Lesson: 45 minutes
 Age group: 10 and up

Materials: Deck of cards, enough chairs for every person in class, two tables, tape, chalk board, chalk

Session Objective:
1. Students will identify ways in which status is conveyed physically.
2. Student will examine and identify different status roles that he/she plays in own life.
3. Student will explore ways in which manipulation of status affects situations.
4. Student will examine how knowledge and manipulation of status applies to different contexts in own life.

Note:   Classroom preparation: For a class of twelve students, two tables and six chairs should be grouped chaotically on each side of the room.

Session Content:
    1. Status in Space - Divide class into two groups of six students for a class of twelve). Each group should assemble by one of the chair/table groupings. Explain that one at a time each person should arrange the chairs and table so as to make one chair the most powerful object, in relation to the other chairs and the table. Any objects can be moved or placed on top of each other, or on their sides, or whatever, but nothing can be removed altogether. After each person has had a chance to try, the group will select the arrangement they feel is the most powerful. At this time, one person in the group will enter the space and take the powerful position without moving anything. Once they have done so, the others may move into the space and try to place themselves in even more powerful positions, and take away the power of the first. (This game is from Boal's Games for Actors and Non-Actors.  It is under the name of "The Great Game of Power" on page 150.)

Assess:
    Discuss what the spatial arrangements revealed about power. Discuss how this power was conveyed. Discuss strategies people employed to lessen the power of others.
Discuss concepts of status and how status is conveyed. How space is manipulated to reveal status, how physical mannerisms convey status, how status can be consciously lowered or raised given the intent and needs of a given situation. Brainstorm physical indicators of status and write on the board. (These can be taking up a lot of physical space, invading another's space, eye contact - holding it or breaking it, ignoring, silence (stonewalling), physical levels in relation to others, posture, etc.)

2. Tools for playing with status - Direct students to
select from the "tools" on the board one or two physical traits they will play with in the following scenes.

Divide class into four groups (for a class of twelve, this will be three groups of 3 and one of 4): Each will be given a different task relating to status to create a scene around. The other groups will not know what the tasks are. When groups have decided, they will present to the class and class will guess which task they were given. The tasks are:
· All lower status
· All raise status
· One raises while the others lower All exchange
These scenes can be very short. ]Johnstone gives as an example a scene in which one person enters a room where another is reading. The person entering asks "What are you reading?". The person reading says "War and Peace". The response determines whether the respondent wants to raise or lower their own status. If raise, they may say "Oh, I read that a long time ago". To lower, they may say they've never read it, and so on....

3. Status Party - Explain that everyone has been invited to an end-of-the-year party for the College of Fine Arts. (The setting may be adapted to fit the group. It may be anywhere the group will experience significant status levels) Explain that everyone has been invited, including the Dean, past graduate students who are now employed, the President of the University, etc. Having pre-selected twelve deck cards of assorted value, each with a piece of tape on the back, place the cards on the foreheads of all the players. As you do so, tell them that there will be all sorts of refreshments at this party, that it is a catered affair, there is free food and drink. Tell them
 that the object of the game is to guess your status in relation to the others based on how they relate to you. After players have interacted for a while, ask them to line up in the relative order of their status. Designate one end as highest, the other as lowest. After they have done so, ask people what made them pick their position, what about how the others related to them indicated to them their status. (This should elicit some interesting observations which will allow a nice segue into assessment.)
 

Assessment: Discuss how the concepts of status developed during this session may influence decisions people make daily about how they relate to people, how they respond. Ask them to imagine themselves going through their day and think about how many times they change roles, and how this affects their status, and how their behavior changes. Ask students to write a philosophy statement about how they use status throughout the day, particularly how they envision using status in their teaching.

Resources:
Boal, Augusto. Games for Actors and Non-Actors. Trans. Adrian Jackson. NY:
Routledge, 1992.
Johnstone, Keith. Impro: Improvisation and the Theatre. NY: Theatre Arts Books, 1979.

Addendum:

Status concepts developed by Johnstone:
· Status is something one does
· You can be low status but play high
· A comedian is paid to lower their status
· Tragedy is the ousting of the high status person from the group. Everybody moves up a step as a consequence.
· A teacher is an expert status player
· Friends agree to play status games together.
· The shape of the space you are in affects status. People play the status they are comfortable with.

Status Tools: eye contact (holding, breaking without looking back); silence (stonewalling); ignoring; physical levels in relation to others; movement of the head (less movement, higher status; posture; space (how much space you take up personally).
                                                                                        Created by Lori Hager