Besides hanging around at various Zambian locales and investigating the flora and fauna, I also work!  I teach music, and I am fortunate to be working with a drama director with lots of experience, plenty of energy, an enormous amount of creativity and a healthy dose of insanity.

This past weekend was the annual “24 Hour Drama” event.

About 50 middle-school students (grades 6 – 8) descended upon the Performing Arts Center at exactly 7:00pm Friday evening and were greeted by about 10 High School drama students, who would be their teachers and guides for the next 24 hours.

The kids were divided into three groups for warm-ups, brainstorming, discussion of themes and plots, various theater games and finally, creating, rehearsing and performing an original short play for their parents and friends on the following evening.

In between, they would eat, swim in the pool, drink plenty of water and (at some point) sleep.

I showed up Saturday morning to check out the scene and take a few pictures.  Everyone was into the “brainstorming” phase, which included lots of physical activity and movement.

When I returned that evening, the motley groups had been transformed.  Now they were in “costume” and focused, ready to go on stage with their premiere performances.

I was very impressed.  Each little play had a theme, a plot, an over-all “message” and every single student was involved.  Some had choreography and singing, too. From chaos had come order – and it was all their own work (with a big boost from the High School students, who looked only slightly bleary at the end!)