Pilot Activity Re: The “Artist Within” 3rd Training “YOUR INNER CLOWN, HUMOUR STRATEGIES AND OTHER COMPETENCES” Leipzig, Germany
Reflections on the First Stage Pilot Workshop „THE ART OF CLOWNERY & HUMOR" (Trainers: Evelina, Emil, Tania)
Target group: Adolescents, teachers, pedagogues and school supervisors from “Angel Uzunov Boarding (Reform) School” in Rakitovo, Bulgaria Date: 8-9 November, 2015 (Saturday & Sunday) Location: Angel Uzunov Boarding School, Rakitovo, (Rakitovo Boarding School), Western Rhodopes’ Mountains Region, Bulgaria 1. Introduction As discussed and announced already during the Leipzig training, we have decided to split our pilot activities into two stages after this training. The decision was triggered by the profile of two of the ARM-BG participants: Evelina Spassova and Ivanka (Vanya) Puleva, who are respectively working currently with problems of delinquent teenagers (Evelina) and refugees, asylum seekers and migrants (Vanya). The First Stage: we decided to hold at least two pilot workshops, each consisting of minimum two working days in the Rakitovo Boarding School. We ended-up by facing the need of organizing two different modules of the First stage workshop, each two days long; Our Partner in organizing the First stage workshop was the Association “Re-Act”. Nearly 4000 children and young people in Bulgaria are raised in institutions. Behind this word lies the lack of own home and parental care. One of the most serious
problems faced by the young people leaving these homes for children, deprived of parental care, is the lack of social integration resources. The representatives of Association "Re-Act" have set themselves the objective to help these young people find their place in life as self-dependent people. They run professional training courses and prove to be natural partners in terms of the “Artist Within” project. Our Introduction: The ARM-BG was introduced to the problems of the adolescents, living in the Rakitovo Boarding (Reform) School by Evelina Spassova, who is a “ReAct” member, and for almost three years has been providing art-training to the Boarding school students in Rakitovo. Needs of Target Groups: The ultimate target group of “The Artist Within” training modules is the group of teachers and school supervisors from “Angel Uzunov Boarding School”, as well as their colleagues from other institutionalized homes for children, deprived of parental care, in the Western Rhodopes Mountains Region. However, in order to understand the main burn-out factors these youth helpers encounter, we decided to meet and get to know the adolescents they work with. These are boys who exhibited deviant behaviour in the past, were in detention and were later placed in the Rakitovo reform school. Since their teachers and pedagogues have problems in fulfilling their main task of organizing effective education, while helping these youngsters to find their further way in life and get access to better social integration, the target groups in need of help proved to be actually two. The main reasons of the mentioned Reform schools failure relates to the obsolete institutionalization system and concept, directly resulting in deficiencies of both educational and current pedagogical approaches and programs. One of the main issues is the existing regime and atmosphere of coercion in these schools. We intended to face all these issues, empowered by what we learned in Leipzig and our previous “The Artist Within” trainings. As Learned in Leipzig: - We become aware of our vulnerability, when, through Clowns’- art, we realize the fragility of life, and become able to laugh; - The best part of Clownery that makes people laugh is that you feel the overall, collective chord of complicity and empathy, feel part of something larger, an impulse that reminds you that you are alive and that you are able to experience deep and sincere feelings; Expectations: - First workshop: To transmit to students and teachers how to learn and know about the world around us through the Art of Clownery and Humor; - Second workshop: To help students and teachers gain power through laughter. Our next workshop in the coming months will be devoted to "Transformation of conflict." 2. First Stage Workshop “The Art of Clownery & Humor” (8-9 November) Feedback 2.1.The first stage workshop was composed of two modules. 2.2.The First Module took one working day – November 8, 2015. It was led by Eva (Evelina Spasova) and dedicated to creative candle-works; both Emil and Tania were part of the learning process – all of us were Eva’s students (6 RS students and the two
of us); she introduced us to the history of candles, to the main principles of ecology and to ecological candle-making; Her module was a mélange of ice-breakers, energizers and candle-works; It gave the ARM-BG training-newcomers a perfect chance to get to know better the students; please, see the photo-story, but NB!!! Please, don’t share the photos with anyone and DO NOT PUBLISH them!!! 2.3.Second Module trainers: Emil, Eva, Tania; 2.4.The Second Module was organized on November 9, 2015 for four hours in the afternoon. The day was a sunny one and we chose to do it on the lawn behind the school’s hen house and workshops buildings; 12 students volunteered to join the workshop after the announcement; The Biology teacher Ms. Galya Dimova was also extremely interested to join the workshop and was welcomed by everyone. See the photo-story. 2.5.Exercises: Throwing away bad memories and bad energies of the day; A Bulgarian version of “Whiskey mixer”; ‘Peter plet plete’ - right; ‘Kralitsa Klara’ – left; ‘Chervenotikvenichkovcheta’ – pointing to a person opposite of you; those who laughed ran continuously around the circle; Introductions: introducing the person on your right by something he or she is not; feedback to the introduction; Different Genres of ‘Movie Watching’ scenes: playing the reactions of three fictive characters: The Boss; the Stupid; the Stranger; Trainers’ humor theory feedback comments on main clown characters: an angry clown, a sad clown, a stupid clown, a know-it-all clown, a scared clown, a bored clown, an absentminded clown, etc. Expressing by movement and sound how one feels in the moment; Farewell and talking about the upcoming workshop; 2.6. Reflexions: Mind the context The general effect of the workshop was positive, judging by the feedback. Interesting and bagging for reflection was the background context of the workshop. At the start of the workshop, a private car from Rakitovo drove in the school campus. There was agitation among the boys: they knew those people came to recruit a couple of them for temporary work. One participant went away. We knew already that those “recruitments” were a matter of acute competition among the boys: work and particularly rewarded work is scarce and dependent on chance. The contradiction is all too obvious: these types of schools were created in socialist times for reforming through work that also gave the boys important skills, facilitating a relatively successful social reintegration later on. Unfortunately, the schools themselves were not reformed after 1989 to fit the market economy conditions. All the exercises were previously discussed by the trainers and we agreed on context oriented flexibility about who will lead the particular exercise. We also agreed that we will only test the grounds for introducing the Clown creation process next time. Effects of exercises
Throwing away bad memories was artistically led by Eva. Apart from the fun and relaxation effects it was meant to show the boys that there are other layers to life than those they experience every day in the school; The exercise proved to be an asset for the follow-up training in December; We will add to it by the end a feed-back round of reflections by participants; The “Whiskey mixer” energizer led by Emo, offered fun and started the process of ‘group forming’; The introduction by ‘what you are not’ exercise, led by Eva, had a very good psychological feed-back effect for us, the trainers: almost all of the boys chose some uplifting to higher grounds characteristics that obviously made them reconsider their dreams in a serious manner; the exercise also proved to be an asset for our up-coming later on event; The ‘Movie Watching’ scenes, led by Tania proved to be fun and rewarding in terms of testing the ground for the Clown creation process. We should have been much less cautious in introducing the ‘clown noses’ character building. The students proved opened and most of them a ‘fertile soil’ for starting the clown building process; Definitely an asset for the next workshop; The humor theory feedback comments, led by Tania were much too short due to the above explained dispositions; it proved to be a challenge in this context. However, it’s definitely a promising part of the follow-up program: we will start introducing them by the kinetics of ‘different types of clowns’ walking exercises next time; The ‘expressing by movement and sound’ exercise, successfully led by Emo, proved to be very good – most of the students were very enthusiastic in doing it; it proved to be yet another asset for fulfilling the much more challenging task of the next workshop; The farewell conversation proved promising due to the interest, expressed on behalf of the teachers to organize a specially ‘teachers tailored’ training in the near future. See the photo-story Unfortunately due to her tough BRC refugees’ related schedule and some objective transportation issues, our colleague Ivanka Puleva/ Vanya was unable to join us this time. She will be part of the follow-up training in the coming months.
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Acknowledgements
This project was possible with the financial support from the Erasmus+ program. The methodological resources and inspiration came from the The artist within – Applied eMOTION long-term adult education project (www.theartistwithin.eu). The generosity from the fund and these organisations is much appreciated.