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July 1, 2015
Vol. 57
No. 7

Using Improv to Address Bullying

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      The stage has long been a place where the actors and the audience are free to explore the human condition from a variety of perspectives. When the classroom becomes the stage through improv, students can consider bullying from different points of view as they play the roles of target, bully, and onlooker, says Julie Ganey, a senior member of Wavelength, a professional development company that guides teachers to use improv with their students. She has helped develop a workshop designed to teach the skills that can be used to address the problem in an effective manner.
      Educators who attended Ganey's workshop at the 70th ASCD Annual Conference and Exhibit Show experienced one of the workshop activities, intended to help expand their understanding of what it means to be in a group.
      Ganey told educators to cluster together by considering their footwear. Group members could not exclude anyone, they were told. Instead, they were to redefine the rationale for their grouping in order to bring new members into the fold.
      As participants discovered, there was no "right" or "wrong" way to determine the group to which they belonged. They could have arranged themselves by color, by heel type (flats or pumps), boots or sneakers, and so on.

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