ok, so i'm teaching a class this year. i said i was gonna take the summer off and chill. travel the country in a pickup truck, stop at various starbuck's and write the big screenplay or dream on the documentary. instead. i'm in a classroom assigning punishment essays to some kids ages 9-13 in my Performing ARTs Academy. they needed it. they deserved it. and i'm the enforcer, i suppose.
this is only happening because they acted up on the visual arts teacher, and that class was right before my performance seminar class, so i had to make a choice: keep pressing through oral interpretation of fabulous speeches and poems, or have a "teaching moment" centered around how to respect adults. from the look on my face, i guess you see i chose the latter.
but the kiddies will be all the better for it. they just don't know it now. i talked to them first. i told them that it takes at least two people to disrupt a class: a sender and a receiver. a talker and a listener. a clown and an audience member who laughs. maybe they got it. i can't complain, though. 3 weeks into a 6 week camp and this is the first time i've had to laydown the hammer. not bad really, when you think about it.
and as for that summer off? maybe i'll do the fall. i've gotten some even better ideas brewing since the camp started, and i'm enjoying these kids. they are talented and funny, and heck, all of us at some point make mistakes, right?
so i gotta get back now. it's time for class to transition, and me to go back out into the world outside of the Academy. i figured i'd blog my time away, since i was robbed of my opportunity to pontificate on performance by some "bad apples."
:-)
