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To prepare material for our performance we researched about mental health and got some statistics and we also interviewed people on mental health to get different opinions on mental health. We asked them 10 questions that were, how did u feel when you woke up this morning? name somethings that make you happy/sad, what is your biggest worry?, is there a moment that changed the way you perceive mental health? what makes you feel safe?  do you feel people understand you? when you close your eyes, what is the first thing that comes into your head?  what would you like to change about yourself? do you think people understand mental health?
But before we did that we practiced interviewing people. In my opinion i think the performance went quite well and everyone did what they were suppose to do and no one forgot their parts. However there was some problems with the lighting being in the wrong place and cutting off people before their cues.
Our performance catered to the target audience because it was funny and people enjoyed which kept the audience engaged and they learnt a bit more about mental health. The response we got back from the audience was all positive and everyone said that they loved it because it was really engaging and was fun to watch, another thing they said was that they didn't realise that they were getting educated on mental health.
For the performance we used a range of different storytelling techniques these were verbatim, physical theatre, flash blacks, thought-tracking and song. I think thought-tracking is a good technique because it lets you see another side of the character and shows how they really feel, verbatim theatre is good to use because it is makes the performance real since it is taking what people have said and not changing anything they said which gives realism and naturalism to the piece. I think strongest aspects in our group was teamwork because it helped us devised scenes quicker another strong aspect our group had was compromise as there was a lot of disagreements but we managed to meet halfway with the ideas that everyone was happy with.
Our group had a lot of big challenges when it came to devising the scenes one being making scenes that didn't work for example, the "watch" scene as we re did the scene 3 times differently, we started off with doing the scene in a police station but the staging wasn't good so we change the staging which made it better and then we got another idea to set the scene in a school but when we went to performance back to the other group  everyone was confused with which one we was doing so we decided to do the police station interrogation, another scene that didn't work was "change about my self" as we all needed to make sharp and quick movements at the same time, the next one we also had trouble with was "what do you see" because we didn't know when to choose a cue for everyone to come on and we changed the order that me, Mungo and Niamh came on stage. We also had trouble with the "food" scene as we had to all try and be in a straight line and try and make the letters look good without it looking messy, we also needed to make sure that we were all spaced out because it didn't make it look like "food". Other than having challenges with the scenes we also struggled with sticking to the topic as a lot of the time we would come up with an idea then develop it so much that it loses the point to the actual piece which happened quite often. The improvements I would make would be to follow a narrative since this is a story telling topic and we didn't tell a story so I think that if we did use somebodies real life story we could have devised something really good. Another improvement i would make is to involve the whole group more as some people took control with the ideas and with the devising. I think another thing is learning to compromise with each other so that everyone else's ideas is heard and can be used to see if they all work.

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In todays lesson we used our final rehearsal time to have a full run through of our performance. The positive part of our rehearsals is that we managed to use our feedback from last lesson when we performed it to the other group to improve our performance. The biggest challenge is having a group member missing because tomorrow we have the performance and not having everyone there is a problem.

Our plan for next lessons rehearsal is to have one final run through for the performance and also to tech the performance so that it is already for the show.

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In todays lesson Mitch, Mungo, Alice and Tom L devised the turn it off dance and then after wards we ran through the watch scene again. The positive aspect of todays lesson is that we made really good progress on turn it off dance. The challenge we had today was to choreograph the turn it off dance because it was hard to find cues and times for people to come in and also to make sure that they were all in sync with each other. Another challenge was that a few people were absent which made it difficult to rehearse.

Our plan for next lesson is to perform back to class and to continue to devise scenes.

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Today we redevised the watch scene back to how we had it before because we all thought that it work better and we forgot that we changed it back for when we performed it back together, my feedback was to project my voice more, and we are all now happy and comfortable. The most positive aspects is that we linked to scenes together for a better transition to make the performance run smooth. The biggest challenge of todays rehearsal was finding a suitable scene for the watch scene.

The plan for next lesson is to work on our new scene and for Alice to bring in her guitar so that we can rehearse her song.

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Todays rehearsal we fully wrote up our script and annotated where lighting and technical elements would be used for the techies. The positive elements of this lesson would be the who were in and everyone helped eachother collectively. We used our time effectively letting each person have a different task to do.
The biggest challenge was filling in everyones scenes who was not here and finding appropriate ques for the techs.

Our plan for next lesson for rehearsals is to fully run through performance and possibly refine aspects of our scenes that need attention.

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In todays rehearsal we continued to devise the watch scene and we decided to scrap the what we had in favour of a more naturalistic scene. We also discussed our lighting for our show.
The positive aspects of todays rehearsal is progressing with watch, as we decided to make it set in school and everyone bullies Corin about his mum having a mental illness. The biggest challenges of todays rehearsal is again focusing and lacking of energy.

Our plan for next rehearsal is to improve on our new stand up scene which is inspired by mock of the week.

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Todays rehearals we used our time to rehearse and record the song and start to devise the dance routine that Mungo, Alice, Mitch and Tom are doing. (turn it off interlude). We also did a run through of all our scenes to make sure they are all polished and look good. We all practiced lines for the new scenes that we have added.

The most positive aspect of todays rehearsal is probably smoothing out all the flaws in 'what do you see?' by rehearsing and shortening the transitions. We also got the song recorded and nearly finished.  Our biggest challenge has become focusing, we all do not focus that well as some people get distrated which takes away time for rehearsing.
Our plan for next lesson to rehearsal is to devise watch, rehearse mine and Toms poem and to rehearse the song.

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In todays rehearsal we spent time devising the watch scene. The most positive aspect was that we had used our time wisely and we continued to go through the scenes we need to go through. one of the challeges we had was with the watch scene, which was we decided to make it as a interagation in a police station with Corin and Mungo. In my opinion it wasnt realistic as usually two people would get interviewed by police separately, so i came up with an idea which was we could split the stage so that we can have Corin one side and Mungo on the otherside so it seems as they were in two different rooms and not the same one.
another challenge we had was people needing to focus more.

Our plan for next rehearsals is to complete the watch scene and make it more smoother.

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In todays rehearsal it well really well as we managed to devise the rest of the scenes, we neatened up a couple of scenes. The positive aspects of todays rehearsal was we devised another scene, we also didn't mess around we got straight to it so we managed to get everything we need to get done finished and everyone was concertrated. We had some challenges in this lessons as we could not do a full run through which is what our plan was from last lesson but we could not do it because Cam was absent.
Our plan for next rehearsal is to devise the "watch" scene and do at least a new scene. plus also performing back to the group and we need to work on timing so I gave an idea for us to time our performance so we know how long it is. Overall i think our rehearals was very productive and we used our time wisely on the scenes.

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In todays rehearsal we used our time to figure out the scene order and we now have 7 out of 9 scenes completed. I think our most positive aspects of this rehearsal was that we completed our Christmas target of where we wanted to be before we break up before Christmas so we didnt need to worry about time so i think that made everyone happy. We still had some challenges during rehearsals which were our scene transitions to make them more smooth.

For our next rehearsal next lesson we plan to rehearse the poem scene more with Tom and I. The poem is from a book that is called 'Beyond bedlam'. And to also finalise everything. Overall our play has been formed and evgerything during rehearsal went well.

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Today our group decided to that some people should go to the LRC to write up all our interviews whilst other people staged and blocked another scene. I think the most positive aspect of todays rehearsal was that we successful completed a scene between and have a rough idea of the run format. i contributed to the staging by improving it as the group was stuck on how to make the staging better with where people should stand. During the lesson we came across a challenge that the blocking team had was invovling charactaristics into the acting.

For next lesson our plans are to run everything through once, we also need to make Cam's scene more comedic and start on fluctuating the emotions more in our scenes for more effect.

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For the warm ups we got Cam to do one of his warm ups which was zip zap boing but a different version where you could throw the ball and everyone jumps until someone catches it, and when some one says tangerine everyone turns around u and carries on until someone says tangerine.
After the warm up we then went back in to our interviews

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For warm ups we did a new game called pitch perfect where the class was divided in to two big groups and we got given a topic e.g. money and we had to pick a song that goes with that topic. Our group was going to chose I need a dollar by Aloe Blacc but then we heard the other group talk about it so we changed it to money, money, money by Abba. After this we then moved on to the verbatim pieces and we got divided in to little groups of 3 and we had to come up with five open questions to ask people and then we went around and asked people around college and recorded their answers. This was to help us practice interview people since both groups are dealing with sensitive topics. After we then went back and listened to the recordings and chose which ones we wanted to use.

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In the lesson we learnt about verbatim theatre which is a documentary but in the style of theatre and it takes interviews from real people. We all got given a monologue from the play Twlight, Los Angeles. My interview was from a woman who was speaking about a Korean person shooting a black person and how out of everyone to defend it, it was a black man. After I first read the monologue I was quiet confused with what it was about and some of the words that was used such as "kilt" but the woman meant "killed", there was also quite a lot of pauses. After reading it over and over I then understood a little more with what it was about and why the woman was so angry and it was because she felt like she had been betrayed by a person from her own community who just cares about money. I found this task quite challenging because I am not as confident as everyone else and doing a monologue scared me a bit.

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In the lesson we started off by watching some peoples verbatim monologue pieces. it was really good with how some people had to same monologue but how differently they had approached it. And how some people like Luke for example made the piece really realistic by doing subtle things and not doing big movements and sometimes not moving at all just sitting in a chair.
After this we got put in to two groups and we had to start creating our own verbatim piece. I got put in a group with Luke, Niamh, Cam, Mungo, Corin, Tom L and Mitch and we all decided on doing Mental Health because it is a serious topic that some people think they know about but they don't know how it effects the people who have it and we all know people who have been effected by Mental Health. After we decided on what we were doing we then went to the library and did some research.

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In the lesson we carried on with the verbatim theatre pieces. I spent a lot of time reading it through and annotating it and writing notes about how they might feel and explanations to make it simpler to understand and some stage directions. I also read it out with Rachel who helped me with how to portray the person, with how she speaks and when to start getting angry in the monologue.

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In the lesson we learnt about sound scaping. And we did warm ups saying "i really want a cup of coffee in a proper copper coffee cup" we then did another warm up where Kelly would point to someone and say one and then say a number from 1-4 for example if we got 4 then you had to do a melody. I then had to bring in a picture of a scene and I choose a sea scene and then we got put in to two groups and make a soundscape. Our group at the beginning did a sound of a boat going out in to the sea and then there was dolphins, and the waves crashing along with the wind and then a submarine and a crab. From this I learnt how effect sounds can be and how the littlest sound effect could make a big impact on the whole scene. After this we then got in to groups and we got to choose instruments and then create a scene. Our group decide to choose a cowbell, maracas and a tambourine, with these instruments we decided to create a Christmas sound scene with santa landing and going down the chimney and then back up. Using instruments made it easier as we could do a lot more as we could use them and our voices a little bit.

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In the lesson we got performed our group pieces. I found it interesting how the other groups did their pieces and how some got the audience involved which makes it more engaging for children to watch.

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In the lesson we learnt about archetypes and different types that's can be found in a story for example, hero, villain, mother, king, fool etc. e then sat don and talked about what we can include for making a children's story and then the purpose for the making the stories, educational or for entertainment. we then got put in to groups and then got giving different purposes, our group got given morals so we decided to go up with "do good and you will be rewarded" and it was two kids who wanted money but they parents said no so they went out to play and was lady who was walking dropped some money and then they had the decision of to keep the money or to find the person and give it back and when they went to return it the lady let them keep the money for being kind. we also added a narrator who spoke using rhymes to keep it interesting.

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In the lesson we played communication games to help us all communicate as a group. the game we played was were someone is out the room and blindfolded and then there is two people who are bad and good, then everyone else is the obstacles and we used chairs and then when they come back in the bad person had to give bad instructions and the good gave good instructions and the blindfolded person had to choose which one to trust and if they touch anyone then the game is over.

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In the lesson we rehearsed our object stories and then performed our object stories and gave feedback. we then moved on to talking about our next unit that we our doing.

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In the lesson we sat down in a circle and talked about different stand up comedians we watch and what they do to make the audience engaged in what they say and the techniques they use to this.
We talked about Michael McIntyre and how when he is on stage he moves around a lot and does some actions as well. he also brings up things that happen to all of us and makes it funny and relatable for everyone. another comedian we talked about Lee Evans and how does a lot of sound effects and acting in his performances while he is telling a story, he also talks about things that happen to all of us that we don't notice.
We then talked about target audience these stories would be for example in Shrek they have loads of innuendos which means its target audience can be children, teenagers and adults.
We then went off in to our groups afterwards and added more to our object stories. in our group we added a scene where it was the after math of Louise telling everyone she's moving away, but Peter had told Doris and Margret that he liked her before.

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In the lesson we continued with the storytelling and people volunteered to go up one by one and pick a topic from a bag and then they had to use whatever it said as a stimulus for example, garden and then they had to speak for one minute, we then gave feedback to them on how they can improve. The most common feedback we all gave was that they spoke to fast. This was a good exercise because it was helping us think on the spot and speak to an audience telling a story and also helps us get a wider vocabulary.

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In the lesson we started off with a shape warm up and we had to walk around the space and then we had to quickly pair up with the person closest to us and become the shape that has been called.

After the warm up we then got put in to groups and show the objects that we have brought in as homework and tell eachother the story behind the object. I was put in a group with Rachel, Ben and Louise. After we had shared the stories we then had to choose the best one and our group chose louises object which was a rubber band and used it as a stimulus. The story we came up with was a group of friends called Peter, Margret and Doris and Peter tells them that he fancies Tracey and help him pluck up the courage to tell her. When he is about to tell her she then tells

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On Tuesday's lesson we learnt about storytelling.
First we did an exercise where we had a toilet roll and then we all had to go around and take off how much we use and then after we have to count how many pieces we have then we had to come up that many facts about us. I had 4 pieces. The whole point of this excerise was to show how we all have different stories and facts.

The next warm up was zip zap boing but it was a different version that was based around eastenders. So we would go around and shout "OI" but if somebody said "get out of my pub" it would then swap and go around the opposite way and another one was if someone said "you aint my mother" you would then say "oh yes i am" and swap places and then if some one said "nice earrings pat" every one will then say "jingle jangle" and everyone moves. This was to make us focus and to get us to think on our feet.

We then split up in to partners and one person was A and then other B and A had to tell B and story and then we all sat in a circle and then B's would tell A's story and then after would say if we left anything out or not. I was in a pair with alice and she told me a story about her going to Disney Land Paris. The reason for this was to get us listening and to tell stories.

After we then got in to 4's and wrote makes a story, our groups came up with the story arc, characters, setting, plot, climax.

We then got in to 8 groups of 2 and then we all got given and object and then we had to make a story about thst object. I was put with ben and our object was a sliver party hat. The story we came up with was the hat was for the Queens jubilee and had a party that was put together by her two grandson's Will's and Harry. They also had lots of celebritys there like Adele, Justin Bieber, Will ferrell etc. This was to help us with telling a story to an audience. My strength was helping to come up with a story and contributing and my weakness was probably my voice with being quiet.

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In todays lesson we did a warm up called space bounce were we all stood in a circle and someone would start in the middle and create a scene and then freeze and then someone else will join them in the middle and create a new scene then after they will freeze again and the person who was first in then leaves and a new person joins. After the warm up we did a game called The Great Game of Power by Augusto Boal were we had to make a chair powerful. We had to use 5 chairs and a table and then put a bottle on the chair that holds the power