600 Manchester children love Shakespeare
600 children in Manchester have fallen in love with Shakespeare. And another 170 in Peterborough have also got the bug. What’s going on?
2024 – How was it for you?
End of 2024 – how was it for you? I can’t believe we have reached the end of the year already, but here we are. Thank you for finding the will and wherewithal to work with us for us another incredible year.
You Create What You Will
Will has helped FINDING THE WILL encourage tens of thousands of children to create what you will over the last 17 years.
Time and again we hear from teachers that they have seen a side to a child they had not been aware of prior to our workshop.
End of the Year – We Made It!
At the end of the year, we’ve worked with approximately 1700 children aged 4-12, in 13 different counties and 1 other country.
Flaming June – well WE were cooking!
A sparky group of children with interesting ideas of how Hermia and Lysander could be together, despite the law of Athens!
You are now official Shakespeare Ambassadors!
“Naming The View was a really special night. Quality writing and performances came together and we were all invested in your every word. We haven’t stopped talking about it.”
Happy Summer Holidays!
A quick count up shows that during the last 10 months we’ve worked with approximately 1000 children ranging in age from 4 – 16.
We’ve covered the country from Merthyr Tydfil to Peterborough, Southampton to Yorkshire and all sorts of places in between!
Mediterranean, Mermaids and Michael Rosen
In the afternoon we travelled on to Greece for an introduction to A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM.
There’s something magical about hearing a child speak Puck’s words at the end of the play.
Standing on a stage and speaking out loud to over 150 adults, is a pretty daunting task, especially when you are only 8 or 9.
Woodpecker or Monkey Brains?
Last week we went from Verona to Athens back to Italy and finally to Scotland!
“Woodpecker seasoned with pepper”. I think there’s a tongue twister in there somewhere!
So, here at FINDING THE WILL, we have a policy of Gender Blind Casting
Dear Diary…..
The Diary entry of Macbeth on the night he killed King Duncan, as imagined by one pupil in Year 6.
King Duncan set us off with his desire to ‘terminate’ the Thane of Cawdor.
Some of the teachers became actors – an extra thrill for the students watching the staff fall in and out of love at the squeeze of a purple flower!
Merry Christmas from the FTW Family!
Merry Christmas! As the temperature outside plummets, I’m sitting here (wearing 4 layers) and hoping that you are all warm, safe and, somehow, surviving. It’s been a funny old year for FINDING THE WILL, We’ve worked in a mixture of old and new schools countrywide. Our performing work has been seen on screens in the UK and Ukraine, and live on stage in Canada and in the South West of England. Whilst the academic year 22/23 has got off to an inevitably slow start, thanks to the cost of living crisis in all walks of life, we remain optimistic for the coming year. We finished 2022 with a cracking morning at St Mary’s Catholic Primary School in Hornchurch – read about it in our last blog. Now, with the Christmas holidays in touching distance, we are looking forward to the new year. 2023 We’ll be back with a bang in January at one of our old favourites – Great Leighs Primary School, Essex. Nick and I will spend a week with KS2 working on A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM. In previous years we’ve tackled Macbeth, Romeo & Juliet, Twelfth Night and Hamlet, so this magical mayhem of a comedy promises to be great fun. And at Great Leighs everyone, even the Kitchen, gets completely involved! Following on we will revisit Whitehall Primary, Bristol for more of THE TEMPEST with Year 3, Castleview Primary, Slough for more of MACBETH and St Catherine of Siena, Lee Bank, Birmingham for both A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM and MACBETH. In April, we are thrilled to be part of the Merthyr Tydfil Children’s Literature Festival providing, amidst other things, MACBETH Interactive Workshops in Welsh! Catch us on screen! If you find yourself at a loose end over the Christmas holidays, or just feel like watching something a little different, can I encourage you to go to www.scenesaver.co.uk. Here, you will find all kinds of theatre productions – Christmas shows, children’s shows, drama, dance, comedy – which you can enjoy free of charge. You can make a donation, which will go directly to the production company if you wish, but there is no obligation. Type in NAMING THE VIEW and you will find our Arts Council England funded film which is available also in BSL, Signed or Audio Described versions. Scenesaver is a wonderful resource and, for us, is a direct result of working with ProEnglish Theatre’s ProAct Fest in Ukraine in the summer of 2022. Thanks Huge thanks to Jack, the talented artist who, unbeknownst to him, designed our Christmas card this year! Jack is 9 (maybe 10 now, not sure, sorry Jack!) and worked with us at BARKSTON & SYSTON CE PRIMARY near Grantham in June this year. We’d also like to thank all the Schools, Teachers, Head Teachers, Teaching Assistants, Support Staff, Office Staff, Governors, Parents, Patrons and, of course, Children that we have worked with and been in contact with throughout this year. It’s been tough, it will undoubtedly get tougher, but we cling on and, together, we will get through it! So all that’s left to say is: MERRY CHRISTMAS FROM JULES AND THE FINDING THE WILL FAMILY!