Dear Parents, Guardians and Educators,

Performing Arts Workshop is wrapping up our final year of evaluation activities for Project ARISE at 5 of our partner schools. ARISE stands for Arts Residency Interventions in Special Education and is a project with the U.S. Department of Education, San Francisco Unified School District and Performing Arts Workshop. The project began in 2007 and while the evaluation wraps up this year, we hope to continue bringing high-quality arts programming to schools and special education students throughout the district.

What this means for your student:

• Special education and general education students in grades 3-5 at Edward Robeson Taylor, Starr King, Robert Louis Stevenson, and Ulloa Elementary schools are receiving classes in Theatre Arts or Creative Movement once a week taught by a professional artist.
• The arts program runs for the full school year and is combined with an evaluation that examines the program’s impact.

What we’ve learned so far:

• ARISE helps build self-esteem, especially for students with special needs. All students are treated the same during the arts lessons, and they provide a time for some to shine who might not excel in other academic areas.
  • Last year, special education students in ARISE had significant gains in demonstrating respectful behavior to peers and adults at school.
  • ARISE programming also supports growth among English Learners. The lessons develop public speaking skills and non-verbal communication, which helps students during the rest of the school day.

These are just a few of the things we’ve learned from our 2 years of project data. Starting in June, we’ll add data from this year to share with our partner schools. In the meantime, I invite you to read about what is happening in some of our classes. Our artists are happy to share their experiences and stories about their work, and I hope you enjoy reading about them!

Sincerely,

Karena Salmond
Program Manager, Artists-in-Schools
Performing Arts Workshop
1661 Tennessee Street, Suite 3-O
San Francisco, CA  94107
(415) 673-2634 ext. 202
karena@performingartsworkshop.org

Theatre at ER Taylor: The Art of Risking
by Beverly Sotelo

Theatre at Ulloa: Sparking Creativity
by Jason Brown

“Good morning boys and girls! Come on up on the stage. Anything you see on stage you can call it something else. Rename the chair to dog, the curtain to feather...whatever you think of. This class is not about me learning what you know, but what you think, how creative you can be.” I love this class. Transitions can be tough and attitudes flare spontaneously, but the teacher and aides are present and support me in diffusing what comes.

“Everyone find a partner, make the shape of a letter with your partner. Abraham and Quincy made an ‘L.’ What words start with ‘L?’” Using this starting point and the word “LIFE”, we created a play. The setting is a court room. Life (a student) is on trial. Death and Disease, (two students) accuse Life of being partial to Sun and Water (another two students). All subjects represent themselves. There is no judge, just a conversation on stage with fifth graders exploring their ideas around life and death. We created this lesson and experience together. Acting for me is often about digging out the creativity from the individual. With my ARISE students, I don’t have to do much digging at all.

Last week I asked my students, “How do you think theatre arts might be important for a job?” The first responses expressed that theatre arts class was only good if you wanted a job in theatre. But at a closer look, we discovered that theatre arts skills are applicable to any job interview process, and many social atmospheres.

In theatre arts class, we are learning to be calm and confident speaking in front of others. We learn to take risks, making individual choices and performing them. We are learning to overcome shyness and learn the feeling of success that comes from trying something new, and succeeding.

In addition to learning about individual choices, students are also strengthening their skills at working together. By building a scene collectively, or performing as an ensemble, students are learning the importance of each member of the community. In addition, they are engaging positive conflict-resolution skills.

These skills combined are preparing them for the future!

Creative Movement at Starr King: Learning Together
by Jason Brown

It is Tuesday morning. 9:15am. I’m at Starr King, Room 5. The room smells like syrup and sausage. My seven students are wriggling on the wooden bench in the corner. The teacher’s aides are holding some, talking with others.

“OK, are you ready for performing arts class?” asks Mr. Slye. Not much response. Ayanna whispers, “Tata,” (the name the children use to address me). I throw on a CD and work to excite the kids...

“Goooooood Morning! How you guys doing today? Let’s warm up. Who remembers the first step?” With this class of severely autistic kids I am very interested in learning about their memories. They remember my name. At least Ayanna does, so...how much body memory do they have? The aides help me to get them off the wooden bench, and we are exercising. In the beginning I did not know how to really engage my students with special needs. So much of my class is discussion-based and these children are not very verbal. So...I decided to teach them full contact dances, like Waltz, as well as Guinean acrobatic dance with huge leaps and bounds! The more they touch me, and each other, the more they get to move without limit, the more smiles I see on their faces. Now its 10:00am and its time to make rain, an exercise used to relax through sound - decompress, if you will. The class quickly returns to its regular rhythm. Jason will swing in the doorway, Ayanna will play with her blocks, Vivian and Vanessa will leap around. I will go down the hall to room 7 to teach another Special Day Class, this time a much younger group. Deep breath, “Gooooood Morning! Ready to dance?”