Our objective is for schools to see the Holocaust as a subject that reaches beyond the History textbook. With a cross curricular approach and with a whole school commitment, the learnings become deeper, more meaningful and long lasting.
Mal Smith, Head of Drama, Lytham St Annes High School
We work in schools and communities, perform in school halls and theatres, village halls and on world platforms, at academic conferences and small community events. We advise schools on their Holocaust education programmes, run teacher training courses and have advised the Holocaust Educational Trust on their Drama resource pack. We would be delighted to discuss with you coming in to work with your students and / or staff.
Voices creates high calibre professional productions that tour across England and Wales. We design education days that culminate in a performance and post-performance discussion in your school hall / venue. In addition to our inspirational performances, each production day with Voices aims to both engage young people in learning about the Holocaust, but also aims to inspire and refresh the creativity of students and inspire the pedagogical approaches of their teachers.
We span a number of curriculum areas and can design an education programme to best meet your needs. Our resource packs are designed to empower schools to embed their own ongoing cross curricular work into their practice, and our ongoing programmes inspire the idea that performing arts can provide the creative catalyst for whole school engagement.
We put no limits on the number of students that we perform our productions to; but the more the better. We just ask that your staffing is appropriate for the numbers in the audience. Unless otherwise advised, our plays are suitable for students aged 11+ but are specifically designed to offer reach and challenge to all students at KS3, 4 and 5.
We take a bursary approach to subsidising these costs if a school or organisation are not able to meet the full cost of a Voices visit. Due to this, we are delighted that we have a number of opportunities for schools in target outreach areas. Please get in touch about our bursaries and grants to support bringing Voices in to your school.
Sam Bawden, Duke's Aldridge Academy (Tottenham)
A sample of our most popular education packages:
INTRODUCTION TO HOLOCAUST HISTORY TESTIMONY THROUGH ACTIVE LEARNING OR DRAMA
Helping to unpick the complexities of the history of the Holocaust through survivor testimony. From the persecutions on the streets to ‘Kristallnacht’ (the November pogrom) to experiences of ghettos, the einsatzgruppen (the Holocaust by bullets) to acts of rescue and resistance to the implications of survival students will engage in the lived experiences of those who endured one of the most disturbing periods in human history in an accessible and thought provoking way.
VERBATIM TESTIMONY AND PHYSICAL THEATRE - WORKING WITH VOICES' TECHNIQUES
Exploring the core principles and practices of Voices’ techniques and approaches to ‘imagining the unimaginable’. We work from extracts of testimony from ‘Kindness’ to explore the physical theatre techniques we use in our plays. Through use of movement and extracting the ‘essence’ at the heart of the lived experience we take students away from the physicalisation of the lived experience and towards a deeper engagement in the process of the representation of the unimaginable.
*We can pitch this up to KS5 and beyond very easily. How far we go is up to you and your students.
WHERE WAS GOD?
Addressing the issues of faith and survival in the Holocaust through practical sessions. *We ask that students have already engaged in some Holocaust history sessions prior to this day.
We explore through literature and testimony survivors’ experiences and responses to this fundamental question and further deepen core ideas using extracts from ‘Kindness: A Legacy of the Holocaust’. Through practical engagement in these deeper understandings we can begin to challenge the question of faith in the knowledge of the Holocaust.
*We ask that students have already engaged in some Holocaust history sessions prior to this day.
SOCIAL ACTION PROJECT DAY
A student leadership engagement day, stimulating whole school engagement in a Social Action Project. We will work with your student council / a cross selection of students on engagement with survivor stories and their positioning in the history of the Holocaust, along the way addressing the question “why bother learning about the Holocaust?”. We then take the group through a process of developing their own ideas for a project to engage all tutor groups in KS3 and 4 beyond our day together. Projects have included student led performances using verbatim testimony for year group assemblies, tutor based presentations and social action projects that can make their way through the broader life of your school. From Acts of Kindness ‘pay it forward’ schemes to charity and fundraising work to refugee support schemes and Holocaust Memorial Day events for your wider community – what comes from this day is very much led by the students with the support of your head of SMSC / other lead teacher(s).
Search through each subject area for more examples of our education packages:
Working with a range of stimuli – music, props, poetry, paintings – we’ll take your students through a variety of processes to begin shaping a thought provoking performance creating depth of meaning through a range of stylized techniques. Outcomes are as rich and varied as the students and their imaginations but we’ll explore making meaning and moving away from narrative / naturalistic performance towards something “elegant, beautiful and powerful” as our work is so often described.
This session can be pitched to KS3, 4 or 5 with differentiation implemented accordingly although, most commonly we find ourselves working with year 9+ in these workshops. We’re comfortable doing this work at undergraduate and postgraduate level – and indeed with our own professional actors. So where we start and how far we go really depends on what point we are starting from and how long we’ve got!
Monologues and Duologues / Ensemble Work:
Through whole group sharing and smaller group work we will explore a variety of extracts of script. We’ll explore script interpretation from the perspectives of actor and director and ways of drawing out characterization and the broader power of performance from the possibilities that a written text offers. Students will be encouraged to share and develop their confidence in supporting and building one another’s direction toward compelling performances with integrity of style, technique and meaning.
These sessions are really great for building your GCSE students’ confidence up but also brilliant for your high flying post16 students who might be considering Drama school or a professional acting career. As with most of our Drama workshops, we can go as rich and as deep with differentiation by outcome.
Exploring the core principles and practices of Voices’ techniques and approaches to ‘imagining the unimaginable’. We work from extracts of testimony from ‘Kindness’ to explore the physical theatre techniques we use in our plays. Through use of movement and extracting the ‘essence’ at the heart of the lived experience we take students away from the physicalisation of the lived experience and towards a deeper engagement in the process of the representation of the unimaginable.
This session can be pitched to KS3, 4 or 5 with differentiation implemented accordingly. We’re comfortable doing this work at undergraduate and postgraduate level – and indeed with our own professional actors. So where we start and how far we go really depends on what point we are starting from and how long we’ve got!
Holocaust History Through Drama:
Helping to unpick the complexities of the history of the Holocaust through survivor testimony. From the persecutions on the streets to ‘Kristallnacht’ (the November pogrom) to experiences of ghettos, the einsatzgruppen (the Holocaust by bullets) to acts of rescue and resistance to the implications of survival students will engage in the lived experiences of those who endured one of the most disturbing periods in human history in an accessible and thought provoking way.
We explore the key period of the Nazi regime from an historic and personal perspective. Students engage in the personal stories of those who endured the varied phases that led to the Holocaust as well as other victim groups making history distinct and complex. We contextualise the Holocaust in the long history of antisemitism and the more immediate context of the Nazi’s rise to power and consider the changed landscape of Europe as well as the aftermath of the Holocaust. With additional time we can further explore the ‘10 changes of genocide’, the uniqueness of the Holocaust as well as some of the generalized ‘warnings from history’ that this knowledge and understanding gives us.
Addressing the issues of faith and survival in the Holocaust through practical sessions. *We ask that students have already engaged in some Holocaust history sessions prior to this day.
We explore through literature and testimony survivors’ experiences and responses to this fundamental question and further deepen core ideas using extracts from ‘Kindness: A Legacy of the Holocaust’. Through practical engagement in these deeper understandings we can begin to challenge the question of faith in the knowledge of the Holocaust.
Inter-Key Stage Social Action Project Day:
A student leadership engagement day, stimulating whole school engagement in a Mitzvah Project. We will work with your student council / a cross selection of students on engagement with survivor stories and their positioning in the history of the Holocaust, along the way addressing the question “why bother learning about the Holocaust?”. We then take the group through a process of developing their own ideas for a project to engage all tutor groups in KS3 and 4 beyond our day together. Projects have included student-led performances using verbatim testimony for year group assemblies, tutor based presentations and social action / Mitzvah Projects that can make their way through the broader life of your school. From Acts of Kindness ‘pay it forward’ schemes to charity and fundraising work to refugee support schemes and Holocaust Memorial Day events for your wider community – what comes from this day is very much led by the students with the support of your head of SMSC / other lead teacher(s).
Ongoing Student Engagement Projects: Interdepartmental Model
Devising meaningful verbatim theatre that meets Drama students’ exam needs whilst creating meaningful work to have a whole school impact for your students. Our 3-4 month package outline sees us coming in for a ‘launch day’ with our production and a full morning of introductory workshops for your target group of students (We suggest no more than 25 for this part of the programme). We then aim to have a second ‘off timetable’ day for your group to develop responses to the performance and explore style, technique and form. We offer guidance and support for you working with the students (in their lessons or in your extra-curricular club) to find and choose testimony/ies to work from, developing a performance through structured exploration and rehearsal. We come back every few weeks to see how you’re going / offer new material, resources or direction through ongoing conversations. These projects always work best if your Drama lead teacher has the support of someone in your History / RE departments but, if you aren’t able to get someone on board we can be ‘virtually’ by your side to help ensure that the piece develops with historic accuracy and within the pedagogy that we’ll embed with you and your students from the start. A super exciting way of working with beautiful and meaningful outcomes that will enrich student outcomes and offer you something incredibly special to share at whole school level and / or with your wider community for Holocaust Memorial Day or another key anniversary or date.
Are you looking for support in building / developing / changing your Holocaust education programme or at building greater confidence or knowledge in your Humanities faculty / History department. We can come and work with you in a gentle, supportive and grounded way.
Do your performing Arts team need a bit of inspiration and want to look at new ways or working or at creating a rich and dynamic programme using Kindness with your students. Perhaps you can draw together some other Drama teachers in your area for a professional development day – we can bring you a day of dynamic and exciting work tailored to your needs.
Are you our dream school – teachers looking to work together across different departments to enrich the whole school impact of Holocaust education in your school? We would love to work with you to realise that vision. We have done single days with schools but also ongoing consultancy over the course of a school year.
For the pedants amongst us; we know – historically it’s always been referred to as ‘theatre in education’ but that’s not really what we’re about. We make plays that help us educate and we often do that in educational settings but not always. We are all always learning. And all the best theatre makes you think as well as feel – and we take pride on making plays that will get everyone thinking and feeling. We love to take our plays to theatres and community venues – it’s not less important to engage with and encourage learning in adult communities as youth settings. So yes, we are actively for education and sometimes, but not always, in education!
Kindness: A Legacy of the Holocaust
A high quality theatre production that provides a powerful starting point for Holocaust curriculum objectives as well as giving tremendous value to Drama departments who may already be using Mark Wheeller as a set text or need to complete theatre review coursework. Includes a post performance Q&A with Cate and the actors addressing any aspects of the play, Susan’s story, Holocaust history that the whole audience can benefit from.
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