THE SHLEMIEL PROJECT

The Miniorkiestra together with the Drama Centre "Na Poddaszu" at the Toruń Teacher Training College offer an interactive musical story-telling performance for learners of English.  We also invite schools and arts centres in small towns and rural areas to join in a wider project, designed to foster inter-cultural awareness and to encourage learners to express and transmit something of their own regional culture through the medium of English.

INFORMATION FOR SCHOOLS:

If your school would like to take part in the project we will if at all possible visit you beforehand to talk about what kind of participation would best suit you and your pupils, both in relation to the inter-active performance and to the wider project.

The performance
This comprises a story told in simple English by a storyteller (from the Drama Centre Na Poddaszu) with live music (played by the Toruń-based Miniorkiestra).  The performance is based on a tale for children by the Yiddish writer Isaac Bashevis Singer, with traditional Jewish folk songs and dances.  We would like the audience to be participants rather than passive spectators and will invite them to take part in various simple ways, e.g. by calling out responses to yes / no questions, or joining in a simple circle dance.  We will want to consult you about such things as:

• Language. The dramatic style of the narration and the music will help the audience to follow the story even if they do not understand all the words, and this kind of authentic listening can be very beneficial and motivating for learners.  However, we will go through the text with you to see if it should be modified and whether / how some key vocabulary items should be pre-taught in school.
• Audience participation. We will discuss how best to manage this, taking into consideration the venue, the number of pupils involved, their age and language level, and the possibility of a workshop before the performance.  For example, the circle dance may be taught at a workshop beforehand or during the performance, it may be danced by everyone or by just a group, with the rest marking the rhythm.    You will decide what will be best for your pupils, in this and other matters.  The story also includes an account of a visit by some of the characters to your town / village, and we would like the pupils to add something about your locality to the performance (see the project below for details).

The project
Our story is set in the eastern borderlands of Poland, formerly characterised by a rich mix of cultures, languages and religions.  It is a simple story, but provides a starting-point for a cross-curriculum, cross-cultural project and the educational value of the performance will be enhanced if schools would like to work around it, with some degree of preparation and follow-up.  You will yourself decide just how much, or how little, you are able / would like to do, to ensure that the project is a pleasure for all and not a burden.  Perhaps some preparation can be done in art, history, geography, English or music lessons, as appropriate.  Project work could involve many areas of research and creative work, but we suggest a simple start, as follows.

• The world of the story: making a picture map. The story concerns a journey from the town of Chelm in eastern Poland to your town or village.  Pupils can work in small groups on a simple map to show the route from Chelm to your place, as it might have been about 100 years ago.  Each group has a large sheet of paper with a section of the route marked on it.  They decorate this part of the map, each person contributing something, with drawings / symbols representing the landscape, towns, historical monuments etc. on the route, with simple labels in English.  They also find out something about the places on their part of the map and add a few words of information, in Polish if necessary.  The various sections of the map are assembled in order, like a frieze, on the walls of the performance venue, and the storyteller will refer to it in the course of the narration.  This activity could be expanded to include all kinds of written documentation, pictures, etc. but it can also be very simple and the pupils can add imaginary features to the landscape, according to their own fantasy.

• The world of the participants: local cultural input. This story also provides opportunities for pupils to use their own particular skills and present something of their own local culture to the visiting performers.  Your town / village will be a leading topic in the story.  It is described and praised by some characters who have visited it; some simple pictures previously drawn / painted by the pupils can be introduced into the narrative at this point, as souvenirs brought back by the visitors in the story.  Later on the main character dreams that he is there himself and it is his birthday party; for this, pupils could prepare samples of local food, with recipes in English, or make simple paper representations of local artefacts that might be given as presents, or make their own small guidebook, or present a song / dance from their regional tradition, thus entering the enactment themselves.

Whatever you decide to contribute to this inter-active entertainment and project, it should be well within the capabilities of your learners and not require more effort than the teachers are happy to make.  Costs should be kept to a minimum: learners can be wonderfully creative with the simplest of materials, making the most of whatever comes to hand at school or in the home. 

After the event we hope that schools will feel inspired to develop the project further in some way and we shall invite you to contribute to the Shlemiel website.

Please contact us if you are interested.