Androcles Cast Gives a Headstart to Teachers

The cast got a special assignment today! The cast was invited to teach classroom strategies to the teachers of the valley’s Headstart program.

Three hundred teachers in Phoenix’s Headstart Program spent the first hour of a full day of training with eleven Childsplay teaching artists including the cast of Androcles and the Lion at the Black Canyon Conference Center in Phoenix. The Childsplay artists served as the keynote speaker for the event getting the teachers up on their feet and moving.

Each Childsplay artist was assigned thirty teachers and spent the hour teaching songs, games, class management techniques and teaching strategies that could be used in the preschool classrooms.

None of the cast members had taught teachers before, so all of us were nervous. But the lesson plan provided by Trish Black, head of Education at Childsplay, made the hour fun and easy for everyone.

I had fun getting the teachers out on the floor as “preschool students” and seeing them drop their inhibitions, laughing and enjoying the activities together that hopefully they will be able to use with their real preschool students.