Indoor Activities: Acting Exercise for Kids
Have your kids put on a play about their day!
Submitted by
Kayla Chong
Kayla Chong
It's another wet weekend and you're trapped inside, waiting for the monsoon to pass. You've already baked one batch of cookies, watched two episodes of SpongeBob and played three games of hide-and-seek. But you've still got 400 chores to do! How can you get the kids to set you free? Get them to put on a play about their day!
- Five completed activities.Even if you've only been up for a little while, you've already brushed your teeth, eaten breakfast and told your kids, "No!" at least three times. Those all count!
- Pen and paper
- The performers:Your theatrical family
- PropsAnything you've used throughout the day. Maybe you can convince your kids to brush their teeth again!
Gather your family and make a list of the five most important things that happened during the day. Anything goes: it can be mundane, like having pancakes for breakfast or watching TV, or amazing, like getting a call from a long-lost friend or winning the lottery. (Hey, you can dream, right?)
Put the events in chronological order, and write them up as little stories with a beginning, middle and end.
Strike a tableau for each event. For example, if you're eating breakfast, have everyone sit around a table, mouths open, as if just about to eat. If you're winning the lottery, have everyone rejoicing (and pretending to quit their jobs).
Start each scene with this pose, then act out the event. No need to write an actual script unless you have a budding Shakespeare dying to do so. Just encourage your kids to improvise, using the event as a jumping off point. This isn't a documentary. Feel free to embellish!
Run the scene a few times, keeping the stuff you like (a witty piece of dialogue) and trashing the stuff you don't (the fight you had about cleaning up).
Once you have the scene down, incorporate props.
Move on to the next event. By now the kids don't need your help, and you can sneak off to do a chore or two. If they beg you to come back, tell them you're doing activities so you can add to the play later. Can they make vacuuming exciting? They better start trying right away!
- Kids got the acting bug? Introduce them to charades to keep their skills sharp. Make up clues of your own or get inspiration from Nick Jr.'s Blues Animal Charades.
Submit!
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