...events and more in february;)...take it from there!

FEBRUARY 2009- PARA DAR ESPERANZA: …How to give an impression about the last month!?...


First I want to change languages to make my profile and blog reachable for everybody who is interested, and English gives me the opportunity to reach out for more people internationally.

February was a very busy and interesting month for me and for my professional development. The most special events during this month have been the workshop I gave in drama about “Amistad” and valentine´s day. Besides that I had time to work through my evaluation from the project and the team members, who got the chance to evaluate my work during the last 6 month and give feedback over the process I made. I could do my medium task about “storytelling” without any problems in three days with two different groups of the older class.
All the special occasions brought me a lot of new experiences and learn moments I want to improve of myself. I will describe them more detailed below:

Workshop “LA AMISTAD” or process oriented theatre based on the improvisation method

For two days I had the girls of Ellas group for preparing a theatre play, which is based on the valentine´s day and its meaning. We had 8 people participating the workshop who all have been between 12 and 16 years old.
I worked quiet spontaneously with the ideas the group collected during the brain storming on the first day, and let them choose between 8 different themes (connected to the title of friendship). Before they chose they formed groups of two up to four people (helping hands from the other groups for a small character in the play possible), and discussed which theme fits most. After we decided who is working with what theme we began to write a script of more or less around 10 sentences for each character and personality within the play. The kids had the chance to choose the place they prefer to play it, and in total the four groups had 30 minutes today to develop their theatre. After we came together in the end for a short evaluation, I could see how exciting the activity seems to be for the group members. The girls had no problem to start working on it, but more on making compromises and combine two minds in one story.

The second day we used to see all the different presentations within the group, give feedback and tips (the others could take the position of the director for the play), and we got back working in the smaller groups for 20 more minutes. Here they had time to improve and adjust their plays with the given feedback and work on their intern communication. After we came back together again we could start to choose everybody singly their outfits and materials they want to use. For them dressing up for theatre is a very exciting thing and they enjoyed to try everything out. In the end everybody had chosen outfit and requisits for the play so we could evaluate our workshop in total before we went back to the classes.

On the Thursday before valentine´s day we presented the small scenes to the other kids, and the group has been very nervous, but motivated. So we could manage to come out in time, eventhough the children did not really talk loud and clear the smaller kids enjoyed the presentation and welcomed/said good by with a big applause! That was a good and strengthening experience for them, I guess doing good for their self confidence as well.

Medium task: “STORYTELLING” …….let it out, let it in, create together!


For the task I could manage to get a group of 6 people from the group of Ella. I took a group of just girls for the first session, and a group of just boys for the second time. For me it was important that the children are same age and feeling comfortable in the accommodation of the group and its leader. For that I chose a one-sex group, especially because the sexuality and contact to the others play such a big part in this specific age group, and are taken so sensitively.

I gave a short impression about my working plan and the time available for us to do it. The girls did need some more time and ask a lot of questions about how to do it, but I wanted them to work spontaneously and without much active leadership, so the process is more concentrated on them. One of the group members got the task to write down all the sentences been said during the activity. The only direction I gave was that every sentence in a row has to begin with “Happily…” and “Unfortunately…”, and so on. So I gave already a bit of the emotions which could be filled in.

After we made a round of asking if everybody knows what to do we started to create the story of a family, which wants to make some holidays on the sea side of Ecuador. The girls did not have much problems to adapt on the sentence said before, but still did not really play with each other, more for themselves and their own imagination. After a while and about 20 different sentences we stopped and repeated everything together. The following step was to play the story within the time I red it out loud. I gave them enough time to arrange or rearrange for a sentence, and we needed about 5 minutes for the realization.

After that I went out of the room for 20 minutes to let them prepare a presentation based on the story but as well filled in with own ideas of what to say, how to say, how to act and what to wear and decorate in the room.
After I returned they had 5 more minutes to evaluate how it was to have the responsibility and free hands for creating their own story with drama materials. I had the feeling they have been even nervous though they just presented it in front of me, and I tried to sell it relatively and tell them that it is more about the process and what they already did till now, so the presentation had less of an examination and more of being just one part of what we created together.
I was more than satisfied about the outcome of my work, especially because I could see the joy and excitement of the group while creating their own story, for the first time for everybody.

“STORYTELLING” ...boys will be boys?!...

Improvements of my first experience with improvisation theatre was, that I give more direction and active leading in the beginning, but less during the work and creation process of the group. There are more points of my role as a therapist which changed during the second time of practice, and so I started to invent more concrete time schedules and we could manage to finish within one day, and 2 hours of creating.
The boys have been more interacting and working together, but at the same time had several problems to take the activity serious and respect the others turn. I could see that the lesson of sexuality they have had before had its influence on their behavior, but still asked myself a lot about the differences which were obvious in the process of the girls and the boys. The boys were a bit older and more self confident than the girls, but could not manage to work without active leadership. As soon as it was just them the working stocked in joking and making fun of each other. Just the structure of the theatre was well done and they were stimulated to make a great play out of a little and not adapting story of them. They did know that it is not the product we were concentrated on, but more the process how we are able to work with each other and combine ideas and visions.
I am more satisfied than I find negative points of this activity, especially by concerning the circumstances and the short time of active communication I could have with both groups. It was defiantly helping that I knew all of them before, had and have some of them in individual therapy and I am known with Ella´s group and her way of working with the older once. I think and learned storytelling is a great and good opportunity to work as well in groups as well as individually. During the task of my study I could get to know more about different manners and methods for storytelling, such as improvisation, bible drama, psychodrama, and so on.

Evaluation from the project, teachers and psychologist of my project
Wow, of course I did hope to get a good in-between-evaluation for the first half of my internship, but I was not prepared to be appreciated and stimulated that well from all the different sides in the project as well as from the university. I am happy that the team knows that I work with motivation and love to be with all of them, especially cause of the open communication in between.
I am really happy to be able to attend this project which especially is influenced by a familiar atmosphere and the smile in everyone´s face when you come or go! There are no conflicts in between the relations of the team, and if there are problems there are always open ears and heards to help work it out the best way!