Chinese Dragons

In this workshop we celebrated Chinese New Year by making some fierce dragon masks. I began by handing out some photocopies of a dragon mask and some metallic markers. Everyone had to colour in two masks. The students spent lots of time on these. Once they had finished, I asked the carers to cut the eyes and nose out of one of the masks. I showed them how to make little zig-zags from scraps of paper which we glued onto the backs of the eyes and noses. These were then glued onto the other mask to make a goggly 3D effect. The mask was then glued onto a paper plate for strength. I gave out some strips of red and orange tissue so that students could make some flames to come out of the dragon's mouth and finally we made a spiky fringe from scraps of painted paper.

Five Minute Theatre

Yesterday was a big day for my drama group at Vale of  Leven Academy in West Dunbartonshire. They performed and recorded their five minute play 'Squirrels vs the Moon' about a group of squirrels building a rocket in order to reach the 'glorious white nut in the sky'. (The play was written by the young people - there's no way I could come up with an idea as crazy as that!)
It will be shown as part of 24 hours of non-stop theatre from the 21st to 22nd of June 2011 on the National Theatre of Scotland website: http://fiveminutetheatre.com/
We will be on sometime between 2 & 3pm on the 22nd.