African-American Shadow Plays

This program wove many strands of culture, history, language and visual arts, culminating in filmed live performances. Sixth- to eighth-graders studied the African storytelling tradition and learned to do a literary analysis of folktales in order to adapt them into plays. Then they made shadow puppets for their characters and produced and performed their plays, first as part of the Black History program and again for the community. A project this multidimensional takes vision on the part of well-organized, knowledgeable and dedicated educators.

Watch the students shed light on the shadow puppet process