每年, under the guidance of 上学校 Visual Arts and Performing Arts Teacher Sara Sturdevant (and with faculty and staff support from all divisions), Ellis’ fifth grade class engages in an eight-week experience during which they develop a storyline and write an original script, then figure out how to take it to the stage. 

"The reason the fifth grade does this project is that they’re at this fabulous age where they don’t realize they 可以’t 这样做,” Ms. Sturdevant says. "There’s always a moment where someone says, 'this is hard’ or 'we 可以’t do this,’我说, '你’re going to be fine, 你 可以 这样做.’ Or, they have a realization of what goes into making this happen. It’s about them finding that they have to come together to make this happen.”

Ms. Sturdevant has been coordinating the fifth grade play since 2005, when former Head of School Mary Grant asked her to develop a playwriting exercise rooted in the curriculum.

This year’s play tied into the fifth grade humanities curriculum by focusing on female leadership in Egyptian history. The class also incorporated their enthusiasm for this year’s World Cup as a setting for their show. 这出戏, The Curious Case of the Captured Cup, was about four Ellis students who win a mysterious trip to the World Cup finals in Doha, but their trip is endangered by a shadowy villain. 在一起, the Ellisians must use courage, 勇敢, and knowledge gained from their history projects to make it to the game and stop the evil plan.

Ms. Sturdevant says the grade 5 play always includes a connection to Ellis, that there’s usually a beloved teacher who makes an appearance as a character (this year it was Ms. Sidari, played by Autumn Mohring), and that the rest depends on the curriculum. 在过去, plays have considered what would happen if we didn’t have math for the day, or have starred Greek gods and goddesses because that’s what students were studying at the time.

The fifth graders begin the eight-week, play-creation process by talking about current events and what they’re enjoying learning in their classes. Then they think about how they 可以 capture both in an original story. They use improvisational exercises to help develop dialogue, and they learn how to break a complex project into manageable components. In addition to writing the play, the students handle stage management, learn to run light and sound boards, design and build the set, and create digital effects, 服装, 和道具. They even handle their own event promotion, which this year included a video introducing the cast and crew.

Ms. Sturdevant says the process is more important than the product for this experience—although the product is often clever and hilarious—and that theater is a great way to teach process because there’s an end game and 你 have to make it work.

"Everyone relies on everyone else, and 你 don’t always get what 你 want. Students learn perseverance, and they learn how to just simply 这样做 and not wait until it’s perfect,她说。. "Rehearsal is a really, really important skill, because it reminds 你 that 你 have to work at things to make them great. And what do we learn in this context? You learn that 你 可以 solve the problem, that 你 are brave, and that helping 你r friends is a really good idea.”