Lesson brochure Friends in the Library (6-8 years old)

plan d-/andreas denk

Dear teacher,You class will soon be coming to see the dance performance Friends in the library. In order to pre-pare the children for this performance we have put together this lesson brochure.It consists of short assignments which can be used in the classroom or in the gym with information about the performance, classroom assignments and questions referring back to the performance afterwards.

We hope you enjoy the performance.

Sincerely,

Andreas Denk and Jordi Casanovas

Friends in the library

Getting lost in a story. Day dreaming away while reading a book. Who hasn’t experienced this? We all enjoy books and their power of attraction. Books for the kitchen, art books, in-formative books, books to forget. [The Book ball and Books week.] Books are everywhere. In the childrens’ bedroom, at school at the hairdressers and in the bookcase. Two men, thousands of books and innumerable stories accompany the friends in their special visit to the library. Friends in the library, a poetic journey of dance through space and time.

The two friends sit next to each other in the library. One is is busy playing games on his computer the other is watching films on his iPad. Surrounded by meters of high cases full with books, the two friends lose themselves in the digital world. But all of a sudden it all goes dark – the computers don’t work anymore. What now? The friends try to find electricity. All of a sudden they realize they are surrounded by so many books. They become curious – what is in all these books? And how do they get to the top plank? It is time for an exciting expedition through the library! The friends climb in the bookcases, they slide down and just manage to keep the cases from falling over. They open several books and lose themselves in fantastic stories and bring wonderful pictures to life. They read, look, listen and dance between the books. The library becomes a fun place of chaos.

In this musical and dance performance the friends celebrate the book, the stories and the power of imagination. Of course much goes wrong in the friends world but they know how to make things work again in their own inimitable way.

Choreographer, dancer and set designer Andreas Denk makes attractive dance theater for a broad public: for children, young people and adults. Andreas Denk has been creating performances with his own foundation Plan-d since 2008. Before that he was for many years one of the artistic lead-ers of the successful Hans Hof Ensemble. Plan-d has taken part in many enterprising festivals and has won several theatre prizes.

Assignment 1: Dance your nameTime: 7 minutesSet up: Gym – moving in groups of 5Assignment: Write your name in the air as big as you can. Begin at one end of the gym and end at the other end. Write your name with: your finger, your nose, your elbow etc. You can write your name with joined letters, or individual letters, slovenly or precise, thick letters, capitals or small let-ters

Assignment 2: Passing booksTime: 7 minutesSet up: Gym in a large circleAssignment Pass a pretend book through the circle. The book can be enormous, very heavy, very very small, very precious, a book in braille, or a dusty book.

Assignment: 3 A bookworm Time: 5 minutes Set up: Gym - free movement

Assignment: What is a bookworm? Is it someone who really likes to read? Or a worm who eats sheets of paper from a book instead of green leaves? How does a bookworm move? Move through the gym, if you see another bookworm make sure that you can creep either under or above each other.

Assignment 4: Books moving across the gymTime: 5 minutesMaterial: 5 booksSet up: gym in groups of five childrenAssignment: The half of the group stand at one end of the gym the other half at the other end. Start at one end: five children cross over and try to move a book, without using their hands. (pushing the books over the floor, stick the books between their knees, balancing the on their heads, or under their armpits or putting them in their capu-chon etc.) At the other end they pass their book on to the next group. N.B. this is not about being the fastest; who thinks up the most extraordinary way of moving the book through the gym?

Assignment 5: Making letters Time 10 minutesMaterial: see attachment 1Set up: Gym - children in groups of 2 or 3Assignment: Print the last sheet of this lesson brochure. Each duo or trio chooses a letter and tries to portray it. Can the class make a word?

Assignment 6: Domino booksTime: 20 minutesMaterial: booksSet up: Classroom - school libraryAssignment: Put all the books in one long row on the floor and push the first book forward. Can je make a curve under teh table? What happens if you push the first and last book?Extra option: Domino people: stand in a circle and repeat the movement of the teacher one by one (arms up, crouch, jump, turn round, clap hands etc.)

Assignment 7: Sticking wordsTime: 20 minutesMaterial: old magazines/folders, scissors, glue, A4Set up: classroom own table

Assignment: Each child get a magazine/folder where they can cut out individual words. The words cut out make up new sentences. Stick the sentences on to a page of A4 and read out loud the new poem to the class. Perhaps you can make a nice illustration to go with your poem.

Assignment 8: Making book coversTime: 15 minutes

Material: drawing paper pencils and felt tip pensSet up: classroom - own tableAssignment: Every book had a front cover. Make a new front cover for your book. NB: on the cover you always find the writer’s name, the title and the name of the illustrator!

Assignment 9: ConclusionTime: 15 minutesMaterial: Writing paper and penSet up: Classroom - own tableAssignment: A book always has a beginning, a middle and an end. The end is also called the con-clusion. Write a different conclusion (ending) for the book you last read.

Assignment 10 making letters Time: 20 minutesMaterial: colored paper, scissors and glueAssignment: Cut out the first letter of you name out of a A4. Glue this on to another sheet of paper. Which animal has the same first letter? Can you r glue this animal from your letter?

Assignment 11: ReflectionA: In the performance you saw two friends in the library. The electricity stopped working. The friends went to find a way of repairing it. What did they find on their way.? What sort of dance did you see, what is the name given to this sort of dancing? Can you say something about the set/decor?B: The friends are very good at finding solutions to problems. Cn you find a solution to the following problem?How do you make a book plank without using nails? (eg. place 2 chairs opposite each other with 2 brooms between on which the books can stand.)Magazine is torn: all sorts of loose sheets. What can you do with this? (eg. fold a sheet into an airplane, throw a screwed up piece of paper, use as a place mat, make a hat)There is a piece of text missing: “When the friends…Can the class complete the story? Every child only says one word at a time. (“When the friends...came...from...the… bathroom...they...were...hungry…)C: What did you see in the performance that was nice, funny, scary, dangerous, mad, pathetic? Who can do something themselves like that which they saw? Who had thaought of the best en/ conclusion? Can you reenact this with the class?

Assignment 10: Review

Write a review about the performance of Friends in the Library. That is a short text in which tell what you thought of the performance. Send your review to: info@plan-d.nl The friends are very curious about what you thought of the performance.

Finally:Thank you for coming to see Friends in the library. We like to see you again in the theatre or at your school once again. Do you want to know more about the activities of Plan-d? Just click on the thumb on our Facebook page:https://www.facebook.com/PlanDAndreasDenk/?fref=ts