Our school is a Title I school and over 50% of our students receive free and reduced lunches. We are a community of cultural diversity. Some of my students will be the first in their family to graduate high school. My students are full of curiosity and hope . They work hard to do their best, even in this age of Distance Learning. They are some of the most humble, honest, and brilliant people I know.
I try to create a healthy learning environment in my physical classroom and in my online classroom...one that inspires my students to be themselves and to know they are safe.
They persevere through any adversity because they want to make a difference for themselves and the world. I am very proud to be their teacher.
My Project
The Performing Arts has had no choice but to change the way we think of performing during this time of Distance Learning. Now, instead of one large, black box stage, we have thirty-six black box squares. And yet, our job is the same: to reach beyond those borders with the message of humanity and compassion that theatre promises. Our core principles of theatre are just as important today as they were before Covid-19 hit, maybe even more so. One of those core principles is the NEED for building community, which theatre does better than any other art form.
"Live" theatre may not look like it used to, but it is still VERY much alive!
One of the ways I am building community in my online classroom is through digital performance. My students do several projects together each month. This allows them to get to know each other better, to collaborate during the creative process and, therefore, to discover together the new demands of digital theatre. They are pioneers!
However, having the proper equipment to do theatre they way we NOW need to do theatre, is essential. Our school computers are slow and the audio and editing elements of them are difficult to navigate. They are unpredictable and often unreliable. Therefore, we need at least one excellent classroom computer that we can count on...one that we can use for a live feed of our work and one that we can use to edit recordings of our work to be able to reach more people and build our community far beyond our online classroom borders.
DonorsChoose is the most trusted classroom funding site for teachers.
As a teacher-founded nonprofit, we're trusted by thousands of teachers and supporters across the country. This classroom request for funding was created by Ms. Phillips and reviewed by the DonorsChoose team.
