This fun and creative experience can be used to build community through movement and sound.
This can also be considered a dance or music experience as youth experiment with movement, tempo, sound and levels.
Facilitator’s Note: Review an example of this experience here:
The Machine – 2012 Saturday Academy in Drama
Experience
Step 1
- Identify what part of the space you will use for the stage and show youth where this is.
- Ask youth if they have ever seen an assembly line for a machine.
- Say, “Machines have lots of different parts that move and make sounds over and over to make something. Today we’re going to make our own machine. To build our machine, you need to think of a simple, short movement and a simple, short sound that can be repeated over and over.”
- Demonstrate an example by bending your knees and pushing your hands out in front of you while making a “shhhhh” sound. Provide another example by tilting your head to one side and saying “ding!” and then back to the other side, repeating “ding!”
- Share any additional examples you come up with to represent simple movements and sounds.
Step 2
- Ask who would like to start the machine. Once that youth has established their repeated movement and sound, ask if another youth would like to join with their own repeated movement and sound.
- Remind youth to add on to a different section of the same machine and to work together by standing close to the first person.
- Allow youth to join the machine one at a time. Remind youth to add on to the machine by making short sounds so they can still hear other parts.
- Continue building the machine until either all youth have joined, or the machine is too loud.
- Repeat the experience, creating different machines for as long as time allows
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