1. Using Applied Theatre
to Change School Culture:
An Impact Evaluation of ETFO’s Poverty and
Education Project 2007-2009
Professor Kathleen Gallagher
OISE - University of Toronto
Luisa Sotomayor, Research Officer
Centre for Urban Schooling
Ivan Service, Graduate Assistant
OISE - University of Toronto
3. The Ontario Context
One in six children - approximately 478, 480 - live in poverty.
132,000 children rely on a food bank each month.
Two in every five children living in low-income families have a
parent working full-time, year round.
Women and youth account for 83% of Canada’s minimum wage
workers.
The majority- 54.6%- of children living in low-income, single-
parent families live with their mother.
47% of children in new immigrant families and 32% of children
in racialized families are considered poor, an increase of 60%
over the last 20 years.
70% of Ontario’s Aboriginal population lives off-reserve. One-
third of off-reserve Aboriginal children live in poverty.
4. ETFO Poverty and Education Project
ETFO’s Goal:
Help elementary schools understand and cope with child and
family poverty.
Each school received:
Performance of the play
Afternoon workshops with the
actors
Class scripts for school
ETFO’s community resource
poster
DVD: “One in Six”
Professional development Actors facilitating a workshop with
$10,000 in funding students (Fall 2007)
20 release days
5. Research Goals: Year 1 & 2
Year 1:
To understand agency within constraint
To examine the role played by theatre to affect change in
relationships, initiate dialogue, and deepen understanding of
social issues To understand sustainability of the project for
schools different levels of funding, support, and length of
involvement
Year 2:
To understand sustainability of the project for schools with
different levels of funding, support, and length of
involvement
(Research funded by ETFO)
7. Discovering Danny: Challenging
Assumptions, Seeing Context
“…the other day [a student] said something about
moving. ‘Oh that’s like my mom, she doesn’t like to stay
in one place. We just usually stay there for a month at a
time…’ We went on a bus trip and so we had gone by
one of his old houses. And he was referring to some of
the different places that he’s lived and he said, ‘My
mom doesn’t like to stay any longer than a month at a
place.’ So I thought, that’s Danny, really.”
8. Method for Impact Assessment
Year 1: Mixed Methods Design (n = 8)
Phase A: 3 pre-play focus groups with teachers
Phase B: Online survey
Phase C: 8 focus groups and 8 interviews followed
by coding and analysis
Year 2: Case Study Approach (n = 3)
Phase A: 3 focus groups with all schools
Phase B: 2 focus groups with 2 supported schools
followed by coding and analysis
9. School-Based Initiatives Year 1 & 2:
Initiatives Aimed to Address:
1. Physical Needs: Kitchens, laundry rooms, clothing,
nutritional and hygiene programs.
2. Intrinsic Needs: Counselor.
3. Pedagogical: Focus on character Ed, literacy
resources, media, arts programs, Danny themes
embedded in curriculum, trips.
4. Social/Cultural: Parent and community outreach,
visits to the museum, performances.
5. Mix of Various Strategies
10. School-Based Initiatives Year 1 & 2:
“And that’s a big part of what we want to do
this year is the whole student engagement
piece and getting them involved in things
that they may not have a chance to at home
because our kids don’t have the money to
join sports teams and go to dance classes
and things like that.”
11. Applied Theatre: Changing
School Culture
“There is now a greater amount of patience for
the students on the part of some teachers as a
result of the play...The sentiment was that the play
inspired one to remember why one wanted to
teach in first place, something that can get lost in
the daily grind of school life.”
12. Survey: Impact of Drama
Question SA SWA U SWD SD
The play was a high quality artistic 74 9 0 0 0
experience.
The production was engaging for my 75 8 0 0 0
students.
The topics addressed in the play 0 4 2 16 64
were too sensitive for a discussion.
The messages of the play are 69 12 1 1 0
consistent with what we want to
transmit to our students.
My students were able to translate 25 45 8 4 1
the issues that Danny and his friends
were facing into their own context.
13. Survey: Impact of Drama
Question SA SWA U SWD SD
I believe these types of projects can 62 16 4 1 0
enhance the curriculum.
The play made me reflect about my 51 27 1 4 0
own teaching practice and working in
a high-needs community.
We have very few opportunities and 14 46 6 14 3
resources in our school to address
poverty on our own.
I don’t see how the school can move 2 16 16 20 29
forward to address issues of poverty
that are too complex for teachers to
solve – like single parenting and
homelessness.
16. Survey: Effectiveness of Applied Theatre
Question SA SWA U SWD SD
I believe that theatre is an effective 65 18 0 0 0
way to raise awareness of our
students needs among staff.
I believe that theatre an effective way 73 9 1 0 0
to communicate with our students
and engage them in discussions
about social justice.
Theatre-based PDs are an engaging 72 10 1 0 0
and informative way to learn about
social issues.
I would like ETFO to bring us more 73 8 1 0 1
theatre-based PDs in the future.
17. Aesthetic Engagement
Responses describing the intrinsic value of
seeing drama or appreciation of the art form
“The play and drama workshops were wonderful, and they have
inspired both our staff and students to feel empowered to
overcome obstacles associated with poverty.”
“Really listening, really thinking about it. I know it's had an impact
well-beyond that week. We're still hearing things about it. Talking to
other teachers too, um, I know that in Mr. Adam’s room upstairs he
has kids that are making text connections to it, and still talking
about it. So it's really carrying on, and affecting all the kids in the
school.”
18. Catharsis and Empathy
Emotional response or change in thinking towards
issues of poverty that resulted from watching the
drama
"Well, particularly a scene where Danny is being revived after he
has been exposed to the elements and the kids in three groups that
made the comment…about the fact that it was fairly awful how he
found himself in that situation and how terrible it would be to be put
into the situation where you felt you had no options but to run away
and be left at the mercy of mother nature and not feel that there
was any place to turn to. So the kids talked about options and
things within the community that were available to people that
need."
19. Dialogue
Frequency of conversations or depth of the
discussions that followed the drama
"It knocked down those walls that you didn’t realize were there, but
it was just something that you never really talked about, but it
opened the doorway for communication to start.”
“…before the play came to the school we were asked to discuss
poverty…and I found my students didn’t really understand the word
poverty…but it was after the play came to the school that the
conversation became really interesting…I had kids who were
twelve years old understanding the parents perspective,
understanding the parents motivations, understanding the parents
challenges, which I didn’t think they were capable of doing.”
20. Changes In Social Relations
New relationships that emerged within the school-
community as a result of the performance
"After seeing ‘Danny King of The Basement’ and the readings…it
really opened the doors to free communication.”
"In my classroom, I have a lot of students that act out because
they're hungry, and that, they haven't had proper nutrition, and I
have this one student in particular that, um, it's really severe. And
this year, because of the inclusive environment that we've created,
and through talking about poverty, he will no longer shut that off, he
will say out loud, put his hand up, and when we're on the carpet
and say, “You know Miss Betty I'm really hungry, can I have a
banana…That's something that they feel like they can discuss not
only one on one but they feel like they can discuss it with their
peers, so, it's pretty good."
21. Learning From The Drama
Staff and students learned more about issues of poverty
directly from the drama
"It brought personal beliefs and experiences to the forefront through
character experiences and situations. This play was excellent and helped
me get in touch with what some of our students are likely feeling, and why
they are reacting the way they do."
"For us, it’s broadened our definition because we often think of poverty we
only think in terms of physical needs but garbled… you see there are some
kids that are emotionally poor that are well provided for but…the
comments that they make, you know give the impression that they are
emotionally poor. They are missing something else from their life that isn’t
necessarily connected to a monetary value."
22. Pedagogical Tool
Incorporating themes or ideas found within the
drama into the curriculum or teaching practices
"And I was impressed with how fast they picked up drama as a
means of communication. They respected the form of
communication…it moved us ahead in conversation to a deeper
depth, discussing everything in language arts…So I felt that it had
spin offs that were valuable in the curriculum content as well.”
"Where as instead of saying someone, you know, it might be like
first they can relate, well, Danny in the play he was poor, like,
monetarily, but, you know, he was rich in his imagination and stuff
like that. So, they can talk about, you know, the characteristics of
different types of poverty of stage characters. Where as normally if
you were talking without seeing a play or something, it’d be like
they couldn’t bring that realization of seeing someone like that."
23. Other research themes
Principals’ Awareness
Teachers’ Awareness
Teachers’ Practice
Collaboration
Engagement
Students
Leadership
Impact on students
School environment
School Culture
Project Operations Danny’s Tree of Hope, Oshawa
24. The Sustainability of Applied
Theatre
“…we’re not going outside to find something all the
time. It’s Diana, it’s Fiona, it’s Tammy. We’re looking at
ourselves and what can we do and we teach one
another…We’re going to teach one another how to do it
on a daily basis in a classroom. So I see that as
sustainable instead of being a one-time fun, oh this is
great, let’s do this. No, it’s something we help one
another with and then you know we have more
confidence to do it on our own…”
25. Sustainability: Where did the
Drama Go?
For these three schools, the focus of the Danny play
disappeared as the project progressed
“Last year the focus for us was really on Character Education…we
have veered off in a different direction while keeping going what we
did last year.”
“Well they only know about swimming, but we haven’t really tied it to
the Danny project or Danny play or project with the kids.”
26. Sustainability: Embedding
Initiatives In Curriculum
Incorporating initiatives into the curriculum led to greater
sustainability of the lessons and insights
“We definitely considered it from the beginning and especially last
year embedding it in the curriculum was the best way we could think
of continuing it. And you can see that it’s still happening. A lot of the
lessons that were written have been passed on and people are using
or just remembering what happened last year.”
27. Sustainability: Developing
Partnerships
Partnerships with community organizations sustained the
initiatives because of increased resources, support, and
energy
“That is a big part of it. That was the sort of more of the focus of our
presentation to all the community people that day was we want this to
continue. How can you help us make this continue? What can you do
for us? And where can the volunteers tap in? So who has volunteers
or who knows where we can get some? So between some service
groups and the church group and things like that, that was one focus
of the people we invited and the other part was who has the most
money to give us each year?”
28. Sustainability: Raising
Consciousness
Raising staff consciousness about issues of poverty impacted their
teaching practices and school programs well into the future, with or
without continued support from ETFO
“I’m an awful lot more sensitive, I think most teachers are to where
our kids are coming from and it affects their work in school and so on.
And I just have a class full of needy kids this year. And I probably
always have had a class of needy kids, I just didn’t really pay much
attention to the need. Or not enough attention.”
“Well I’m much more attentive to parents and to kids. I’m listening a
lot more than I used to. So you know the teacher-learner relationships
are just a whole lot better. So make time for that to happen and good
things happen.”
29. Conclusions
Applied theatre proved effective to initiate
dialogue and transform social relations.
Flexibility was key to programme success.
Workshops, grants, release days, embedding
in curriculum, and raising consciousness kept
the themes of the play alive.
30. Effective practices
Enough pre-play preparation time
All-school involvement
Horizontal partnerships
Distributed Leadership
Sound use of resources
Regular meeting times
Team work
Embedding in curriculum
Raising consciousness
31. In Summary
Performance is about ‘going into another world and
coming back with gifts’
Tim Etchells, British theatre director.
