Visitors from the Oasis

Two members from the Oasis Academy in Bristol were visiting the BRIT school this week. They are looking to expand their delivery of performing arts through the school and wanted to have a look at the work and courses that the BRIT school runs. Our visitors spent quite a bit of their visit in the Technical Theatre/technology area of the school because they wanted to see how we integrate technology as a BTEC unit into all our KS4 performing arts strands. Leading Edge team member and head of Technology Chris Lewington was on hand to show them the department and some of the stage design work underway for the theatre departments common ground season.

New Expressions at Oak Lodge

Leading Edge dance and musical theatre specialist Lorraine Woodley has been working with Oak Lodge, a School for deaf students between the ages of 11 and 19. Lorraine says she first got in touch with them when she was asked to manage the BRIT school's Festival Week for Musical Theatre in 2008 and decided she would like the opening song to be ‘signed’.
Lorraine has been working with Oak Lodge teaching them choreography and technique. Lorraine says
" I thought that basic Laban notation symbols would be a good way to interact so I used that to help them learn a few basic skills, particularly how to communicate emotion through travel, signing and symbols".
At Oak Lodge the students have previously only copied people and this method allowed them to express themselves. " I wanted Oak Lodge to understand how important it is to have Dance education because physical expression is important in helping students develop their confidence and self esteem."

Strawberry Pickings Forever

Thursday 16th July saw the culmination of a Leading Edge project in which our year 12 theatre students performed a selection of plays written by year 10 students from Saint Mark's Academy in Merton. The project was initiated by Leading Edge theatre manager Simon Stephens who has worked with the students at St Mark's to help write the plays. The performances to the public took place at the Croydon Warehouse theatre as part of the BRIT theatre departments Strawberry Picking week long residency where plays written and performed by our students are performed. There were four plays from St Mark's students on offer looking at issues such as smoking and bullying. The St Mark's students clearly enjoyed the experience of working with our own students to realise the performance of their plays. Here's an email from Gabi Thomas the St Marks student who wrote Checkerboard, one of the plays performed

"Thank you for picking my script and bringing it to life from page to stage, the actors/actresses where amazing and i still cant believe that mine was picked! It has really inspired me to future to be on stage when im older! Thank you again everyone who directed and performed, i had a really good day
Again Thank You Gabi Thomas"

The plays performed were

BIN FILLING by Florence Stanton
NO SMOKING by Tyler South
CHECKERBOARD by Gabi Thomas
PURSUIT OF DREAMS by Anneka Williams

AWAY WITH THE FAIRIES

The BRIT school entertained children from two of our local schools this week to see our year 10 dance/ technology show "Fazana and the Fairy Garden". Nursery children from Selhurst Early Years centre and Reception children from Broadmead primary school came to see the show that tells the story of a little girl who likes to play with her fairy friends at the bottom of the garden and also dance with her creepy crawly insect friends. The show was a cross curricular project between technology whose year 10 students created the set and costumes and year 10 dance strand students who performed. The nursery children got to have a dance as well at the end and pretend they were a frog and a spider under the guidance of our dance students. As well as entertaining our nearest and smallest neighbours the project also aims to engender the seeds of possibilities in the performing arts at an early age.

JAMMING AT THE PINEAPPLE CLUB

The Pineapple club is a radio project run by Leading Edge radio manager Jon Preston that invites senior members of the local West Indian community to come in and create their own radio show. Following on from their success last year the members of the Pineapple West Indian Luncheon club in Anerly have been in September and Christmas time and now this summer term to lay down their own mix of smooth Caribbean rhythms and interviews. Pineapple members work with some of the BRIT students to create the radio show from both in front and behind the microphone.

LITTLE BIG MENU PROVES A HUGE HIT!

Students from Saint Mary's Junior school have been into the BRIT school to work with Leading Edge radio manager Jon Preston and create their own show "The Little Big Menu". The aim of the project is to encourage an enduring interest in media and radio and develop teamwork amongst the children. The project has been running a number of years now at the school, each year bringing in year 6 students in their last year of Junior school to experience working in the BRIT radio studio.

Radio stars

St Joseph's school have been very happy with the impact of the Radio project on their year 9 & 10 students. Students from Saint Joseph's college in Beaulah Hill South East London have been working on a radio project with our Leading Edge radio manager Jon Preston through out terms 3 and 4 this year. The project has been created with the BRIT school and St Joseph's SENCO team to help engender positive involvement and learning amongst the students involved.

Instant Karma with Yellow Flowers

..

On February 4th and 5th Year 10 students performed in a show about Tibet called Yellow Flowers. The show was a combination of work from year 10 Technology students, year 12 Technical Theatre students and the year 10 Theatre GCSE option students. The show aimed to highlight the continuing plight of the Tibetan people under Chinese occupation since the 1950's and subject to continuing imprisonment, torture and human rights abuses. The show included the screening of an interview with Tibetan dissident and singer Soname Yangcheng shot by the schools Film and digital arts team led by Ken McGill. The theme of the show was an adaptation of Tibetan folk tales by Theatre teachers Stuart Warden and Andrew Midgley. The set and costumes were designed and made by Year 10 Technology students as part of their Technical theatre studies for their BTEC Performing arts qualifications. The year 12 Technical Theatre students erected the set and provided lighting, sound and technical experience. It was an example of a typical project that the school has become very adept at where a number of different strands and years come to together to create a project on a cross curricular basis.