Schools, Drama, and COVID-19: How Prospero can help.

Children in New York City use Prospero to create and share their class drama online.

Coronavirus, COVID-19, is forcing the world to change its everyday behaviours in profound ways.  Even the simplest of interactions are being reviewed, evaluated and in many cases changed. 

Educational communities are far from exempt from these challenges. Drama, theatre and arts teachers are on the frontline, with their practices being dependent on collaboration and social engagement.

C&T’s Prospero technology was designed to drive exactly those qualities in arts learning and theatre education.  But now, C&T finds itself in an unexpected place.  With so many teachers seeking ways of enabling online distance learning, Prospero offers a way to continue to help shape meaningful creative education with students at distance and scale, through the simplest, accessible and widely available technology: your web browser.

We want to try and help teachers and students at this time.  We think Prospero can be a powerful tool to help our community.

We don’t have all the solutions but we want to make a start. Here’s what we want to do.

 Try Prospero online drama workshops for free

Currently Prospero has free, online drama resources available to all teachers.   We want teachers to know about them.

‘Write Your Own Play’ leads students through a process, facilitated by RSC playwright Phil Porter, helping your students to write a short scene.  It's free and available now.  Students can use it independently or in class settings.  Please give it a try.

‘Drama School’ is a package of seven workshops exploring different actor techniques that students might learn at Drama School.  It’s led by recent graduates from Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, London and was filmed in the school. Some can be used by individual students, others in groups.  They are free.  Please have a look.

All you have to do is a sign up for a free Prospero account with your email here.

 Tell us what you want

 Over the coming weeks and months we want to create new resources for you and your students.  To get this right we need to know what you want.  Please click on the link to this survey and tell us. It will take five minutes.  

We can’t guarantee to respond to all your needs, but we want to listen and respond as best we can.  Help us to help you.

 Tell us how you can help others

 The drama education community has strength in its diversity of skills and experience.  If you have specialist expertise that you might be prepared to share tell us.  Again, we can’t guarantee to involve everyone – our resources are finite – but telling us what you have to offer is a start. Use the survey below to tell us.

 Become a Prospero Producer and make your own resources to share

 Anyone can make and share their own resources in Prospero. Currently licenses are designed for institutions to use.  Soon we will announce a new Individual license so anyone can start using, making and sharing In Prospero. Make sure you click ‘subscribe’ to newsletter when you sign up for your free Prospero account to find out more soon.  

 We hope these efforts help us all to navigate these difficult times. Let us know how we can help you with Prospero. 

 Find out more about Prospero here.