Students will be able to perform tasks in a variety of tech theatre areas by learning about what is required to be a lighting/sound designer/technician, stage manager, and resident publicist. After learning about these fields they will then complete tasks that these technicians would be required to perform for a production.
2014 National Core Arts Theatre Standards:
TH:Cr1.1.HSI
a. Apply basic research to construct ideas about the visual composition of a drama/theatre work. b. Explore the impact of technology on design choices in a drama/theatre work.
TH:Re7.1.HSII
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.
1994 National Standards:
Content Standard #3: Designing and producing by conceptualizing and realizing artistic interpretations for informal or formal productions
Content Standard #7: Analyzing, critiquing, and constructing meanings from informal and formal theatre, film, television, and electronic media productions
Enduring Understandings:
Technical theatre artists play an integral and vital role in making a production successful. Technical theatre artists gain invaluable, lifelong skills by the work that they are required to do.
Essential Questions:
What lifelong skills do we need, and which can we build from a career in technical theatre? How can we use the skills we gain from working in technical theatre in our everyday lives?
Students will know…
How electricity works, how a microphone works, how to run a mic through a sound board, what a mixer does, how to design the light for a scene, how to publicize a production, and what is required to be a successful stage manager.
Students will be able to…
Create a mic plot, create an ad and a newspaper article for the production, create a lighting design, and understand how lighting affects mood.
Assessments:
There will be daily assessments, as well a tech Olympics that will combine and test what students have learned over the entire unit.
Prior Experience:
This is a beginners unit, so students should not have extensive prior experience in these areas.
Learning Objective: Students will demonstrate their ability to complete the necessary preparatory work to designing a production by completing a script breakdown that accounts for all of the necessary design/visual requirements of the show.
Learning Objective: Students will demonstrate their understanding of basic stage management skills and responsibilities by participating in small group/whole class discussions (including a Q&A), and completing a stage management worksheet.
Learning Objective: Students will demonstrate their beginning understanding of theatrical sound by taking notes over a sound demonstration and preparing to take a written and practical sound test.
Learning Objective: Students will demonstrate their mastery of the introductions of how sound works and how to connect a microphone by taking both a written and practical test over theatrical sound.
Learning Objective: Students will demonstrate their practical ability to operate the mics for a production by first completing an actor scene breakdown, and then cueing the mics for the first act of Fiddler on the Roof in a script.
Learning Objective: Students will demonstrate both the ability to practically apply the knowledge they’ve gained thus far, and to also think critically by calling their mic cues during a mock performance, and by participating in small group and class discussions.
Learning Objective: Students will demonstrate their basic comprehension and understanding of lighting/lighting design by taking notes and participating in a discussion.
Learning Objective: Students will demonstrate their ability to think like a lighting designer as they create a lighting design complete with analysis for a scene in The Fiddler on the Roof.
Learning Objective: Students will demonstrate their understanding and ability of how to publicize a show by participating in a discussion, brainstorming, and creating their own publicity for The Fiddler on the Roof.
Learning Objective: Students will demonstrate their competence and mastery of the tech skills they’ve learned throughout this unit (as well as skills they may have gained throughout the year) by competing in groups in a tech Olympics.
*This unit uses Fiddler on the Roof for practical application of the concepts being taught*
