Units December 12, 2024
The Power of the Story Teller - The Importance of the Story
State:
Grades:
This unit was created by a theatre educator at Florin High School in California, as part of the 2022 cohort of The 1619 Project Education Network. It is designed for facilitation across approximately 2 weeks, or eight 90-minute class periods.
Objectives & Outcomes
- Students will be able to analyze and explain how story-telling empowers individuals and improves our understanding of our world.
- Students will be able to demonstrate strong vocal qualities and physical communication to tell their stories.
- Students will demonstrate the ability to make use of researched material to enhance or illustrate their stories.
- Students will be able to use elements of technical theatre -- lights, sound, and projections -- to enhance their stories.
- Students will demonstrate the analytical skills needed to make their audience understand why the story is important and why it must be told.
- Students will demonstrate their ability to evaluate their own work and the work of others using a rubric of skills and informal revision sessions.
Essential Questions
- Why is storytelling important to humanity?
- What parts of a story need more details?
- What parts of a story would make a great scene?
- How does dialogue help us empathize with the characters?
- What stories can we tell that will tell the “truths” about America that we should all know?
Unit Overview
What is the power of the StoryTeller?
How can we use the tools of theatrical performing to bring underreported or untold stories into the light?
In this unit, theatre students will engage in a series of lessons which create a community of storytellers seeking to share stories that need to be told in order to bring us closer to each other. Their stories will be inspired by The 1619 Project’s mission of telling underreported stories to reveal “the unvarnished truth.”
Students will work on community building.
Students will practice skills of listening, speaking, and community through a series of “circle games.”
Students will practice skills of research to identify stories of individuals whose lives illustrate an element of our society that should be noticed, considered, and empathized with in order to effect positive change.
Students will learn skills of technical theatre as they make choices for how to present their stories.
Performance Task
Students will demonstrate an ability to use researched narratives as a part of their theatrical piece to achieve a specific story-telling objective.
Students may create either a solo or a small-group presentation. All group members must perform in ways that demonstrate rehearsal, memorization, and strong physical and vocal performances.
Students will write reflections to demonstrate their understanding of the importance of story-telling in our community and to reflect on the effects of their own story-telling efforts.
Students will create a live, multi-media performance piece that tells an under-reported story using performance techniques of voice, physical communication, and technical theatre elements.
A two week unit plan for teachers, including pacing, texts and multimedia resources, graphic organizers for student projects, and performance tasks for the unit. Download below, or scroll down to read the complete unit plan.
Facilitation Resources
National Core Arts Standards
TH:Cr1.1.HSI.a Apply basic research to construct ideas about the visual composition of a drama/theatre work.
TH:Cr1.1.HSI.b Explore the impact of technology on design choices in a drama/theatre work.
TH:Cr3.1.HSI.a Practice and revise a devised or scripted drama/theatre work using theatrical staging conventions.
TH:Re8.1.HSI.c Justify personal aesthetics, preferences, and beliefs through participation in and observation of a drama/theatre work.
TH:Pr6.1.HSII.a Present a drama/theatre work using creative processes that shape the production for a specific audience.
TH:Cn10.1.HSIII.a Collaborate on a drama/theatre work that examines a critical global issue using multiple personal, community, and cultural perspectives.
The following classroom examples reflect the work completed by high school theatre students who engaged with this unit in winter 2023.
Foundation
Students first examined the power of narrative storytelling and contemplated what "underreported stories" were. They were asked why telling underreported stories was important:
[It is] powerful and can lead to positive change in our society and the world.
[It]gives us the knowledge that we need as a citizen to become smart and help others. [It] gives us the opportunity to understand what is happening in the world right now.
It can lead the stories to [...resolving] the problem or issue.
Research
Students were then asked to research an underreported story:
Action
In groups, students then utilized the reporting to write scripts -- with an emphasis on empathy in the dialogue -- to help raise awareness about their selected issues.