Acting

Los Angeles is an industry town.  Amongst my friends, so many people are involved in The Industry.  They’re actors, writers, directors, camera people, directors of photography, trailer editors, set designers, warm-up comedians, blah blah blah. They’re in film, tv, and theater.  Our kids have been filmed since Day 1, and by tween or teendom, are taking up the camera or pen or computer or hammer or whatever.  YouTube and Facebook and countless hard drives are littered with their output and stardom.  It’s in their blood.  And environment.

LA is also deeply segregated.  Let’s not even get into race (though given how white The Industry is, I suppose race is unavoidable).  I’m simply talking about access.  The kids I teach (mostly, but not completely Latino) are rarely filmed, photographed, exposed to creative occupations and ways of thinking.  When, for a unit on family traditions, the 2nd grade teachers asked students to bring early photographs of themselves to school, we got less than a 30% response rate.  I know if it were my child’s class, the parents and kids would have to spend hours sorting through boxes and albums and jpegs and mpegs and quicktimes.

And this is just pictures of the kids.  Let alone pictures/videos/movies by the kids.

So here’s one more area where teachers have to bridge a large and ever widening gap.  It’s a technology gap and a creativity gap.  A gap in being producers of media and art and the mindframe that lets one say, I’m going to make a work of art. Or heck, I’m just going to goof around with a pen or a computer or camera or my body and see what pops out.  I’m going to let myself be free!

Today, in ELD (English Language Development–instruction targeted to meet the specific language needs of children learning English at different levels), we were working on the aforementioned Family Traditions Unit.  We teachers had created a core of vocabulary we wanted all students to be able to use fluently: events, stages of life, newborns, infancy, toddlers, tweens, teens, adults, parents, grandparents, greatgrandparents, etc.

After we discussed each stage of life, looked at pictures of them, brainstormed salient characteristics of each one, I thought, let’s have them play charades.  They broke up into groups of four, and each group played charades with the vocab list.  The only rule was that guesses had to be in complete sentences and accompanied by a logical reason:  “I think you’re being a toddler because you’re learning to walk in a wobbly way.” “I think you’re a teenager because all you’re doing is playing video games!”

At first they were a bit shy.  But each group had its in-house extrovert.  After ten minutes everyone lost all shyness.  Inhibitions went flying out the door.  Kids were wailing and rolling on the ground and pretending to be in wheelchairs and cradling babies.  And speaking in complete sentences using their news words and reasoning.  Fun was had by all.

While the vocab was important, I think the most significant learning was the overcoming of inhibitions.  They were actors.  They were so unselfconscious.  They had an intention.  They communicated their intention.  They reacted to each other.  They were, in short, free.   Today we toddled towards bridging the creativity gap.