Virtual Programs

Virtual PUBLIC SPEAKING

This dynamic skill-building workshop demonstrates how to effectively and confidently deliver online in a range of venues. Topics covered include participating in virtual classroom discussions as well as preparing and presenting for Science Forums, National History Day, Poetry Out Loud, and Interviews. The two-phase program begins with either a live stream or prerecorded workshop of targeted exercises that teach various skills like phrasing, pausing, body language, and how to allow listener absorption time. Breakout sessions and a final Q&A allow time to try out exercises and foster a supportive and enjoyable learning environment.

virtual storytelling

These collaborative performances and creative sessions feature traditional stories, songs, movement, and wordplay, along with Personal Stories. The performed stories, told online, act as prompts to activate connections in the audience so they can explore, express, and present their own stories. Each session features exercises that give viewers an opportunity to share and play. The program is also available as a solo performance of “Isis and Osiris”,  “Japanese Wonder Tales”, Norton Juster’s “Alberic the Wise”, and “World Myths and Fables”. Audience participation workshops include “Rachel Carson’s Sense of Wonder”, and Bilingual versions (with Valentina Ortiz) of “Lucia Zenteno”.

virtual creative drama

These online interactive workshops use a blend of live stream, break out groups, Q&A’s, and lively prerecorded mini lessons. Skill-building exercises introduce focus, motivation, setting intention, sharing your voice, personal space, character-building, body language and reading your audience. Select from a range of curriculum based themes that include: Native Americans, Explorers, The Colonies, Immigration, Westward Expansion, 1619 Project, The Civil War, and Untold World Diversity Stories. Fun-filled sessions meet NYS Next Generation Learning Standards and SEL, and can be custom-made to address the topic, values, and student learning styles of your choice.

Nature Ed Online

This multi-arts approach to Environmental Education includes a customized set of resources, including virtual field trips, sketching, journaling, and much more. Participants choose one presentational art form such as writing and a practice like mindfulness and visualization. Teaching Artist, Karen De Mauro, designs and leads a session for your chosen topic. Pre-recorded and live-streamed conversations with professional Writers, Performers, Artists, and Naturalists, inspire and prompt participants to do their own work. Project based Workshops include: “The Writers’ Group”, “Girls on the Run: Get Outside and Get Moving”, “Field Sketching” and “Haiku Pilgrimage”.

FREE VIRTUAL RESOURCES

During the coronavirus pandemic, our lives have been turned upside down. In this new learning environment we miss our friends, teachers, and activities. But we are learning new ways to connect. Technology, despite however far apart we may be, is bringing us closer together than ever before. We can’t take trips anymore, but new movies and documentaries can take us into a brand new world. As we transition to an unprecedented year, now more than ever is it imperative that we learn to communicate and learn effectively. The Acting Center is giving away free guides in virtual speaking and documentary development, with more resources on the way. Click below to access them now!

Virtual Coaching

Each online coaching session addresses how to best present ourselves in public and online. The customized and individualized approach enables students, teachers, business leaders, writers, artists, and performers to meet academic and professional standards by practicing with a professional coach. Skills include: how to interview and be interviewed, methods that generate sound bites, effectively use anecdotes and stories, frame and sequence content, enhance personal style, make artistic statements, deliver the word, and shape engaging introductions. Also suitable for commencement speeches, scientific research presentations, training sessions, and rehearsals.

  All of our programs are aligned with New York State Next Generation Learning Standards and ascribe to the SEL Framework