Working Group:

The teaching and learning of the performing arts, whether in schools (primary or secondary), in post-secondary education (college, university, professional), or in other non-formal training environments, face important issues and challenges in the new realities of our world at the time of COVID-19 and the post-COVID-19 era. One thing is certain: the evolution of our ways of teaching and learning will be marked by this.

This session, linked to the SQET’s theatre and training working group, invites discussion, in a spirit of solidarity, of the impact of COVID-19 on different teaching, learning, and research contexts, of the strategies put forward in response to the different issues and challenges we face, and of the adaptations and modifications of current or future research projects.

Participating in this session will be Patricia-Anne Blanchet (doctoral student, Université de Sherbrooke), Anik Bouvrette (choreographer and artistic director, Tara Luz Danse, Ontario), Francine Chaîné (associate professor, Université Laval), David Dufour (teacher, Béatrice-Desloges Arts Academy), Marie-Eve Skelling Desmeules (professor (NLT), University of Ottawa) and Katharina Stalder (artist-teacher, director and doctoral student, Université Sorbonne Nouvelle - Paris 3).

Contribution by Francine Chaîné

Autoethnography of a creative experience in the dramatic arts in presence-absence

In the context of creating Cycles Repère, the work is done collectively and in action, hence “to do is to know” (Jacques Lessard dans Chaîné, Marceau, 2015). By March 2020, this real classroom space no longer exists. How do we construct meaning in this process that is taking a strange turn?  In an autoethnographic approach (Ellis and Bochner, 2000), it will be a question of a narrative of practice (De Certeau, 1990) in presence/distance. What remains of the initial project that ends in front of the screen? Could this time of crisis and isolation with regard to creation hide an epiphany? (Denzin, 1989)

Bio:

Francine Chaîné is an associate professor at the School of Art of Université Laval. Her research focuses on accompaniment and the creative process from an ethnographic and autoethnographic perspective. She has served as guest editor for several journals. She is a member of the GRET-UQAM executive committee and co-directed the research project and publication Porte ouverte sur l’enseignement du théâtre, histoires de formation (2021).

Contribution by Patricia-Anne Blanchet

Media-based theatre education as a vehicle for wellness by and for Aboriginal college students

Among the measures recommended to facilitate the trajectory of Aboriginal college students, art is favourable to their social involvement and academic perseverance, in that it allows them to express their cultural identity. Based on the First Nations holistic model of lifelong learning, I seek to explore how a process of dramatization of life stories mobilizes the dimensions of wellness for Aboriginal college students. What happens when the creative space becomes virtual? How do we foster a culturally safe learning environment? This communication retraces the quest for adaptation that led me to switch to a media device for the pursuit of my doctoral project in research-action-creation.

Bio:

Member of the GRET-UQAM steering committee, lecturer, and doctoral student in education (Université de Sherbrooke), Patricia-Anne Blanchet is interested in theatre education from an Aboriginal and feminist perspective. Her career as a drama teacher and her artistic practice with the ecofeminist collective Les Tisserandes have led her to recognize the emancipatory potential of social theatre with marginalized women’s groups. 

Contribution by Katharina Stalder

Face-to-face learning, online learning, or “make do” learning—how do we teach dramatic arts during and after the health crisis?

In France, lockdowns forced conservatories to close their doors. The artist-educators in theatre have kept in touch with their students, while defending that it was not a teaching of the art of acting. Can theatre be taught at a distance? Inventing new forms of theatre will be vital if the pandemic continues. But the precision of acting, its adjustment, and its rehearsal, as well as informal learning (serendipity) are not compatible with telework. The constraints, nowadays sanitary, can stimulate the imagination to find artistic solutions. Rather than waiting for the technical means to be perfected in order to teach in a virtual rehearsal room, artist-educators have an important role to play in this process. 

Bio:

Katharina Stalder is a director, translator, artist-educator, and researcher. She works with professional actors as well as with students. She translates plays from German and is a member of the Eurodram and Maison Antoine Vitez theatre translation networks. She teaches drama at the Conservatoire de Toulouse, gives courses at universities, and is writing a thesis on training for directing.

Contribution by Marie-Eve Skelling Desmeules and Anik Bouvrette

The confined, sometimes forgotten, body: Experiences in creating, learning, and teaching the body in motion

In this communication, we propose to discuss strategies put forward in the context of creation, dissemination and arts education during the pandemic, mainly in relation to the work of the body in movement, the dancing body.

We will establish links between the initiatives of the Franco-Ontarian dance company Tara Luz Danse and innovative practices in arts education courses at the Faculty of Education of the University of Ottawa. In particular, we will look at how we rethink art-making experiences; how we nurture interactions between the arts, schools, and communities; and how we care for each other and our bodies, which are too often neglected.

Bios:

Marie-Eve Skelling Desmeueles is a professor (LTA) in the Faculty of Education at the University of Ottawa, vice-president of the Société québécoise d’études théâtrales and responsible for the Theatre and Training working group. Her doctoral studies focus on the work of the body in professional actpr training and her postdoctoral and current research deals with the experiences of professional training in the circus arts. She recently co-edited the issue Pédagogies et pratiques artistiques of the Percées journal.

Anik Bouvrette is the founder and artistic director of Tara Luz Danse and President of the Cultural Alliance of Ontario. Seeing young people as our future and our audience of tomorrow, she has created many shows (including Les billes, Les batons, and Les souliers d’Angélie) and directs several projects in schools and communities (including Matinées Jeunesses, Dessin/Danse, RésiDANSE: Création/Jeunesse, and En studio avec nous).

Contribution by Emma June Huebner

Expressing yourself in a pandemic context: Creating short films in “secondary five”

This communication will discuss training experiences in media arts, and more specifically the creation of short films in the Media and Communication course taught to “Secondary V” (the final year of Quebec secondary studies) students. The lecture will discuss, among other things, the potential of artistic creation to address the isolation caused by the pandemic, and the issues that such a project can generate. My experience shows that creative projects allow students to express themselves and to share their challenges and vulnerabilities related to the current context, while developing their self-esteem.

Bio:

Emma June Huebner is a Master’s student in Art Education at Concordia University and a high school teacher. Previously, she completed a BA in Art History and Communication at McGill University and a BA in Education at the University of Ottawa. Her current research focuses on learning in the museum context through the co-creation of digital educational tools.