Julia: I’ve been involved with Rumpus Room for a few years now, attending workshops, becoming part of the committee, facilitating activities. I knew that after being on the committee for 2 years it was time for me to move on but I still wanted to be part of the community and enrich it somehow, give back, be useful, continue the good work. So Sean & I proposed piloting a drama group for 8-12 year olds at Rumpus Room. It felt like the right thing for me to move on from the committee and into a leading role at Rumpus.
It felt important to us that this drama group had a goal to work towards, even if the 6 sessions we had felt like a short amount of time. We wanted to create a good relationship with the children involved, make time for them to get used to each other and us as facilitators, develop their agency. So we made sure they had a say in what the sessions held, whilst offering some structure, knowledge and some themes to work with.
We spent the first few sessions playing games and building trust and confidence, whilst gently installing some performance rules. Then we worked with the children to devise short scenes, which would become the basis for a sharing in the final session.
Sean and I have been thinking about the idea of being creatures for a while now: what if instead of identifying ourselves as people, human, man or woman or child, we thought of ourselves as creatures? What creatures would we be? What qualities would this bring to us? How would this change our way of interacting with the world and ourselves? What freedoms would appear? We decided these questions would be our starting point with the group, with an understanding they would make it their own and a willingness to let that happen and hold that for the children. Being a creature felt like a great way for us and the children to trust ourselves and be confident in being ourselves.
The children were interested in whether creatures were good or bad and about their dietary requirements, whether they were dangerous to humans, what they might look, move and sound like.
It was great to host our project with children at Rumpus Room as most had attended other events here before so felt comfortable in the space. The children were quickly at ease with each other and us, but also growing closer through playing games and being paired up with each other to do tasks in different combinations.
We noticed they loved playing games that had to do with imagination, enacting scenes, playing characters, one game was Temple of Doom, which they often requested, were they had to collect a magic artefact at the end of a corridor filled with traps.
They’d go in one after the other, each being knocked out from a new trap they had to come up with on the spot, whilst avoiding the traps that come before, ultimately the last one to go in would survive all the traps, collect the magic artefact and decide whether to save everyone or gain eternal life (the responses varied…). They were not so fond of task based games and struggled with games that involved working together, these types of games we sprinkled throughout the sessions to encourage growth in these areas.
All the children had an incredible sense of imagination, were bursting with new ideas and were very funny too. They shared 3 short scenes with their family that they had devised for the final session: a text they wrote describing what a creature could be, a movement/flocking sequence where they moved as one creature and a semi improvised scene about frogs having a party, involving death, betrayal, eating and dancing (this group loved the snacks at Rumpus Room!). They were nervous but ultimately decided to go ahead and share what they had done. It was a great success, they did so well to remember what they had to do, perform with energy, clearly enjoying themselves, and help each other out in a pickle, even if that meant conferring on stage.
Working on this drama group with the children was great. It was filled with fun, laughter, learning, sticky bits, confidence building and tension. We were able to build a relationship with the children in the short time we had. They were a great bunch and we had lots of room for play and discovery as well as building trust and figuring out what it was going to be.
We found a lot of confidence and love for making work in this way. It felt great to do this pilot with Rumpus Room. Everyone on the team is super kind and supportive and we have always championed what they do, attending events, telling all our friends, even if we were feeling a little too old to still be involved. So being able to lead our own project and make this drama group happen with them felt like a great next step.
Facilitating the group made us more confident about what we want from leading a children’s drama group. What feels most alive for us from this experience is to make performances with the children & young people whilst offering learning opportunities and chances for everyone to lead and create space for agency, playfulness and connection.
Rumpus does a great job at tackling boundaries and power within their groups whilst keeping it safe and fun. We are working to find ways to continue the drama group with support from Rumpus Room. We would also like to take this group to see shows for and or by young people so we can continue to have conversations about what it is to make theatre, art and performance and the importance of why we do it. It would be great to make performances that could captivate young people as well as adults.
Cheers to everyone who helped make this happen. It was a hoot!