Teaching as Improv

All in-coming first year students at Colby College are required to participate in the Colby Outdoor Orientation Trip (fondly acronymned “COOT”)—a four-day venture away from the campus in a group of your choice—canoeing, hiking, biking, camping, and so on. As a committed non-outdoor person (or rather, non-active outdoor person), I chose the theater COOT. We camped outdoors under the stars, but we played theater games and never had to venture far from our lodge. Here, I learned that I was good at improv.

Improvisational theater is fairly well-known as the result of some tremendous professional and amateur groups around the country (several of them right here in my home of Chicago). These groups are the proving ground for actors—usually comedic actors, but dramatic actors cut their chops in improv as well. I’m not an actor and don’t know much about the trade, but I’ve known actors who cannot improv and they recognize the special ability of the improv actor who performs without a net.

Improvisational theater has one steadfast rule: Never Say No. Actors are on a stage. They have no roles, they have no script. They have an idea and they may have a structure and they have certainly rehearsed, but everything else is tenuous at best. When I found that I could take an idea given to me “on stage” and run with it, in any and all directions, I flourished, cherishing the freedom to create, invent, be inspired and inspire others. I joined the improv club and stayed with it for my four years at college. I directed the group for 3 semesters, as well. After shows (usually packed—we were a popular ticket on campus) I would always encounter someone who said something to the effect of “that was awesome, I could never do that, it looks terrifying”.

The part that looks terrifying is the part where you are relying almost entirely on your audience. If you take suggestions for where you want your show to go from the people you are performing for, you are leaving a lot up to chance. You say “I need a genre!” and you work with what they give you, whether it’s a simple one like Western or Showtune or something impossible like Methodological Relativism (you get people like that in an audience—it doesn’t matter that it’s not a genre). And, of course, there’s always the possibility that you get no response. You could call out into the crowd and hear crickets.

It’s this give and take of improv that to me, suggests teaching. Teaching isn’t a show you put on for well-heeled audience, sitting pretty in their box seats, their programs open on their laps in front of them. Teaching should involve audience participation-- I like to ask the students for their input, find out which direction they would like the class to go, encourage them to shout out their suggestions. I’ve got some props, I’ve got a sheet of paper outlining where I need start and where I hope to finish, but the rest has to be open to the terrifying possibilities of chance.

And, of course, there are always the crickets. Some days you get no response, but the show has to go on, doesn’t it, and so you do your shtick and hope to clear the stage before the tomatoes fly.