Personal Project Proposal

My idea for my personal project is to write a short play about Christmas which I may or may not perform, depending on the circumstances. My play will most likely be 10-12 minutes, though it might be longer, and it will be a play about the true meaning of Christmas (biblical). My purpose is to tell about the true meaning of Christmas and to tell them the Christmas story in a way that will be interesting and easy to understand. By the end of the project I expect that I will have completed the play, a creative written piece of work, and possibly performed it as well.

The resources I will need are the following:

• The Bible (if I write about the true meaning of Christmas)
• Research about Christmas plays that have been written
• Information about the history of Santa Claus and the legends and stories about him (if I choose to write about that

If I end up performing the play I will also need the following:

• A theater to perform the play in
• Actors and Actresses
• Props
• Costumes
• Makeup

The study skills I will need for the project are writing, acting, and research. I will need to research what I am writing about, and I will need to know how to write about it. I will also need to act if I end up performing the play.
The area of interaction my project will focus on is Human Ingenuity, formerly known as Homo Faber. This is my area of interaction because I will be creating something myself from scratch, using my ingenuity. My project will also be about Approaches to Learning because I will be seeking to learn even more about what I will be writing about, and because I will be attempting to have a moral to the story and teach the audience something.

At the Personal Project Exhibition, I will display the script of my play, and if I perform the play as well as writing it, I will have a video of the play along with the script. I will also display my research and pictures of rehearsals (if we end up performing it). I might also display mind maps and other forms of planning I might use in the process of writing the play, and maybe the original drafts of the script, and all of the different drafts throughout the stages of the project.

October 19th

I told Mr. Paul what I am planning, and he suggested that instead of writing and performing the play, I could just write it since getting all of the people together to do the play might be hard. I think I will for now just finish writing the play, and if possible I can think about performing it later.

October 12

I decided that I will do a Christmas play, since the timings will probably line up perfectly for that. I spoke with Ms. Charlotte, my supervisor, and she thinks that it is a good idea. I will hopefully start writing the play soon, if time permits.

October 9th

Ms. Barbara gave me a book called "Power Plays for Youth Groups" by Bill Hand. It is a book filled with 30 skits adapted from Bible stories, and is directed at kids.
I find that I keep second-guessing myself with what I'm going to do. I keep thinking that my idea isn't good and that I need to change it. I am going to try to have my final idea by the end of next week.

October 8th

I spoke with Miss Barbara again, and she suggested that I adapt a well-known story (Bible story, fable, nursery rhyme, etc.) and perform it in front of elementary students.

October 1st

I spoke with Miss Barbara Johnson, the head of drama at the Baptist School. She told me to make the play no longer than fifteen minutes if I plan to perform it, and the best length is probably 10-12 minutes.

Beginning

Originally I had the idea of writing a movie script and filming it, but then I realized that that would be hard. Actors could be hard to find, as would be the equipment and the sets. So I decided that I had to do something else, and I realized that I could write a play instead. It would be more manageable and we could perform it and possibly charge for the performance and give the money to charity. I think that this is what I will do, but I need to come up with ideas so that I can write it.

Ideas for the play:

• Modern-day Shakespeare?
• Comedy
• Murder Mystery
• Something Audience-participation
• Children's play
• Adaptation of a well-known story (fairy tale, bible story, etc.)

I think I definitely want it to be a sort of comedy, or at least kind of funny.

List of things needed:

• Idea for script
• Script
• Permission to use auditorium when needed
• Drama teacher's approval of using the drama group
• Posters/ advertisements (?)
• A little bit of fundraising ahead of time if I'm going to make advertisements.