• Who are the people? How can you tell?
• What can you tell about their age, clothes?
• What do you imagine the people are feeling?
• What might happen next?
• What does the picture make you feel?
• Put yourself in the place of the photographer what's happening behind you?
• What's happening behind the policeman's back?
  
  Alternatively the whole class may look at a slide and describe it to two people who sit with their backs to it.

Interpreting Pictures
Get everyone to look at a picture and help then though questioning to interpret it. Suppose I give them this cartoon to look at
(See illustration) I may ask questions such as:

• Who is involved in the conflict?
• How did it start?
• Why has it happened?
• What does each person/side hope to gain from the conflict?
• How does each side/person feel?
• What might happen next?
• Is there a solution that each side/person would agree to, feel happy with?

Modelling a picture
Ensure the class understand the term 'conflict'. Groups then prepare a still photograph of 'a conflict'. The still image should give clues not only to who is in conflict but why. While the group are preparing ask them what visual clues they need to make things clearer for the audience. If it helps to know the incident is happening in a pub, draw a glass of beer for one of them to hold, if they are arguing over money, draw them a ten-pound note. Give them simple images and name them in writing if necessary. They usually accept these simple depictions quite easily. When the 'pictures' are shown to the group the onlookers should interpret what they see. After a while whether they come to a group agreement or not add some more clues. Say to the people in the photograph. "I'll tap one of you on the shoulder, when I do you may speak. Say something that you would say as that person in that situation". The group can decide whom they want to hear from first- someone they think would give the best clue. Does it alter their interpretation of the picture? Here are some questions you might ask of the group looking at the picture:

• What is the picture about? Describe it.
• What is the situation, what's happening?
• When and where is the situation?
• Who are the people? How can you tell?

Here are some questions you might ask of people inside the picture:

• What are you saying?
• What are you thinking?
• How are you feeling?
• What do you imagine the people are feeling?
• What might happen next?
• What does the picture make you feel?.

Hot Seating
As a follow up to the photograph you might want to interview some of the characters in depth. Have the person playing the character sit on a sit and be interviewed by the others. In this case the characters have to invent a history. Don't spend large amounts of time on this if they never improvised, learned or played the 'hot seat game' before, because they may start contradicting themselves.