PHYSICAL THEATER

PHYSICAL WARMUPS & ACTIVITES

FEEL YOUR FEELINGS

For this activity, everyone has to sit on the floor wherever you like.  It is important that wherever you are sitting, you are close enough that you can hear my voice, but still have enough room to spread your body out for this activity.  Though this activity will be relaxing, it is important for you all to keep your eyes open and concentrate. Listen very closely to what I am saying and concentrate on the instructions.

Feel your feet in your socks            Feel your socks on your feet

Feel your legs in your pants            Feel your pants on your legs

Feel your chest in your shirt           Feel your shirt against your chest

Feel your fingers in your rings       Feel your rings on your fingers

Feel the hair on your head and the eyebrows on your face

Feel the tongue in your mouth

Feel the teeth in your mouth

Feel your ears

Feel all of the space around you

Let the space feel you.

CROSS THE FLOOR

This activity is going to require that everyone line up in three lines along one side of the classroom. It doesn’t matter if you are near your friends or not.  In this activity, I am going to call out different situations and it is up to you to walk across the floor in whatever style I call out.

For example: Cross the floor like the floor is made of Jello.

When you hear the situation, you must use your whole body to show what is going on. Don’t be afraid of looking silly.  Part of the fun of this activity is to look silly. This is a silent activity.  No one should speak while doing this exercise.  We all know how to use our voices from our vocal warm ups.  Now, let’s train our bodies. Walk like:

There is a Jelllo floor

There is a hot lava floor

You are on ice with rollerskates

You are a Supermodel

You are an old person with a walker

You are a million dollar winner

There is broken glass on the floor

You are stuck up

You are scared of 8^th graders

You have bad gas

You are a giant frog

You are a rock

You are a feather

You are a ribbon in the wind

You have a new hairdo

You are a pop star trying to avoid the papparazzi

You are talking on the phone

The floor is breaking

 The sky is falling

There are bees chasing you

You are a super hero/heroine

You are blind

You are in the dark

You are in bootcamp

You are a ballerina

You are a cowboy

You are trying to avoid a dog biting your leg

You are in slow motion

SLOW MOTION ZOMBIE BLOB FREEZE TAG

This is a really fun activity! This is played in the same way as freeze tag except that everyone who is playing has to move in slow motion, like a zombie, the whole time.  You can never run at regular speed.  If the zombie blob catches you, you become a part of the blob and have to catch other people and make them a part of the blob. Eventually, everyone will become a part of the blob.

GESTURE BATTLE MUSICAL CHAIRS

Who knows what a gesture is?  Can anyone show me any gestures?

A gesture is a physical movement that represents an expression, idea or feeling.

In GESTURE BATTLE MUSICAL CHAIRS, there is no running. We first need to form a circle and we have to deliberately leave out two spaces. When the music plays, we will all move around the circle until the music stops. When the music stops, everyone must strike a gesture, a pose, or some other physicalization of an emotion/idea, and hold a place in the circle.

Can anyone show us a pose or physical gesture?  Think of the movements we did in CROSS THE FLOOR.  Since we have left out two spaces there will be two people who have to “GESTURE BATTLE” to see who gets the space. Each time the music stops, one more of you will help me to be the GESTURE JUDGE.  The last person left posing wins. Ready, here we go!

CAR CAR

This is a very important trust activity.  In this, each of us will have to do something that is very difficult for many of us to do, we have to be willing to give up control of our bodies and personal space. This is an activity that requires for us to partner up with someone else in the class.

Once everyone has a partner, you will decide who will be the “driver” and who will be the “car.” Whoever is the driver, will be the first person in control.  The car has to trust the driver and trust where the driver is going to take them.  Don’t worry, we will switch places after a few minutes and everyone will get a chance to be in control. 

The car will be blindfolded and it will then be up to the driver to rest their hands on the shoulders of the car gently, and when instructed, begin to “drive” the car around the classroom. Each driver should talk to their car and reassure them that everything will be fine. Students should be aware of each other while moving through the space.  The object of this activity is NOT to hurt anyone or crash each other into anything.  Your car is relying on you to protect them and take care of them.  You should treat your car as if they are valuable.  Anyone who has an “accident” will be given lunch detention.  Personal safety is very important.

After driving the new car for about 2 minutes, we will switch places and the cars will become the drivers.

JOURNAL ENTRY
Which did you prefer; being the car or being the driver? Why?
What are some things you had to concentrate on while participating? Please write a one page journal entry about this.