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Ann Pizer, R. (2020) Easily learn ujjayi breath to deepen your yoga practice, Verywell Fit. Available at: https://www.verywellfit.com/ocean-breath-ujjayi-pranayama-3566763 (Accessed: 10 May 2023).

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I usually struggle to relax during a monologue, so I found that doing some yoga before the monologue helped me to loosen up and allow the words to flow more naturally than I would normally do. I also noticed that while doing the yoga poses for relaxation, I felt some pain in my back, so I had to adjust the poses to make sure that I didn't feel any discomfort.
During semester one, I struggled to relax and get into the flow of the yoga exercises, which I felt hindered my ability to properly perform my monologue. After week 10, I saw visible improvement in my ability to relax because I had been doing the yoga exercises outside of class while playing some music that normally helps me relax.

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The yoga techniques that we have used over the year have developed my breath control. The technique that has helped with my breathing the most would be lying in semi-supine and allowing the breath to fill my body, making me feel my weight pushing into the floor. This exercise helped me to develop my lung capacity, make my breath more adaptable, and strengthen it.
I found the Ocean's breath helpful as well because it increases my oxygen and calms me down (Ann Pizer, 2020), which helped me to concentrate on my monologues and the natural pauses that are in the monologue.

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Berry, C. and Berry, C. (1974) ‘voice and the actor’, in Voice and the actor. New York: Macmillan, pp. 7–10.

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Through out this year I have learnt accouple of monologues, I have discovered that I struggle with the flow of the speech and I usually take pauses in random places that don't need to be there, I then learn it in that way and tend to get into a loop when performing.
I have now figured where and when is needed to take pauses. The speech that I had the most trouble with pauses would be Egeus' speech from Midsummer's Nights Dream. To help with this monologue I used Sparknotes no fear translation (Sparknotes, No fear translation 2005)  to help me understand what the speech is saying in modern language.

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SparkNotes editor (2005) No fear translation, Sparknotes. Available at: https://www.sparknotes.com/nofear/shakespeare/msnd/act-1-scene-1/ (Accessed: 10 May 2023).

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During the early stages of the semesters we did a lot of exercises that helped with trying the monologue and getting the breathing right.  One of the exercises that I found has helped me to feel the flow of the text would be one from Cicely Berry where you sway like an ocean and get calmer or rougher depending on the iambic pentameter for each line, for example if the heartbeat is higher then the swaying is quicker and more sporadic. This exercise is better in a group because you can feel the flow of both the calm and rough swaying.
Another exercise that helped me a lot was restraining the actor while they tried to perform there monologue (5 CICELY BERRY Acting Exercises 2021)  because it added tension to the scene, made you engage your core more and enforced you to use more breath. I used this when my character was getting really annoyed and frustrated with who he was talking to. After doing this exercise I added what it felt like to be physically restrained and put that into my voice

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5 CICELY BERRY Acting Exercises (2021) YouTube. YouTube. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3IMit6q3cu8 (Accessed: 10 May 2023).

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During semester one I did work with tongue twisters that helped to improve my articulation, although I still struggle with some words and sound, I have noticed an improvement over the first semester especially when it came to the Shakespearean monologues that I did. Another use of this technique was as part of my warm up and daily exercises that I did to help me to loosen my jaw and to make sure that I am pronouncing the words correctly.
Another voice exercise that I did was humming and lip trills first in semi-supine and then while doing a spinal roll up and down this has helped me because it gets one of the main articulators activated and I found that my focus was drawn to it and I noticed it more. Some other ways that it has helped my was because I was working with my breath and body to vary the sounds that I am making, expanding my vocal potential.

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An exercise that I did that I found really helped me was doing body scans because I could find where the tension and stress that was in my body was, the reason that this was useful for me because it made me aware of it and could work to resolve the tension that was there by doing selective yoga and breathing techniques that worked on the certain areas, for example the area that I had the most tension was my lower back so I found selective exercises like Piriformis or cat and cow stretches (Cronkleton & DiGiacinto, 2021). Doing these stretches regularly I found that after awhile when I next did a body scan the tension was decreased compared to what it was like earlier in the year.
I also used body scanning to compare what my breath is like before and after doing some sun salutations which helped me to find my natural breath, after doing this I always felt more tired because I was focusing on my breath control which made me fall in and out of a sleep like state, I used that state to try my monologues differently in ways that I wouldn't normally do to see if any part work well in that way.

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Cronkleton, E. (2021) 7 lower back stretches to reduce pain and build strength, Healthline. Edited by J. DiGiacinto. Available at: https://www.healthline.com/health/lower-back-stretches#piriformis-stretch (Accessed: 19 May 2023).

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A vocal warm-up that I did was diaphragmatic breathing this helped me because I often breathe in through my chest so it is a good way of making a conscious decision to breathe in through my diaphragm to expand my capacity allowing more when it comes to monologues. Another way that this exercise has helped me was because I used it to centre myself before my monologues and scenes. I found that this was useful because I always get in my head before showing work back and often I got to work up and it is a good way to calm down and focus.
Another warm-up that I did was sirens because I know I need to work on my range, doing this warm-up activates the muscles slowly expanding my vocal range. I found this warm-up useful because I can work on this over time and can keep seeing improvements and can increase the range.

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Upon reflecting on the practical assessment I know that I could have done better because I was nervous and it definitely showed in my voice and physically, I know that if I had centred myself before my monologues I would have been able to have more control and I feel like I would have done better. I think that I could have chosen a better monologue that suited me better.  Although the monologue could have been better for me, I still feel like I portrayed the character and scene to the best of my abilities.
If I could redo the assessment what I would have done better is have a better understanding of the play and scene,  be more confident with the lines and finally I would have asked for more feedback during the lessons so that I can know what needed improvements because the assessment was my first time showing my monologue and sonnet.

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The sonnet that I had chosen for my assessed piece was Sonnet 55, I feel like my sonnet was the better of the two pieces that I did because I had done more work on it and I had more time to experiment with different ways that I could perform and I was able to take certain things that worked well in a different way and put them into one piece that all worked together. From the first time performing my sonnet I knew that this would be a fun sonnet to perform because it isn't just about love it has more layers than some of the other sonnets that I was looking at. I used the line "Nor Mars his sword nor war’s quick fire shall burn The living record of your memory" to change the way that I was for the rest of the sonnet.
If I had to redo my sonnet I would have more fun with it and just play with the text more. I would also take more pauses because I feel like I rushed my sonnet because I wanted to get it over and done with, and that showed during my performance. With the pauses, it would have added more emphasis on certain and can allow me to feel the flow more.

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Actors (2015) Kate Firth voice coach. Available at: https://katefirth.co.uk/actors/ (Accessed: 22 May 2023).

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From the workshops that we had with, Kate Firth, one vocal exercise that has helped me would be emphasizing certain words in a line to see how it changes the tone and weight of the line (Actors 2015). This has helped me because it gave me a chance to get out of the loop of doing it the same way and just have fun. Another way that this has helped me was because I could emphasize words in my sonnet that I wouldn't normally do, to have a more impactful line, especially on the change of tension in the middle.
Another exercise that I found helped me was the "wordplay" exercise. What I did during this was I portrayed a small scene with only singular words or sounds, the reason that this helped me was because it helped me to not focus on the line but on the feelings and telling the story. This was particularly good because I often get too wrapped up in what the lines are, and neglect what isn't being said.
I used this exercise to get the emotions behind the texts and further my understanding. Another way that I used this exercise was to see if I could perform the monologue convincingly without any of the text, when I did this with my peer who had no experience with the play they said that could see a storying forming, with further expanding on this I can have the full story.
One more exercise that I did was using an imaginary brick on each thought and emotion. On each unique thought would be a new brick in the wall and you have to retain where the last one was added. I found this useful because it helped me to focus on one thought at a time and remember what the last thought was and how I can merge the last and next ones.

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During the experimenting process of my monologue work, I discovered that if I build up tension I could use that to affect the way my breathing and voice change my character. When the tension needed to be released I physically let go of all the tension to make for a calmer scene. After I had experimented with the tension I could then internalize it more but keep the effect that I had with full tension. I found that doing this was very beneficial to me because I was then able to feel the emotional memory of when I did it full out during my performance, making it easier to get into the scene and embody what the character was feeling.