The dramatic program at East Woods is designed to give students the opportunity to express their individuality and develop responsibility, self-awareness, inter-personal skills and self-confidence. These tools help students to understand themselves and the world around them.
Dramatic presentations combine a wide variety of skills and disciplines at East Woods. Language arts, social studies, technology (lights and audio), music, art and industrial arts all provide elements to a successful production. Students develop skills in memorization and organization and learn how to project their voices.
In the Early Childhood Program, dramatic productions are mainly musical and provide children with another means of experiencing the material they are learning. In the Lower School, drama is introduced through classroom productions, including musicals, plays and poetry readings. Productions are often the result of scripts written by students with increased participation in all areas of creating scenery, costuming, staging, etc. Upper School students study techniques of performance and learn about the origin and styles of theater in their own as well as in other cultures.
During their years at East Woods, students will participate in several major theatrical productions – in Kindergarten, Fifth Grade and every year thereafter in a large Upper School (Sixth – Ninth Grade) play, with every student participating in acting, music production or stage design.