Next year, Learning Disability Week will take place from the 14th to the 20th of June in the UK, but these differences are felt every day by those affected and stay close to the hearts of many teachers, parents, and other educators. Here at Stage Systems, we supply staging solutions for theatre performances in schools, community centres, churches, and every other place where staging can be used to showcase talent, collaborative work and creativity. This is why we wanted to bring awareness to learning disabilities with a special article regarding the positive impact performing arts can have on children with learning differences.
Kids and teens with learning disabilities can find plenty of benefits from performing, for some a drama program alongside a therapist is more rewarding based on the level of challenges they face, but the benefits are there nonetheless. Between gaining spatial and social awareness, there are also communication skills and creative advantages to be reaped.
Benefits Of Performing Arts For Children With Learning Disabilities
Theatre therapy, as it is often coined, provides countless opportunities to grow. Forming friendships, gaining the confidence to speak in front of a large audience and making your voice heard are just the more obvious ones. So, let’s go over the additional benefits of theatre for children with learning differences.
Teamwork And Communication Strategies
Putting together a play or musical requires team coordination, time commitments and discussion of ideas among peers; all incredibly important details of day-to-day social engagement and development of group skills.
In theatre, children with learning disabilities will be able to practice how to speak in large groups and get their point across whilst conducting respectful dialogue with peers. At the same time, preparing for performance requires a script, allowing the performers to take their turn to speak without worrying about what to say.
Anxiety Management
One of many lifeskills theatre teaches is managing social anxiety by coping with an unknown environment. Theatre makes children engage in new experiences with a brand new set of peers and proves that these can be fun and entertaining as opposed to stressful.
Recognising Emotions and Facial Expressions
For children whose learning differences severely impact their way of emotionally expressing themselves or identifying feelings based on others body language, performing arts is great practice.
Through their play’s script, children will be exposed to the correct facial expression for their character, but also the ones of their peers based on each scene. Playing a role gives a new perspective on how a character will think and act, and expose different methods of resolving challenges, which ultimately teach children other ways of coping with real-world situations.
The chance to also identify emotions whilst discussing behind the scenes will allow kids to learn the appropriate way of expressing emotions outwardly.
Social Skills On and Off Stage
Acting involves practising social skills during rehearsal and whilst performing. Between eye contact, positive body language and facing toward the audience, there are plenty of different skills children with special needs will have to train that will also be useful outside the theatre environment. Though rehearsals may be challenging, the act of speaking clearly and loudly whilst interacting with others will likely become more manageable on stage, as each line will be practised in advance, proving a more manageable challenge for kids with learning disabilities.
Confidence and Self-Expression
Anonymity is often comforting for special needs kids, especially those who have endured any form of bullying. By taking anonymity away and being placed on centre stage (literally) children are encouraged to self-express and to find inner strength. This will help them to find a louder voice well beyond what they believed possible and have the safety of knowing they are the leaders, they play their role and, while performing, they will not be interrupted.
Performing arts gives children a chance to showcase their newfound knowledge: they’ve learned their lines, created their costumes, and can now perform their roles in a safe space. As a creative and dynamic learning environment, theatre strengthens life and social skills. The delivery of the performance itself is rewarding: there is a direct result of their hard work and the way they have challenged themselves in a new setting.
Stage Systems provides adjustable staging solutions and extensions appropriate for various types of plays, musicals and dance routines, allowing kids to let their imagination run wild. Our multi-level staging kits are ideal for creating varied performance spaces, feel free to contact us to find out more.
Header image credit: https://unsplash.com/photos/women-dancing-near-mirror-3ckWUnaCxzc
