MED Theatre were recently to hear that three local primary schools, Chagford, North Tawton and South Tawton, had all spent their 2019 summer term exploring the Three Hares symbol. Not only is this symbol a key element of our own logo, but it is also a topic close to our hearts, as we at MED Theatre are very fond of hares.
And so in October and November 2019 we visited all three schools to deliver for them our ‘Magic of The Hare’ workshop, a fun and active hour long session exploring hares as a magical and fascinating animal, pull some moves and hear some hare-related Dartmoor myths. Thank you to everyone we worked with!
FUN FACT: Did you know the average adult hare can jump up to 3 metres high and run up to 44mph?!
Over the past six years MED Theatre have had the pleasure of working with Princetown Primary on the creation of lanterns and performance of songs for our play, ‘Whitehorse Hill’, that was performed in Bellever Forest near Postbridge. In 2019 we were also able to take these workshops to Widecombe-In-The-Moor Primary, who learnt the songs from the play and heard all of the stories that inspired the script.
The young people who took part in the workshops loved hearing about King Arthur’s links with Dartmoor, the story of Chaw Gully and many other local myths and legends, as well as learning the original songs written by MED Theatre’s composer Gillian Webster.
For more information about the ‘Whitehorse Hill’ project as a whole, click here.
In January and February we were invited to run an after-school drama club in Winkleigh primary school. Education Officer Sarah Sharp took the lead in delivering four fun drama workshops that developed the children’s presentational skills, using two Dartmoor stories – The Hunted Hare and The Cavalier of Blackaton Tor – as material.
The pupils shared their performance of the stories with family members and teachers in the final session.
We worked with gifted and talented pupils from four primary schools who came to work with us at Hatherleigh. These also included Northlew, Lewtrenchard and Winkleigh schools. They wrote and recorded an audio play based on the myth of the Tinner of the Redbrook.