Dance students from Stratford-upon-Avon College took their final dance show on the road recently to perform their end of year show: Taunted.
Students on the Level 3 Dance course prepared a performance followed by a workshop centred on bullying, which after they performed at the college, toured to Solihull College & University Centre and Alcester Academy amongst other events taking place later in the year.
When creating their work, the dancers decided to look at different perspectives such as ‘being bullied’ and ‘being the bully’, and also at the differing relationship’s people have on and offline. Together they also created a finale piece based on ‘what if’, to demonstrate how harmful bullying could be to someone’s mental state and even their life.
Check out some photos from the show!
Alongside the 40-minute dance show, they also created a 40-minute workshop where they taught a section of choreography from the performance and led a drama exercise to explore different types of bullying, including toxic relationships, cyber bullying, physical bullying and emotional manipulation, allowing opportunities for discussion.
The students from Alcester Academy learnt some choreography from the show and explored types of bullying in a drama exercises
The students were extremely excited to present the show and workshop. Student Saphire Fennymore commented: “It is great to have the chance to perform in external venues and develop our skills in performance as well as leading workshops. It gives us the chance to learn what it’s like to perform and tour in industry.”
Jess Perrin added: “It is an important subject too. Bullying awareness is something everyone needs to know about and a subject everyone can relate to.”
The twelve dance students were supported by Backstage Production Arts students Ollie Hayward (lights) and JJ Lines (sound) who also benefited from the learning experience, with Ollie saying: “It’s great to get touring experience and learn how to work in unfamiliar locations.”
Students from Alcester Academy really enjoyed the experience with one commenting: “I really liked how it conveyed a message about how it’s ok to be different and made me more aware of bullying!” and another adding: “I liked how the lighting reflected different emotions and the dancers were so good!”
Alcester Academy Performing Arts teacher, Sabrina Sacco, detailed why the visit was beneficial for the Y9 and Y10 students: “This showed our students different pathways post 16 as well as giving them ideas for their current project work.”
Dance lecturer Samantha Franks described why the students focused on the topic: “The subject of bullying was chosen so that both the students taking part, and their audiences could recognise how prevalent in society bullying is. We wanted to explore the different forms of bullying and the effect this can have on people physically and mentally, and how we could create a dance performance piece that could raise awareness, educate, and even prevent certain types of situations. We felt a tour around various educational establishments would be a great way to bring this topic to the surface, so that other students could recognise how words and actions of their own, or of others, could be so damaging and detrimental.”
She continued to detail how the students handled the project: “The students dealt very well with such a sensitive topic and were mature in their approach in developing and creating the final product.”
