Teaching is the best way to learn. Why? Because what we call teaching is usually a combination of actions, attitudes, and responsibilities that make for good learning. The teacher is fully engaged and active, often acting with strong motivation, clear goals, and a sense of responsibility not just for the material and her/his own action, but also for others and for the group as a whole. "Student," on the other hand, often describes a very limited range of activity.
Another great-looking activity from the Drama Resource website. http://dramaresource.com/strategies/open-and-close
Another Kani Club game.
In pairs or trios, people take turns telling a story one word at a time, improvising as they go. Time limit should be relatively short: 2 minutes?
Person A: This
Person B: morning
Person C: when
Person A: I
Person B: opened
Person C: my
...
As with all Kani games, the key is to embrace others' ideas and add your own. (Yes, and...)
Variation:
Joker can give everyone a word on which they have to end, e.g. "carnations" or "exploded."
Adapted from "Ten Second Objects" on the Drama Resource website (http://dramaresource.com/games/warm-ups/ten-second-objects) The original activity is great as is:
"Divide everyone into small groups (4-6). Call out the name of an object and all the groups have to make the shape of that object out of their own bodies, joining together in different ways while you count down slowly from ten to zero. Usually every group will find a different way of forming the object. Examples could be: a car, a fried breakfast, a clock, a washing machine, a fire."
Variations:
When asking people, "What do you see?" I find the question often confuses them. Though I prompt people with Denzel Washington's line in the film Philadelphia, "explain it to me like I'm six years old" people are unsure what is being asked.
How great to have this labor and social history teaching resource online for free. I hope others will add new lessons and comments. I still recall the time I did the Organic Goodie activity with IBEW apprentices -- a huge guy finally stood up and seized "the machine", holding it high above his head (far out of my reach). The question: what to do next?
In this activity people use illustrations of others to introduce themselves through comparison and contrast. I have used images by Joe Sacco from Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt by Chris Hedges and Joe Sacco, but it would also be interesting to use images of historical figures (known or unknown), literary figures, objects (a cactus, a fish net, a wave), etc.
Hand out pictures randomly (or lay on table for self-access).
Shiho Ide, a participant in my Tokyo English for Activists class, came up with this nice way to do introductions.
Standing in a circle.
The first participant introduces herself, saying her name and what she would like others to call her. She then chooses another person who must ask her a question, any question. After the first person answers the question, the second person repeats the process.
Comment
I learned this game at Kani Club, the theater improvisation group in Tokyo, Japan. The game asks participants to filter their free association through their sense of what others might say. The object is to avoid "idiocy" -- in the sense of being isolated in one's thinking. At the same time, the "idiotic" answers are often reasonable or creative.
Yoko Ono and the Plastic Ono Band made a music video of her song "Bad Dancer" in which Ono and other celebrities dance badly and joyfully. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d3mvEfON2CI) The idea of the song is that we should free ourselves of the burden of "being good" and embrace being bad at things, so as to do them freely.
This idea can be applied to any activity in which fear of poor performance prevents us from acting with freedom. For example, "Bad Presenter," "Bad Singer," "Bad Listener," "Bad Writer," "Bad Artist," "Bad Translator," "Bad Innovator," "Bad Activist," etc.
