Art teachers enhance basic techniques, boost skills in teaching drama |28 June 2018

Scenes from the workshop yesterday

A group of around 30 art teachers from different schools together with members of the Seychelles Theatre Association have had the opportunity to enhance and  learn new techniques  and boost their skills in teaching drama which they would apply in their classrooms when teaching  their students.

This was during a daylong workshop held yesterday at the ICCS.

An initiative of the Seychelles Theatre Association which has received the support of the Ministry of Education and the National Arts Council (NAC), the training workshop was led by Kurt Lagrenade, a qualified drama instructor working with the local Drama School of the National Conservatoire of Performing Arts (NCPA).

The session was very interactive where the participants had to use their imagination a lot, to improvise in different scenarios and act these out like in real theatre scenes and triggering excitement and bouts of laughter from the group.

A lot of laughter indeed characterised the whole  training session as the teachers performed the different exercises that they were given and each one of them trying to come up with the most imaginative idea.

Crasiane Radegonde, a performing art teacher from Glacis primary school, said: “It is a great opportunity to learn new techniques to get our pupils fully engaged in their art classes. The ice breaking activities are great to get the pupils excited, to get them talking and to thing outside the box”.

For Jonathan Azemia, a fine art teacher from Belonie school, the new techniques will help pupils develop their creativity and help them to improvise.

“Often pupils are quiet and it is difficult to get them to participate fully. These techniques will help them to open up, to interact among themselves and be more interested to develop their artistic skills,” Mr Azemia said.

Angelin Marie, the chairperson of the Theatre Association, said it is important to equip teachers with these skills as we want the new generation who will one day replace us do things in the right way.

“It is important that our youth understand what real drama is. It is important that they learn these aspects of drama so that they know how to treat different issues when doing drama. It is good to make people laugh but drama also has a message, a moral lesson to pass so it is important that people know how to play around these issues to encourage respect and promote good values,” Mr Marie said. 

Mr Marie said the classes for art teachers is the first step to enhance teaching of drama here noting that the association has started talks with the NCPA which has a lot of international contacts to hold more  training courses so that art teachers who want to pursue studies in  teaching drama can obtain an internationally recognised certificate.