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PRDV 335-1: Engineering Improv I: The Art of Allowing (0.5 Unit)

Prerequisites

None

Description

This course is a highly interactive demonstration of how students can apply the philosophies and techniques of improvisation to all aspects of their lives. Through readings , reflective writing, class discussion, and improv exercises, students learn tools and develop skills to inspire better improvisational abilities for themselves, their scene partners, and their audiences. Throughout this course, assignments will be given to allow students the opportunity to apply class material in a practical manner. Start anywhere, remember you are not the most important person in the scene, and say yes. Through these and other improv techniques, students learn to tackle unexpected obstacles, building skills that can be leveraged in both academic and non-academic contexts to face challenges with resilience.

Learning Objectives

By the end of the course, with a combination of solo and team work, students will:

Develop basic improv skills including: Attention / Focus, Sensory Awareness, Emotion, Space Objects, Character, Relationship, Objective, Where (CROW), Supporting team members, Status, and Storytelling.
Learn how improv can be used as a “workout” that helps shake loose rigid patterns of thinking and doing.
Learn improv skills that will help students express themselves and to connect to others in a more immediate way.
Learn the relationship between intention, attention, and awareness.
Learn how attention can be used as both a tool and fuel to cultivate accurate and productive awareness, creating the conditions for peak performance.
Learn to incorporate specific improv scene direction.
Discover how to assess what information most accurately and reliably responds to the needs of the character, the action, and the audience.
Discover how play stimulates the mind and enhances personal knowledge of one’s self.
Explore the intersection between the creative expression of improv, and the purposeful, collaborative involvement of engineering.
Learn to take feedback in a positive progressive manner.
Work effectively alone and in teams.

Topics

Week 1: Say "yes"; Don't prepare; and Just show up
Week 2: Start anywhere; Be average; and Pay attention
Week 3: Face the facts; Stay on Course; and Wake up to gifts
Week 4: Make mistakes, please; Act now; and Take care of each other
Week 5: Enjoy the ride

Materials

There are two required books for the course.

Improv Wisdom: ISBN-10:
1400081882, ISBN-13: 978-1400081882