DMP Artist/Educator Statement

The Digital Media Performance assignment is an overwhelming assignment at first glance. Actually, it’s overwhelming at glances one through ten. After that, you start to look at it in more bite-sized chunks and it seems a little more doable. What is so intimidating about this project is how many layers of media must go into it; text, audio, visual, key texts, and movement must all come together to create a consistent theme and a meaningful performance. Oh--and it has to be in a group of about five people. And all five people have vastly different ideas, passions, experiences, interpretations, and opinions about what this piece is, what it’s about, how it should look, and how to get it there. And then you, as a people-pleaser and peacemaker, stress about making sure everyone’s voices are heard and that everyone is on the same page moving forward. So, yes, it is an overwhelming assignment.

The good part about this project having so many components is that there are so many elements to explore and ways to present your message. In our class, we started with stories. I was already a firm believer in the power of storytelling, but I appreciated what I learned about building a project and group on the foundation of stories. Starting with stories built a community. We became personal with each other, because these were stories from our individual lives. There was no face to put up because these stories were real. Sharing these narratives allowed us to see other perspectives than our own. We found common themes and shared experiences in unexpected connections that focused the theme for our project.

Our project experimented with verbatim theater and interviews. This continued to use the power of storytelling and learning from the perspectives of others. I was reminded that we don’t need to reinvent the wheel to make creative projects and performances. Storytelling is a powerful tool, so why not use it? Using stories and experiences from other people reminded me that there are stories everywhere, that we can learn from each other, that people’s individual lives and perspectives are so valuable, and that we have more in common with each other than we might think. Once our group had a theme and questions for our interviews, the experiences people shared fit perfectly with our theme and the message we were trying to share. That was evidence to me that what we were discussing was relevant and relatable.

I did my best to contribute all I could to this project. I came to class on time and ready to work. I came ready to share my thoughts and ideas but also ready to listen and compromise to create this performance as a team. I shared stories with our group; stories that were personal, real, important to me, and relevant to our work. I listened as others told their stories and discussed the common themes we found within the narratives. When we decided to interview people using the questions we created together, I interviewed my mom and transcribed the sections I wanted to use. Once we had the script mostly solidified, I was assigned a section to curate. I compiled, rearranged, and edited the segment to fit the needs of our performance.  

A modified version of this project would be fantastic in a future classroom. I would start by figuring out what my specific goals and objectives are for the assignment; am I wanting them to focus on the media aspects? Do I need to create a semester-long media-focused component to lead up to this assignment? How long should the final performance be? How big are the groups going to be? What is the value of larger or smaller groups, or doing this individually? Depending on how many groups we have, how much time will it take to see everyone’s projects? Is the focus on storytelling and interviews? Are we exploring verbatim theater specifically or learning how to use interviews as scaffolding? How early on do themes need to be solidified? What if multiple groups have the same theme and method of approaching it? How do I make sure the students are headed towards my intended outcomes instead of getting caught up in all the layers or the time constraints?

The assignment would needs to be specific enough to give focus and direction, but open-ended enough for students to explore what they are interested in and what will best support their project. I would set up the assignment to narrow down their themes earlier so they can build off that foundation. I would make sure my instructions are clear about what layers of media need to be included and give some examples. I would make sure that the purpose of the project, addressing an important theme or topic for their group or community (or whatever I choose), is not forgotten in the extensive list of required elements.

Final Script

DMP Visual and Mediascape Draft

Link
I wasn't sure if we're supposed to have the paragraph on here or in the document, so I'm putting it both places. 

We've been thinking about using a video of a flower blooming time lapse. One of our key texts is the poem "Yes, Of Course it Hurts" by Karin Boye. Part of the poem talks about flowers blooming, buds bursting, and a lot of our performance is about becoming and growing and developing, so I think a time lapse of a flower blooming encapsulates and underscores those ideas very beautifully. 

We have also been considering a video or some visual of a pencil drawing and embroidery, mimicking another key text of ours. Finding media that fits that description seems difficult, so we may end up doing it ourselves.  

We talked about having the videos going on every other computer in the room. 

DMP Soundscape Draft

Link

DMP Personal Story

Patterns

DMP Draft Script

Link

DMP Audio Interview

Interview Questions:

• What was a defining moment or turning point in your life?

• What is a pattern from your past that you want to change?

• What is a pattern from your past that you want to continue?

• Tell me about someone who has helped you transition or move past something important in your life?

• Who’s been integral in a transition to adulthood?

Description of interviewee:

Katie Craig, age 43, petite, large brown eyes, short brown hair, mother of 8 children, homeschool mom, doula (birth assistant), absolutely incredible, my mother.


Audio interview

DMP Group Common Questions for Interviews

• What was a defining moment or turning point in your life?

• What is a pattern from your past that you want to change?

• What is a pattern from your past that you want to continue?

• Tell me about someone who has helped you transition or move past something important in your life?
• Who, how, what did they do, etc.
• Tell me about someone outside your family.

DMP Key Texts

“Sometimes we get stuck in patterns or reoccurring themes in our lives that require a shocking epiphany to give us the opportunity to see new possibilities and notice the obstacles that keep us from moving on.”
― Kat Lahr

“The patterns we perceive are determined by the stories we want to believe.” 

― John Verndon

"Speak" Lesson Plan

Speak - From Page to Stage

Unit 2, Lesson 2

Creating Soundscapes

by Abbie Craig and Emily Trejo

Intermediate Theatre Class

National State Theatre Standards

TH:Cr1.1.II.b. Understand and apply technology to design solutions for a drama/theatre work.

TH:Cr2-II.b. Cooperate as a creative team to make interpretive choices for a drama/theatre work.

TH:Pr4.1.II.a. Discover how unique choices shape believable and sustainable drama/ theatre work.

TH: Re7.1.II. a. Demonstrate an understanding of multiple interpretations of artistic criteria and how each might be used to influence future artistic choices of a drama/theatre work.

Utah Effective Teaching Standards

3.e Extends the learning environment using technology, media, and local and global resources.

7.g Supports content and skill development by using multiple media and technology resources and knows how to evaluate these resources for quality, accuracy, and effectiveness.

Objective: Students will demonstrate their understanding of the elements of sound design by creating a multilayered soundscape using Garageband for a scene in Speak.

Materials:

• Computer for each student with either Garageband, Pro Tools, Audacity, or iMovie
• Soundscapes/music for movement activity
• Hospital (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQENbCBEhHk)
• New York City (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QutLo5RsVHM)
• Haunted House (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rrzCctUYttY)
• Disney’s Paint the Night Parade (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQTPpevlOhQ)
• The XX Intro (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G9pkJrBZDMo)
• Everdream (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RCMXO9sBIcU)
• Roller Coaster (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8mcZlLXPpw)

1. Hook: Interacting with Soundscapes - 10 min
1. Do this activity with a song first, and then with a soundscape.
2. Play a song. Have students move around that space, letting the sounds influence your movement and interactions.
3. Once students feel comfortable moving to the music begin playing soundscapes and allowing students to continue moving to it.
4. Dialogue how different sounds and songs influence the mood, tones, etc.?
5. Keep this in mind as we move on today.
2. Class Soundscapes with Images - 20 min
1. Last class we went to a different location, listened to the ambient sounds, and wrote down what we heard. There were so many sounds that made up the surroundings. Varying volumes, distances, repetitions, and tones come together to create a complex background to the space.
2. We’re going to pull up an image and, as a class, create a soundscape for it. We will use our mouths and voices, hands and bodies, while staying in our seats, creating layers, to match what we see.
3. Bring up the images, create sounds, maybe have people share songs that come to mind, layer it, and discuss.
1. https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1ai7GYYnR9sBLWF73kt6CU8vL5FTZvS6psrAgygeGvcE/edit?usp=sharing
1. If technical difficulties occur:
1. describe and draw a basic images of the landscapes. Proceed with the rest of the activity as written.
3. Group Soundscapes - 45 min
1. As a class, list scenes in Speak and their varying locations and write them on the board.
1. This list may include school hallways, Melinda’s room, the library, the cafeteria, etc.
2. If students need prompting begin the list with School Library, School Gym, Melinda’s Room, and Mom’s Store.
2. Explain to students that for the next activity we will be using Garageband to create a multilayered soundscape for a scene of their choosing from Speak.
1. Pull up screenshots of Garageband and provide a short tutorial on how to use the software through step by step examples.
2. Show students how to upload, edit, and layer sounds.
3. Put students in groups of 3-5 and have each group pick a scene on the board. Once picking the scene they will find a specific moment or event that occured in the space. For example, they could choose the school hallway, but to be more specific they could do the hallway on the first day of school, or the hallway after Melinda beats up Andy. They will then create a soundscape for the specific scene location.
1. These soundscapes must:
1. Be 30 seconds long
2. Include at least 5 different layers of sound
3. You must use at least 3 different sources
1. Sources may include your mouth/body, YouTube, sounds in the space, music, etc.
4. Instruct the students in how to use Garageband (or whichever platform you decide to use, or what is accessible in your classroom).
1. Go step by step with screenshots and examples.
5. Gather your sounds and layer them in Garageband. Be prepared to share with the class at the end of the class period.
1. For teachers: This is work that students could go on to create in film, theatre, or other production work. Technology is prevalent all around us and sound is a part of this world we live in, so touching on these resources broadens horizons for the future.
2. In case of technical difficulties, have the groups create soundscapes with their mouths, bodies, and classroom materials. Instead of recording them, just perform them live for the other groups.
4. Share - 5 min
1. Have each group share their soundscape, describe their process and sources, and discuss how the soundscape influences and informs the scene. Remind students that there are people who do soundscapes for a living, in theater and in film. Reemphasize the fact that putting this play on a stage would require a soundscape similar to ones they have been creating.
2. Assessment- Have students write a short reflection on their soundscape and their experience with Garageband (or whichever platform they use). They must include what sounds they used, from what sources they got them, and how it would impact or create the scene.

ELL Accommodations:

Peirce’s Firstness, Secondness, Thirdness (Throughout the two lessons): The EL students are engaging with sounds identifying with what they are, they then engage with different sounds and reflect on how they respond to them, The students then take these sounds and begin to create their own meaning with them by exploring and creating sounds and applying them to the text.

Vygotsky’s Sociocultural Theory: EL students are being introduced to sounds and their meanings in the context of our culture. This is helpful as students become more familiar with the sounds of the culture and can observe how it has affected it.

Zone of Proximal Development: In groups the students will be creating their soundscapes. The teacher will walk around and help with using the technology and teach the students how to use it. The EL students can then use the others in their group to help them learn and be able to participate in the project. This is helpful to them as it stretches them to use materials they don’t often get to use but are provided with assistance so they won’t feel completely helpless and give up.

Provide a copy of the novel in the EL student’s primary language if they get stuck in translation. They can then refer to the translation if they don’t understand a scene and need more ideas for their project.

Culturally Diverse Students Accommodations:

Have students take note of Melinda’s personality traits and think of how she might react in certain situations. How can you have her behavior reflect through the sound? This is useful so that the students can compare Melinda’s culture to their own. They then need to continue drawing on this culture rather than reflecting their own in the project.

Provide Feedback- Regularly check in with the student and their group. Reflect on their decisions and why they are appropriate within the context of the scene. These check ins can be used to gauge the student’s understanding of how Melinda’s culture work. If they are pushing too much of their own culture on to the project, begin a dialogue with the student to help them come to the conclusion that these choices are not appropriate for this project.  

Sensory-Friendly Accommodations: Have students draw or write how the music and sounds make them feel during the warm up activity. This will be helpful to student who are unable to move about the room easily. When the class is working on the group projects have the student focus on one specific sound, decided by the group, to give them more control and focus for the project. 

Deaf Student Accommodations:

Discuss “visual noise” and how that changes scenes. When students are creating a soundscape for a specific scene and location, a group with a Deaf student (or students) could create a 30 second video about the “visual noise”--what is Melinda seeing? What are the tones? How are the feelings communicated? Etc.

Multimedia Artifact

Catalogue of Critical Creativity

Creating with Words: 

-Potent Quotables

-Theatre or English classroom: choose a character from the text we’re studying (play, novel, short story, etc) to encapsulate in one picture by selecting a quote from or about that character and pairing it with a simple image. For example, if we were studying Romeo and Juliet, you could use the text “It is the east and Juliet is the sun” and place it on the image of a sunrise. This exercise helps students think about using text in a way other than an essay or paragraph about what they are reading. 

Creating with Images:

-Emoji Story

-Theatre or English: students create a simple story using only emojis. They then share it with a second student. That second student creates a short story or a short play based on the sting emojis given to them. This exercise uses a language that students are very familiar with (emojis) to create stories and themes in a more formal language (English). 

Creating withs sounds: 

-Playlist a Life

-Theatre or English classroom: summarize the events of a story or play from the perspective of the main character(s) using clips from songs. For example, the ending of Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing where Beatrice denies her love for Benedick, you could insert the song from Disney’s Hercules, “I Won’t Say I’m in Love.” I love music and feel like it expresses things that words can’t, so using it to give more depth and understanding to characters is wonderful and creative. 

Creating with the Body: 

-Dallowinian Party

-Theatre or English classroom: students are assigned (or select) characters from a text or multiple texts that have been studied as a class. They must understand the background of the characters, their situations and relationships. Students will then improv a scene as these characters at a dinner party. While improv might be uncomfortable for many people, it can bring out new discoveries and help students see characters from a new perspective and in new situations. 

Creating with Stuff:

-Metaphorical Architecture

-Theatre or English classroom: design a piece of architecture—whether home, museum, school, theater, landmark, or another structure—to represent a theme (maybe themes like storytelling, forgiveness, friendship, betrayal, empathy, desire, etc). The theme could be selected randomly by the teacher, or be connected with a unit of study, or even a theme from a text being discussed. Create a model of the design in class using only paper and tape. Be able to explain why this structure shows the assigned theme. For example, if the theme was hope, one might design and create a home because home, for them, represents family and children who will go on to lead the future and therefore bring hope to humanity. Playing with architecture in a theatre or English class may seem a bit out of the ordinary, but is a more abstract way to discuss and share thoughts. 

Creating with Social Media:

-Belief Board

-Theatre or English classroom: select a character from the text being studied (play or book) and create a belief board from their point of view. Invite students to try to empathize with these characters’ points of view with things like values and opinions. Show these on the board using quotes, artwork, colors, objects, memes, etc. Think Pinterest. Social media is around for us today, but isn’t always in the texts we study in classrooms. Bringing those two worlds together helps students explore how those elements interact, what new meanings can be made or found, and how they relate to those two time periods. 


-Character Gallery or Belief Board:
Make an online art gallery about the character, but use it as an assessment of how well students know their characters (either in a play they are writing or a creative story they're working on).

-Audio Landscape:
Create a soundscape for a scene from a play or book to get more insight into the situation and feeling. It can also be used for creating a soundscape for a show. 

-Creating with Stuff:
Character analysis through building what their home would look like (external and internal, messy or organized, large or small, etc) based on their personality and tendencies. 

Textual Poaching

The existing media piece I chose was 80s pop songs, specifically those sung, and sometimes written, by females. I identify as a female so this media-some of the lyrics, messages, and stories shared, as well as the female voices-are things I may identify with. I also identify as someone who should have been a teenager in the 80s, and many of the artists included in this piece were teenagers, or a little older, in the 80s. 

My remix brings these hits to our modern day as I lip sync to the music on the radio. I have always loved 80s music and my dad (who was a teenager in the 80s) raised on 80s pop and rock. I often combine this with my passion for lip syncs and over the years have developed a collection of videos. The reserve of videos on my phone are a mix of songs sung by male and female artists, but my female voice identifies with the female artists. 

Historically, females have sometimes been represented in the media as a "pretty face", and many of these pop artists are singing songs written by men. By using videos of myself lip syncing, I am furthering that idea of using someone else's work and being a "pretty face" with it. My project also comments on the music video craze that began in the 80s where the artists or singers lip synced to their songs to create a music video. 

Having so many options for expressing an identity of mine was a bit overwhelming. Suddenly I was bombarded with the number of things I considered a part of my identity--a sister, daughter, friend, female, student, signer, member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, homeschooler, BYU Cougar, teacher, theatre artist, storyteller, lover of ice cream and burgers and fries and chocolate, musician and lover of music, movie watcher and theatre goer...the list goes on and on! That is both an opportunity and limitation in using this project in a school. It is an opportunity to see how many things make up who you are and how we might all have something unique in common with someone else. It can be debilitating because of the lengthy list of possibilities. Being able to discuss this with students, and finding their intent, becomes very important. Pin-pointing their goal of expression or impact will be crucial in helping to narrow down their project. We go from a broadening of perspective, to show how many identities and mediums are available to us and to the project, and then narrow down the parameters again. Using questions to converse about the topics of identity is vital. Make observations, ask questions, be open, figure it out, find out what makes you you. 

Metaphorical Fashion

Quotes and posts claiming to be "honest" and "real" are still a face being put on. What if we were actually honest? Does putting it in a cute font make it better?

"TBH I'M NOT"

"Definitely Judging"

"I'm probably angry or offended about something"

Seat Assignment Response

Seat assignment: Assignment: In 22 minutes (process), in class today (context), you will complete a "This I Believe" piece of writing, inspired by Dierdre Sullivan's work The Funeral (content) and post your creative work on your blog (material). 




I believe in the importance and power of laughter. My parents taught me that.

My parents met in the fall of 1993 when my mom auditioned for, and got into, the Garrens Comedy Troupe at BYU. My dad was already a member of the group and was smitten as soon as he saw the light in my mom's countenance. They became close friends, and eventually dated and got married, with this background of creativity and humor. Laughter brought them together and has been a foundational element of our family since then. 

I will flat out tell you that my parents are hilarious. The only "dad jokes" my dad tells are as a character in a sketch or improv scene. At my house, there are always incredibly expressive faces, flawless movie quotes, spot-on or exaggerated impressions, and a plethora of accents and strange voices being thrown around. Watching my little siblings grow up and witnessing the moment they realize they can make you laugh is a thrilling every time. When I was young, my parents began writing down funny things their kids would say in a journal. I have continued the tradition, keeping a record of quotes that brought the house down. We call these our "funnies" and go back and read them aloud often, reliving the light-hearted memories. 

Laughter can create instant connections. It eases tension and makes friends out of strangers. It becomes a shared memory, binding the individuals together. When I'm in a new class and don't know anyone, or I feel the awkwardness in the room as people are unsure of a process, I'll make a comment under my breath to the person next to me, and we now have a shared experience and will stick with each other for the rest of the event. 

The amount of inside jokes and shared funny experiences and joyful memories that my parents have are precious to them. I would bet money that there is not a day that goes by without them laughing together. It lifts tension, recenters, strengthens, relieves, and makes life bearable. 

Seeing the laughter and light in my parents' marriage has heavily influenced the future I want for myself. One of the first things I look for in people I want to date, and eventually marry, is someone who makes me laugh. Because laughter is important and powerful. My parents taught me that.