A six week online (due to the COVID-19 pandemic) improv course for the friends at Friends Life. Friends Life creates an opportunity for teenagers and adults with disabilities to develop socially, grow personally, and enjoy community as they experience life together. Funded in part by Metro Arts and the TN Arts Commission.
From Max Kemp, instructor:
In early April 2021 Emma and I had the pleasure of facilitating an improv course over Zoom for Friends Life, an organization which provides opportunities for neuro-diverse teenagers and adults.
To prepare, we watched a theater class online in which the Friends had participated. From that we recognized the benefit of structured exercises and reprised rituals, and we began to create a six-week course running one hour each week.
At the top of each class we had everyone join in repeating a pledge, saying, “I promise to say YES, to support my friends, and to thank my brain for great ideas!” Then we would have each person introduce themself in a way relevant to the week’s topic. For example, during character week each person said their name and their secret superhero identity. During object work and physicality week each person said their name and did an action that showed how they felt that day.
We then did an improv warm-up, an exercise or two to teach the day’s topic, and closed with an exercise we called Thank You, Brain. During Thank You, Brain, each person would thank their brain for something it did that day, such as an awesome idea the person had, or something their brain helped them learn. This exercise was important to us as a way to emphasize the inherent value of all present. They weren’t developmentally disabled, they were developmentally diverse, each unique in their own wonderful way, and we wanted to celebrate that.
One particular challenge we worked with was the fact that some Friends didn’t love to speak out loud, and others had a lot to say! But all the Friends were incredibly kind and patient with one another. They respected and affirmed each other to an extent rarely seen in our world today. Each class was an incredibly joyful, mindful experience for Emma and me, and we learned as much as we taught.
This class was also full of surprises. We were constantly floored by the creativity of the Friends. Their minds came up with brilliant ideas and made genius connections that most improvisers only dream of being sharp enough to create. We went into the experience committed to never underestimate the Friends, and that decision was reinforced every week as they blew us away with their humor and imagination.
I would absolutely teach a class like this again. It was an honor to have the Friends share their time, their talents, and stories from their lives with us.