While Indigenous knowledges have long recognised forests as sentient and caring societies, western sciences have only acknowledged that trees communicate, learn and care for one another in recent years. These different ways of coming to know and engage with trees as sentient agents are further complicated by the introduction of digital…

This paper explores young people's aspirations and the influence of community drama in shaping these arts-focussed aspirations. Research was undertaken using creative drama methods with young people who attend a youth drama group. The young people identified career and personal aspirations, recognising the hard work and support that it can take to…

This paper presents the provocation that 'unmediatised liveness', or experiences not filtered through digital technology, is vital to performances that promote recovery, resistance, and survival among young people in response to the climate crisis. Our provocation draws from interviews conducted with youth theatre and performance practitioners in…

Actors create theatre with and for with children in diverse theatrical, educational and therapeutic contexts but little is known about the 'artistry' of their practice. This paper analyses a theatrical encounter between a child and an actor and identifies four key qualities of 'pedagogically tactful' (van Manen 2016) actor practice: listening,…

This article recounts a day at Mexican writer, activist, educator, and performance artist Lia García's "elementary school": a "school" that takes the form of invited performances in other teachers' classrooms. It studies García's staging of an applied theatre workshop at an elementary school in November 2020 with her children's…

Arts programs have much value to offer children and educators alike, and so it is important to seek avenues for providing these enriching opportunities. Emerging from the collective and personal traumas experienced during the COVID-19 pandemic, arts programming may play an especially important role in welcoming students back to schools,…

This article explores how intergenerational performance ecology might distinctively contribute to developing an ecological performance practice. It focuses on a practice-led research project, "Wild Life"--a collaboration with professional and nonprofessional child and adult performers. Drawing on critical perspectives in ecology and…

The experience of visiting a zoo as a child can be remembered decades later and potentially influences future environmental attitudes. In light of steadily growing criticism of the ethics and value of live animal shows, some zoos are seeking alternative means of delivering 'edutainment' to a broad audience. One such alternative is through theatre.…

As children with autism spectrum disorder become adults, social participation continues to be an area of need. Within creative arts, there is a growing body of literature about the use of theatre arts, improvisational theatre, and improvisational techniques as a way to address social participation for individuals with autism spectrum disorder. The…

This report details examples of praxis in the creation and presentation of "Joy Fear and Poetry": an intermedial theatre performance in which children aged 7-12 years generated aesthetic gestures using a range of new media forms. The impetus for the work's development was a desire to make an intervention into habituated patterns of…

An artists' residency in a primary school in regional Victoria Australia staged a production of Shakespeare's "King Lear" in a local theatre. A qualitative, reflective practitioner research study into this project collected and analysed data from participating children and their community audience that gave some insight into their…

While the known health impacts of sedentary lifestyles have focused attention on children's outdoor activity, the development of their physical literacy -- the physiological, social, cultural, cognitive, expressive, and psychological dimensions of their physicality -- is much less in focus. Developing children's physical literacy is embedded in…

The author's entry into the Applied Theatre field coincided with "Research in Drama Education" ("RiDE's") inaugural issue in 1996 and, for the ensuing two decades, her practice has been primarily with "vulnerable" children. The purpose of this article is to interrogate a growing concern: that applied theatre's…

This paper is a study of a Malayalam documentary play "Not Just the Victims" staged by Abhinaya Theatre Research Centre Trivandrum. Along with analyzing the documentary method of the play this study looks at how the theatre group employed the play for "re-educating" the people regarding certain existing norms. The play…

Asset-based community development (ABCD) is a promising practice for communities to engage in self-determination through the efforts residents invest in identifying community assets, framing and documenting the issues communities face, and taking action to advance quality of life. The ABCD literature does not report on the application of ABCD…