Memorandum submitted by The Shysters Theatre Company

 

1. Executive Summary

a) We need to broaden our range of communication methods to ensure effective creativity

b) Creativity is fundamental to way we learn: creativity enables each of us to realise our full potential

c) We learn much more effectively in all settings (and all areas of the curriculum) if we able to realise our potential as people at every stage in our lives

 

2. Who we are

a) The Shysters are an ensemble theatre company of actors with learning disabilities who have been working together since 1997. People with learning disabilities are excluded from mainstream higher education in the performing arts and it has been incumbent on companies like ours to train our actors as well as make theatre with them. As a result of this we have developed working methods that play to the strengths of our actors. We devise our own plays that are 'beyond words', using a wide range of physical and visual theatre techniques in which text is just one element.

 

b) Over the past five years we have worked in a range of special schools, and more recently through Creative Partnerships have developed a three year partnership with one special school - Deedmore School in Coventry. I have spent most of my career as a theatre practitioner working with 'untrained' actors - in a wide variety of community settings. I have witnessed first-hand time and again the capacity that participation in theatre-making processes has to transform people's lives. This has been nowhere more marked than with the Shysters, who are now not only some of the most respected actors with learning disabilities in this country, but are also able to lead full and independent lives.

 

3. Information

a) Our aims as a company for our work with Creative Partnerships are twofold. Firstly we want to understand better, and apply and develop our ways of working within an educational setting. Secondly we want to investigate further the relationship between our theatre-making processes and the way we learn and develop our potential as human beings - how we learn and grow as people.

 

b) What follows is a description of how my understanding of the above has developed since working in Deedmore School. The 'evidence' for this is simply the development of my understanding. I am not arguing for the value of creativity - that for me is taken for granted and will be amply evidenced both by Deedmore School and many others. I am interested here in helping to chart a clearer understanding of creativity so that we can develop this better.

 

c) 'All our futures: Creativity, culture and education', the National Advisory Committee's report, defines the characteristics of creativity as follows:

 

First, they always involve thinking or behaving imaginatively. Second, overall this imaginative activity is purposeful: that is, it is directed to achieving an objective. Third, these processes must generate something original. Fourth, the outcome must be of value in relation to the objective.

 

d) What seems to be missing from this is the concept of communication. Of all the arts perhaps theatre is the most purposely an act of communication, moreover it is by its very nature a social activity. The notion of communication is implicit in this from the beginning: theatre is in its essence one group of people communicating with another group of people. However imaginative, purposeful, original and value within itself a piece of theatre is - it has no value in the end if it doesn't communicate effectively.

 

e) Our society's understanding of communication is that this is something that happens primarily through words. We do however communicate in a variety of other ways: physically, visually, through sound and gesture, facial expression and so on. If we concentrate on words as the primary means of communication then we often deny these other means full validity.

 

f) Each of us can master a range of means of communication, but some of us find some of these easier than others. If we do not validate a broad range of communication techniques (beyond words) then we are potentially restricting our development. What theatre-making, and in particular the kind of theatre-making that I have been involved in, can do is enable each of us to discover ourselves and our means of communication. This in turn better enables us to learn about ourselves, interact with others, be creative and learn in all sorts of settings. This applies to everyone involved - teachers, artists and children.

 

g) I have witnessed the change in the children we have been working within Deedmore School at first hand and the fact that they are learning much better across the whole curriculum, that the teachers involved in the project are themselves becoming much more creative in their approach to teaching, that the whole school is changing its ethos as a result of our working partnership together.

 

h) This brief outline does not do justice to the value of the work and I would be happy to discuss our work further if this would be useful

 

 

4. Recommendations

a) To investigate further and understand better the range of means by which we are able to communicate to each other, and their relationship to creativity and learning.

b) To find effective ways of incorporating these into learning processes

 

July 2007