New country, new culture and the same old lack
of knowledge on how and why to teach theatre in school.
In Brazil, not only once or twice, but several
times I had to affirm myself in front of my working colleagues (the other
teachers) in order to validate my right and my knowledge of teaching theatre.
In a country where Art is totally
underestimated and underappreciated it was easy to understand why you need to
fight for Art itself, and even more for teaching it. I had to struggle a lot
with the students, to show them the value of Art. I had to fight coordinators
and other teacher colleagues, when one of them told me that for me it was easy
to have the students under control in the classroom because I was there as a mere
entertainment piece, like in a circus. Or when another colleague actually told
me that I was teaching circus, so that’s why the students loved my class. Like
it was an offense to me calling my class “circus”, I just love the Circus so
much, especially the clowns. So much that I found me a way to make myself one
of them, took the classes, made courses and woke up my inner-clown. But this is
another story.
My point is, when you are not appreciated not
even for those who were supposed to be the open minded ones and the modelers of
citizens, it’s a very hard and lonely fight for being respected.
Art teachers should not have to fight for
respect. We are teachers for God’s sake! We went to the university, and studied
a lot, just like any other teacher. We had to present our monograph, like
anyone else. We had to spend hours studying, preparing ourselves for the exams,
like anyone else. So why on Earth we don’t deserve respect?
In my case, I did postgraduate studies in
Theatre, my area of expertise. I travelled to see what the books were talking
about because I wanted to see with my own eyes, so I could speak with authority
about the subject I was teaching.
And to be honest, I learned so much more from
my trips then from the books. Please, understand me here, I love books and I
think books are awesome. But somehow they are limited and I needed more, so I
went to learn by observing the art pieces. Speaking about Shakespeare, so I
went to see Shakespeare’s theatre, and watch a play in the old and good British
Shakespearian English, in the good-cold-dark-wet-beautiful London. All of this
because I love Art and Theatre, but also because I wanted my students to love
Art as well. If it was too much to ask, so that they could – at least – respect
Art like some of my colleagues couldn’t.
So, there I was. Armed with all my arsenal of
passion for the subject and the knowledge acquired over the years, having to
convince this school’s principal that you cannot expect an actor to teach
theatre for regular students in a regular school. For the obvious reasons:
first of all, the majority of the students don’t want to be actors. Second of
all, is that an actor knows how to act, and not necessarily knows how to teach
art, especially for this kind of audience. They say that, one who cannot make,
teaches. I partially agree with that, probably why I became an art teacher
instead of an actress or an artist of any kind. But the thing is, it is
different! Period.
You must know all the pedagogy behind Art AND
Theatre so you can put yourself in a situations of teaching Art and Theatre for
regular students. Teenagers. Everyone who deals with them knows what I am
talking about. They are not easy. They are so cute when they are alone, but
when they are in flocks they can be terrifying. And they will challenge the
hell out of every teacher’s soul. So you have to be prepared!
Teaching theatre for regular school is such an
amazing challenge. Because you have to gain the students first, show them that
they can do it! Show them that “talent” is just a word created by stupid people
to prevent normal people to succeed in a
matter where talented people have been the kings and queens for ages. It’s a
huge fight, but totally worthy it.
PS: talent is something that one have when
something is so easy for him or her to do. It doesn’t mean that you cannot
learn talent. If you work hard, you can be a talented person.
If you don’t have the pedagogical eye, you will
hurt students, probably traumatize them, scare them, and make them block
themselves from it. And when I say that I say it with authority, because I saw
this happens with my own eyes, and again, not just once or twice.
I have been turned down as a theatre teacher. This
school I used to work just found an “actor” – yeah, with the quotation marks
and everything – so they thought that guy was more prepared, more “talented”
then me, so he got the job. And for my pleasure – which I still think I’m
totally going to hell because of this little moment of pleasure – that
“talented actor” just disappeared with all the students’ money for this big
musical they were making. So the presentation day came, and the guy – who was
supposed to have all the costumes and scenarios for the musical – didn’t come.
So, guess whom they asked for help to save the situation. Yeah, me! The “untalented”
theatre teacher, who had been neglected all along.
And since I know how to teach theatre, since I
know how the pedagogy works in this area, and since I knew all the students and
had this connection with them, we did it! We did the musical, without scenario,
without costumes, just using the old and good acting making-believe. And it was
awesome!
In another occasion I have been turned down
again, for the same school – after all this incident!!! - because they found a “theater director” this
time. So, again, this guy was more “qualified” then me because he was a
director.
Again, you need to know the pedagogy behind the
subject, and you have to know the minimum psychology to deal with students.
Every teacher, especially when you are young, faced this platonic love on the
part of the students. It is normal. If you are not that old that you cannot
remember, you yourself had a crush on one of your teachers. It is completely
normal. I had a crush on at least 3 of my teachers along my years in the
school.
Teachers know that, because we are prepared for
that when we are being formed teachers at the university. We study a little of
psychology, so we know. And we know how to deal with this.
But this guy was just a director. He knew about
directing, but he didn’t know shit about teaching easily impressionable 14
years old girls.
So guess what happened?
Exactly! The guy had a bizarre, disgusting,
pedophile relationship with one of the girls.
But this time I didn’t have any pleasure on
knowing this, so I made a decision: I quit. I could no longer work in a place
that never takes a firm stance and also never appreciated me as a professional.
But now I am in Denmark. In the fairy tale
kingdom, living my own fairy tale.
Once I’m in this so old and serious country,
where people value education and all this fairy tales, I seriously thought that
things were going to be different.
But I am going to say something now without ANY
knowledge of the situation, because I still don’t know how the educational system
works here. But apparently a Math teacher can teaches Art in regular school. I
know this woman, who is also an Art and Theatre teacher, and she teaches physical education!
So yes, I have the impression that you don’t
need to be an expert in some subjects to teach them here. Maybe because you
don’t need to have an university degree to be a teacher. Here you go to
something they call seminarium, so you can teach for elementary school. I think
you only need a Bachelor Degree for teaching in what here would be high school.
But again, that is what I’ve been told. I didn’t do any research on the
subject. This article is more like an outburst after being turned down again as
a theatre teacher – now in foreign territory.
That being said, I was very disappointed when I
applied for a position as a theatre teacher in one of the “Efterskole” they
have here. Efterskole or after school it’s a place where students go for 1 year
usually, between the 8th and the 10th grade, in order to
find out more about themselves and have some extra experience before they go to
Upper secondary education.
So there they have many different classes, in such
cases they can have a class to learn how to decorate cakes, or how to make a
project, how to cook, to sew etc.
So I went there and asked about theatre, because you
know. And I was very surprised when the principal told me that they were not
interested, even though they have this week when they perform a musical. She
told me that they tried in the past, but it was so horrible the performance the
students presented that they gave up on theatre.
I wonder why the performance was terrible. And I can
think of many reasons, but I am going to wonder here only these:
- - Was
some math teacher that was teaching theatre to the students?
-
- Were they only students, teenagers that not necessarily want to have a formation as
actors and dancers?
-
- - Were
the expectations on the poor students too high?
A theatre teacher would have the right tools to
work with those students and prepare them to make a good job and a nice
presentation.
A theatre teacher would have the right
arguments to lower the expectations of the school and the parents.
A theatre teacher would have the right
motivational words to use with the students, so they would feel that they can
do theatre.
And last but not least, a theatre teacher would
know how to do the goddamn job.
Upper secondary education
covers 2 to 5 years of education. There are 3 choices for 16-19 year-olds
covered by the umbrella term youth education programmes (ungdomsuddannelser):
General Upper
Secondary School.
Technical and
Commercial Upper Secondary School.
Vocational Education
and Training.
Youth education
programmes provide the student with various levels of vocational training as
well as educational and personal qualifications. There are 4 different types of
upper secondary education programmes in Denmark:
1. STX - gymnasium.
2. HHX - higher
commercial examination programme.
3. HTX - higher
technical examination programme.
4. HF - higher
preparatory examination.
Quando eu estava iniciando na escola, lá na longínqua 2a. série, o primeiro verbo que aprendi a conjugar foi o verbo "amar". /GettyImages-482187025-56ddcd2b5f9b5854a9f61f87.jpg)
You must know all the pedagogy behind Art AND
Theatre so you can put yourself in a situations of teaching Art and Theatre for
regular students. Teenagers. Everyone who deals with them knows what I am
talking about. They are not easy. They are so cute when they are alone, but
when they are in flocks they can be terrifying. And they will challenge the
hell out of every teacher’s soul. So you have to be prepared!
