School News:
School Productions/Drama
At the centre of all Drama is communication and confidence. Like all the arts, drama allows children to communicate with and understand others in new ways. It also builds upon the children’s confidence and resilience and gives them a sense of pride. Drama allows all children to shine. At Hutton Rudby Primary, we greatly value the importance of drama, and the impact that it can have on all our pupils.
Each term, children deliver class assemblies to their parents in a 15 minute drama presentation based upon what they have been learning about in school.
Drama and music form the basis of our Harvest festival celebration and Christmas Carol service held at our local community church, All Saints. This year at our Harvest festival, the children will showcase what they have learnt about harvest based upon the work they have been learning in class. Year 1, harvest in old Amsterdam, year 2, harvest in a medieval castle, year 3 a Stone Age harvest, year 4 a Roman harvest, year 5 a Tudor harvest and year 6 will be looking at the impact the German U-boat campaign in World War 1 had on the harvest in Britain.
Our Christmas and Summer productions are truly something to behold. Mr Johnson, our director extraordinaire, has raised the bar year on year. Ably assisted by our musical genius, Mr Whawell, our school productions are truly memorable. Last year our Year 5 and 6 Christmas production of Mulan allowed the children to not only perform on stage in front of three packed out audiences, but also allowed the children to develop their ability to read and write music themselves. ( Watch the performance of Mulan below). This Christmas the children will be performing, ‘Mary Poppins’, linked to the children’s learning in class. Our Year 6, ‘Travelling with Poppins’ unit focuses upon Britain at the start of the 20th century particularly the suffragette movement.
In addition to our Year 5 and 6 musical Christmas productions, our Year 1 and 2 children undertake their own Christmas performance also. Of course Christmas plays would not be complete without our Reception children’s wonderful nativity, where there isn’t a dry eye in the audience.
In the Summer term, Year 3 and 4 take on the baton with their own school production. The confidence the Year 3 and 4 children gain from being involved in a whole school production performing on stage is invaluable to their emotional and social development. Mrs Ruddy, and her right hand man, Mr Whawell, have helped the children perform some memorable performances such as Treasure Island, a 1920’s themed murder mystery and Alice in Wonderland. This year, the children will be performing Charlie and the Chocolate factory, linked to their summer unit of learning, Scrumdiddlyupmtious (see curriculum plans)
