Article Do Tell: Giving Feedback to Your Students
How can arts educators provide engaging and useful feedback? Here are seven suggestions to get you started.
Picture this: Two aspiring young actors are sheepishly performing a scene in drama class. As the players nervously attempt to apply their stage skills, the audience strains to hear their whispered lines. Instead of focusing on the words and their meanings, the actors concentrate on not forgetting their lines—and it shows. And while they stumble over the words, they exaggerate the character’s movements and gestures, attempting to produce the emotion and meaning of the moment.
Not a good start toward creating believable characters!
As the scene ends, all eyes turn to you. It’s feedback time and as their drama teacher you think, “Where do I start?”
So maybe this sounds a little overly dramatic, however, it is a scene played out in drama classrooms across the country. Theater teachers regularly face that delicate balance between truthful feedback and respect for a young actor’s feelings. In just a few words, your feedback can either help a young actor’s understanding of their craft or sabotage their confidence toward pursuing an acting career.
Recently, a survey given at Orlando Repertory Theatre, a professional theater for young audiences in Orlando, Florida, asked professional teaching artists to identify meaningful feedback when assessing performances by young actors.
Below, they share the 10 most effective opening line responses to students’ work:
Teachers are charged with mentoring and fostering artistic expression in young people. A constructive approach to feedback serves as a responsible assessment tool to help young actors improve their craft. It also offers encouragement—a motivation we all need in order to succeed.
Writers
Diane Messina
Ern Messina
Editor
Lisa Resnick
Producer
Joanna McKee
Updated
December 6, 2019
How can arts educators provide engaging and useful feedback? Here are seven suggestions to get you started.
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In this 9-12 lesson, students will examine character as a significant element of fictional stories. They will learn methods of characterization, identify supporting details, and critique these methods in works of fiction. Students will apply methods of characterization with a quick write.
In this 9-12 lesson, students will explore different cultures’ supernatural explanations for human existence. They will make comparisons between creation myths then write an original creation myth play script to perform for an audience.
In this 3-5 lesson, students will explore the sport of baseball to design and construct a model baseball field. Students will work collaboratively to examine baseball through art, movement, and sound. They will present their artwork and problem-solving process with the class at the end.Â
In this 6-8 lesson, students will analyze the characteristics of traditional folktales to write an original tale. They will use elements of folktales to develop their story and strengthen work through the writing process.
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