Professional Development Workshops

Tools and Strategies for Educators

Childsplay partners with schools and districts to design professional development workshops that bring curriculum to life through drama and kinesthetic learning. These interactive sessions help educators engage students more deeply, strengthen classroom community, and discover practical strategies they can use immediately. Each workshop is customized to meet your goals—whether as a single session or a series.

Young children learn best by constantly participating in the world around them. Through drama, early childhood educators can take their curriculum off the printed page and into the world of the classroom so that children experience it directly. Childsplay’s Professional Development Workshops introduce ways educators can utilize drama and kinesthetic learning in their classrooms, bringing their curriculum to life, and increasing student engagement. Childsplay works with schools and districts to develop individualized workshops addressing their specific goals and needs. Workshops can be developed to stand alone, or as a series.

Workshop Topics

We work with each school or district to create workshops that will address their particular focus and reach their specific goals. Workshops might cover such topics as:

  • Teacher as Actor/Performer – a series of workshops focusing on developing each teacher’s “Acting” tools to increase ways to dynamically engage students through voice, body, presence, and classroom organization/management.
  • Arts Integration: Integrating Drama Strategies and Kinesthetic Learning into Your Curriculum – a series of workshops that demonstrate how to integrate drama (specifically kinesthetic learning) into your curriculum. Workshops include: 
    • Drama and S.T.E.A.M.
    • Drama and Literacy
    • Drama and Literacy with a SEI focus
    • Drama and Social Studies
    • Drama and Social-Emotional Development
  • Drama Games – a series of workshops introducing standard drama games and how to adapt them to content specific subjects/standards. Teachers will leave each workshop with games and techniques they can take back and use in their classrooms the next day. The workshops would include:
    • Workshop One – Ensemble building: exercises to build community at the beginning of the school year; ways  to reflect and review on any content at the end of a unit, quarter, or semester; and classroom management techniques for adding kinesthetic learning into your classroom.
    • Workshop Two-Four – Content specific: exercises will be introduced to the entire staff and then subject/grade level breakout groups will adapt content to their specific needs, and practice facilitating.
  • Planning with Drama – a series of workshops during which a drama technique/strategy will be introduced to entire staff, and then subject/grade level groups will break out to develop lessons that integrate that strategy into already developed lesson plans. This will begin to teach teachers how to think about small ways drama can be integrated into their everyday lessons and activities.
  • Staff Ensemble Building – Drama is an ideal tool for developing trust and ensemble. A school is only as strong as the bonds between staff. Using drama games and team-building activities, staff will learn about each other, build empathy, and strengthen their relationships invigorating and improving the way they work together.

Budget

Our current standard rate is $225/hour, $800/half day, and $1,400/full day.

Standard PD workshop includes 2 facilitators for up to 50 participants. Extra facilitators can be added for additional cost to allow for more participants or smaller work groups.

Title I discounted rate is $175/hour, $600/half day, and $1050/full day

What Teachers Say

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