School Play
Learning By Doing Under The Lights
The EBIA school play gives students a chance to build a complete production together. Theater brings Learning by Doing to the stage. Students work toward a real deadline and a real audience while learning to depend on one another.
Recent EBIA Productions
Over the last three years, EBIA students have brought major productions to the stage:
- The Lion King
- Beetlejuice
- Mean Girls
Each production becomes its own temporary community of performers, designers, builders, technicians, organizers, and problem-solvers.
Onstage
Students who audition for acting roles develop memorization, character work, projection, movement, timing, listening, and confidence. They also learn to respond in the moment. Prior theater experience is not required. Middle school can be the place where a student discovers a love of performing.
Behind The Scenes
A production needs much more than actors. Depending on the show, students can contribute through set design, construction, props, costumes, lighting, sound, stage management, backstage crew, publicity, program design, choreography, photography, and front-of-house support. Each role gives students another way to contribute to the final production.
There is more than one way to be an innovator in theater.
A Collaborative Product
Students learn quickly that one person’s work affects everyone else. An actor depends on a stage manager. A scene depends on a set change. Lighting depends on timing. Publicity depends on design and communication. When something unexpected happens, the group has to solve it together.
That combination of creativity, communication, revision, responsibility, and problem-solving is exactly why theater belongs at EBIA.
Who Can Participate?
Students in grades 6-8 can participate. Cast and crew sizes vary by production. EBIA works to create both onstage and production pathways so students with different interests and strengths can contribute.
The Final Performance
After weeks of rehearsal, design, building, revision, and problem-solving, students share the finished production with families and the EBIA community.
Learning by Doing. Belonging by Design.