Successful teachers understand that mastery of a given discipline is only part of the equation; they must also impart what they know in ways that motivate and inspire their students to learn as empowered, independent critical-thinkers.<\/p>\n
To that end, pedagogy, the study and application of how knowledge and skills are furnished in an educational context, is a central focus of Cal State Fullerton\u2019s new Single-Subject Credential in Theatre, a one-year program that prepares bachelor of arts graduates in any major to teach theater in K-12 schools. The program\u2019s first cohort began this fall.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m showing future theater teachers how to communicate craft skills and knowledge in a way that helps them pass on essential performance techniques to their own students, rather than directing them to perform through emotional manipulation, which has historically happened throughout the industry,\u201d said Amanda Rose Villarreal, CSUF associate professor of theater and subject area coordinator of theater education, who has written theater-curriculum guides for multiple school districts.<\/p>\n
While the Single-Subject Credential in Theatre accepts bachelor\u2019s graduates in any major, those with a B.A. in theater are especially well-situated to teach in this discipline, since they\u2019ve received training and instruction in a broad range of related subjects such as casting, acting, directing, choreography, costumes and lighting. To be accepted into the program, however, non-theater B.A. grads must pass the CSET Exam for Theatre. One of the California Subject Examinations for Teachers, it tests for knowledge in theater history, acting techniques and skills and \u201cdevising\u201d (the process of developing new works through creative exploration), among many other elements.<\/p>\n
New program cohorts will begin every fall. Along with a variety of theater-related classes, students receive a world of hands-on teaching experience while being supervised by teacher-mentors. And this month only, the program is crowdfunding to send the fall cohort to a national professional conference for theater educators in the spring (fullerton.scalefunder.com\/cfund\/project\/47258).<\/p>\n
Discussing the importance of pedagogy, Villareal noted that, \u201cA theater teacher is a one-person production team. We look beyond lesson planning, instruction and classroom management and ask, How do you build out a program? How do you create a sequence of learning experiences that makes theater accessible for your whole student population? Historically, when there wasn\u2019t training in theater pedagogy, very well-intentioned teachers who didn\u2019t understand how to provide stepping stones for students to become good actors would give parts to those who had the most access to outside training. That creates an inequitable training and learning experience.\u201d<\/p>\n
One particular area of emphasis is consent-based pedagogy. \u201cIt creates space in which the teacher is encouraging students to meet what they\u2019re being asked to do with agency and autonomy,\u201d Villarreal said. \u201cMany theater students aren\u2019t being taught craft or skills. Rather, they\u2019re informed by the media\u2019s impression of what good artists do.\u201d This includes misconceptions about method acting and the notion that those in theater must suffer for their art, he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur program students are learning about how to give precise assessments and direction,\u201d added Villarreal, co-author of \u201cThe Theatre Artist\u2019s Guide to Consent-Based Pedagogy,\u201d slated to be published next month. \u201cWe\u2019re looking at all the craft skills our students learned in their undergraduate education and then digging into how to translate these for students, especially for students who are at different developmental stages.\u201d<\/p>\n
Alyssa Gauss, who earned her bachelor\u2019s degree in theater (with a history minor) at CSUF last spring, has wanted to be a teacher since she was 17. \u201cWhile I loved theatre growing up, I didn\u2019t have the most supportive high school drama teacher. So I want to be the teacher that I wish I\u2019d had in high school.\u201d<\/p>\n
Gauss noted that this fall\u2019s cohort is composed of seven teacher-candidates, those with bachelor\u2019s degrees who lack a teaching credential, along with four or five current teachers seeking to add to their existing credential. Each of the seven has been assigned a different teacher-mentor. \u201cThe day I met my teacher-mentor, he said, \u2018As much as you\u2019ll learn from me, I\u2019ll get to learn from you as a new generation of teachers,\u2019 \u201d Gauss said.<\/p>\n
This open-minded, empowering approach is a cornerstone of the theater credential program. \u201cWhat makes this program so beautiful is that our mentor-teachers are not supposed to make us into mini versions of themselves,\u201d Gauss said. \u201cThey give us insight on what works for them, and we provide them with insight on what we want to use as teachers in our own classrooms one day. It creates this unique collaborative education that the students really respond to.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Successful teachers understand that mastery of a given discipline is only part of the equation; they must also…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":8063,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[163,165,164,2627,7,2628,2306,23,611,77],"class_list":{"0":"post-8062","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-anaheim","8":"tag-anaheim","9":"tag-anaheim-headlines","10":"tag-anaheim-news","11":"tag-cal-state-fullerton","12":"tag-california","13":"tag-fullerton","14":"tag-higher-education","15":"tag-local-news","16":"tag-orange-county","17":"tag-uncategorized"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8062","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8062"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8062\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8063"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8062"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8062"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8062"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}