The Second Time Around

To close out 2016, we headed back to SOAS University of London for a second run of our introduction workshop and it's safe to say it was a great success!

Unfortunately, Olivia couldn't join us for this workshop, so we had our good friend Rebecca Hayes Laughton co-facilitate. Our other friend, Lauren Nathan-Lane (co-artistic director of the company Unblurred Lines) was our photographer, and we are so grateful to both Rebecca and Lauren for helping Art Lingual make it's second workshop a successful and informative.

We started out the session with many fun and interactive games, and participants went from impersonating penguins in the arctic, to telling stories about home through only sounds and gestures. For the second half of the session, we went around the circle and tried to list as many vulnerable groups as we could. We then chose scenarios of vulnerable groups and each pair of participants was asked to come up with a scaffolded workshop in order to work with these groups.

Here is a photo of one of the workshops a pair created (we think this has the makings of a fantastic workshop! And who would have thought to use the 'story of your name' activity as an end game?):

To close out our workshop, we had a hand checkout. This is where we asked each participant to write on each finger something they found: new, old, enjoyable, challenging, and exciting.

The results were great and we got some amazing qualitative feedback. Here is a sample of a participant's feedback:

After all the work we've put into creating this workshops, we are so proud of the work the participants have created in just under 2 hours. We hope to come back to SOAS in the new year and launch our new facilitator training scheme. Next up, a workshop on Legislative Theatre!

Until next year, we are signing off for the holidays, so have a safe and wonderful holiday season. Here's to 2017, may it be even bigger and better than before.

​- Sierra