Final Project

Target Audience- Junior-level college students, taking their first Directing I course. These are students that have had experience with theatrical elements before. They have been in or been a part of several productions. They have also had experience with a class wiki and screencast sessions on Google docs’s presentation application.

Context- This is the first part in a two-part process. The second part of the process will be to direct part of an actual show. In order to do this however, consideration must be given to several issues. These issues are covered in the first part. They are: overall design concept for the show, the setting, sound/lighting and costumes. Most of this work will be done in the technical lab in the Theater Department on-line and on-line from remote areas (as students will be able to access the applications).

Learning Objectives-

Students will put together a design concept for a show.

Students will use a wiki to collaborate on their designs in order to put them together.

Students will use that design concept to develop the set, sound/lighting and costumes for a show.

Students will present their design concepts for their show to the class using the presentation application from Google docs.

Description of Lesson-Students will collaborate with group members, which I have previously assigned to create a wiki. Using their wiki, they will create four pages; each page will be dedicated to a different element. The first page will be the overall design concept. The second will be the setting design. The third page will be the sound/lighting design and the fourth will be the costume design. Each individual page will explain how the individual concept supports the overall design concept. Each individual page will also show (on that page) or have links to examples of other concept designs for that particular element.

The group will then use the Google docs presentation application to present this information to the class. The presentation should include all of the elements with visual examples incorporated.

Artifact- This is the link to a “sample” of what the students would produce. http://docs.google.com/Presentation?docid=dftjfhc5_16s57zgd5&hl=en

Justification- I chose to have students work with wikis to collaborate because they are much more efficient when it comes to group work. This way, students don’t have to physically be together to work on their projects. They can do their part and submit it to each other for editing etc. It affords them as much time as possible to work because even if they only have a few minutes, they can work on it.

I also chose to have the students use the presentation application from Google docs because they can save them and use as examples of their work; for web-folios and things of that nature. It is important that they use the technology that is effective and efficient and I feel that using this application will allow students to put their presentations together quickly. This will also help to ensure that the presentations are relatively alike in the way that they look and students will be able to focus on the content rather than what one group used that another may not have.

On-line Application Review

On-line application reviews

Google Documents:

Within this suite, I decided to use the presentation application. I would definitely recommend it to others because it is very simple to use. For anyone whose used Microsoft’s PowerPoint application, it is similar.

I did wish that there were more templates to choose from, but I think that can be said about most applications that use templates.

I liked the feature that allows you to determine who has access to your information and that access may be revoked if necessary.

FotoFlexer:

I found this application very easy to use; which was exciting. I loved the tutorials for just about every aspect that the application can perform. This is great for those of us that don’t have an extreme amount of time to play with applications.

I liked the fact that the application seemed to work with some many other products; for example being able to edit photos from Flickr etc.

I would definitely recommend this to others for these reasons and because it is great for creating scrapbooks and other things that may be used for classroom and work settings.

Google SItes Resource Page

This is a resource that allows students access to other websites. These websites contain service and safety information; so that students may educate themselves on what is available to them and their communities.

As students find other services and safety information, it is the desire that they will share these with me and that I will be able to add them to our list.

The link to my website is:

http://sites.google.com/site/helpandsafety/

Theater Screencast

Screencast Project

Class- Theater

Lesson- Preparing To Put On a Live Stage Production

Screencast- Elements of a Live Theatrical Production

Description- This screencast will be a narration that gives a brief overview of the elements of a production. Examples of the elements will fade in and out again, as they are introduced. It would give a brief description of the set design, sound/lighting design and costume design elements. It would also have links to examples of these elements. It will walk students through the issues to consider when doing a production. These issues would show as bullets that students will be able to refer back to; as they will stay one the main screen.

This screencast would be the first piece and the groundwork for the larger lesson. In the larger lesson, students will actually “produce” a scene from a show. They will have to show evidence, in their work, that they have considered all of the elements and explain their designs for the production that they do. This is an essential part of the lesson because without these elements, a live production cannot be correctly done; for it is the marriage of these elements with actors and dialogue (although dialogue is not required) that make the show.