ESF Discovery College Theatre

06/07/2024

So proud of all my students! Such fab results for each of you!! ### onwards and upwards my chickens 🎉

26/08/2023

24 hour play starts today at 3.30 pm, at Discovery College, Theatre Studio 2

03/01/2022

Happy New Year!

After such a long time waiting in the wings for live theatre to return, we filled Term 1 with as many mini productions, events and workshops as we could manage. It was lovely to see our students collaborate face-to-face and perform in front of live audiences again!

A LOOK BACK: 'Down to the Basement' - A Halloween event produced with the help of our Secondary Theatre Club and Stage Crew. - Oct 29th, 2021

03/01/2022

Happy New Year!

After such a long time waiting in the wings for live theatre to return, we filled Term 1 with as many mini productions, events and workshops as we could manage. It was lovely to see our students collaborate face-to-face and perform in front of live audiences again!

A LOOK BACK: Our Year 11's in a Musical Theatre taster workshop with Ms. Mandy Petty from The Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts 香港演藝學院 - HKAPA! The workshop was organised as a sneak peek into what the Performing Arts Career-related Programme (CP) course is like.

03/01/2022

Happy New Year!

After such a long time waiting in the wings for live theatre to return, we filled Term 1 with as many mini productions, events and workshops as we could manage. It was lovely to see our students collaborate face-to-face and perform in front of live audiences again!

A LOOK BACK: Our Year 11's class production of Natalie Mitchell's play, 'When They Go Low'. - Nov 2nd & 4th, 2021

03/01/2022

Happy New Year!

After such a long time waiting in the wings for live theatre to return, we filled Term 1 with as many mini productions, events and workshops as we could manage. It was lovely to see our students collaborate face-to-face and perform in front of live audiences again!

A LOOK BACK: Our Year 12's class production of Alan Ayckbourn's 'Confusions' - Oct 6th & 7th, 2021

25/09/2021

Yesterday Year 8 Theatre students completed their final Bus Stop Mask performance from their Mime and Mask unit. Working in groups of 4, students were asked to create 3 minute long scenes applying the “Rules of Masks,” as well as showing and passing focus, and using major and minor characters. Students were instructed that the scene was to take place at a bus stop and the characters were to enter one by one. None of the characters were to know each other, but an event happens which unites them, causing them to interact. …and ACTION!

26/03/2021

A couple weeks ago, our Y13 DP Theatre students performed their final original solo pieces. We'll be uploading them over the next few days - check them out!

'𝐃𝐞𝐚𝐫 𝐌𝐞,'

"A person receives a letter from his 2050 self, detailing the potential future to come."

- James Rajic - Knight

25/03/2021

A couple weeks ago, our Y13 DP Theatre students performed their final original solo pieces. We'll be uploading them over the next few days - check them out!

'𝐒𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐨𝐟 𝐀𝐛𝐫𝐚𝐡𝐚𝐦'

"Wearing one of his old shirts, I perform verbatim stories my late grandfather told me about growing up in a Yiddish immigrant community in Australia."

- Abbey Oshlack

24/03/2021

A couple weeks ago, our Y13 DP Theatre students performed their final original solo pieces. We'll be uploading them over the next few of days - check them out!

Xavier Carey performs his original solo piece, '- 𝟏𝟗', "a timelapse of unfortunate events, sponsored by Corona.”

31/08/2020

Piñata Production present Boxes - a virtual 24 hour play.

5 Students who have never all been in the same classroom at the same time, create, devise and perform a new play in 24 hours.

29/08/2020

Just over two hours to go!

TODAY at 4pm, our Y12 Theatre students will present their 24 Hour play called 'Boxes'.

Obviously this would usually involve the students staying in school for 24 hours but Covid restrictions meant we had to think outside the box so this is all happening via zoom.

You can watch the performance here -
https://zoom.us/j/91797579084?pwd=OEU4OXh5amhGOXNnWDNWdlFTSlhEUT09

Come join us for our first performance of the year.

29/08/2020

29/08/2020

29/08/2020

Good morning everyone.

We are running a little behind schedule and will be online at the following times today. This is in no way to do with the fact some of the cast are still asleep@

8.15am
10.45am.

Of course our performance is live on our zoom webinar at 4pm today. All details in the pinned post at the top of the page.

28/08/2020

Tomorrow, Saturday 29th August at 4pm, our Y12 Theatre students will present their 24 Hour play called 'Boxes'.

Obviously this would usually involve the students staying in school for 24 hours but Covid restrictions meant we had to think outside the box so this is all happening via zoom.

You can watch the performance here -
https://zoom.us/j/91797579084?pwd=OEU4OXh5amhGOXNnWDNWdlFTSlhEUT09

We will also be going live HERE on FB at the following times so you can check in and see what they have been getting up to.

Friday Evening - 7pm
Friday Night - 10pm
Saturday Morning - 8am
Saturday Morning - 11am

Come join us for our first performance of the year.

20/04/2020

Keep holding on! ❤️

Virtual choirs are on the rise, and this is your chance to get in on one!

Keepholdingon2020's project founder Jane Engelmann believes that everyone can sing, whether you're a seasoned performer or a nervous beginner.

Whilst we can't physically gather, there's nothing to stop you from becoming part of Sing HK's virtual choir!

Follow the link below and share with all the music lovers you know 🥰

Whilst we can't physically sing together at the moment, we can sing together virtually. We have formed a crowd-sourced choir, Keep Holding On 2020 with Jane Engelmann, and will put our hearts and voices together to be united in song

20/01/2020

Buckets
A play about life, death and all the magical moments in between.

Come support our Year 12 Theatre students tomorrow evening at 7:00 PM!

WHEN: Tue 21st Jan 2020 at 7:00 PM
WHERE: Discovery College Blackbox Theatre (LG/F Entrance)

11/11/2019

Come along and support our Year 13 Drama students' final Collaborative performances, 'Mannequin', 'Mosaic' and ';'.
WHEN: Wednesday 13th November 2019, 7PM
WHERE: Discovery College Theatre

05/11/2019

Proud of our student technical crew who have been helping The BIG Picnic team get this awesome community event up and running - they'll be helping out on the BIG day too!

You can buy your wristbands for a discounted HKD 80 at Siena Park (cash only) from 3:00 - 3:30pm today, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday 🤘🏼🎶

Shout out to ESF Discovery College Theatre's student technical crew and Discovery College PTA who have been supporting us!

04/10/2019

On Wednesday and Thursday, Year 12 DP Theatre students performed their collaborative project pieces in the Blackbox and Whitebox - congratulations!

18/09/2019

Warm up time! Auditions for this year's secondary school are underway - watch this space 🙂

13/09/2019

On Thursday, our Year 12 and 13 DP/CP Theatre students had the amazing opportunity to work with renowned theatre company, Gecko Theatre who performed their production, at Hong Kong City Hall last weekend. Students had a wonderful time working on their physical theatre, devising and creative skills with their workshop leaders Katie and Miguel.

Our Year 12s, who attended the Post - 16 ESF Drama Conference at Renaissance College had another opportunity to work with Gecko again today.

“[The Gecko Workshop] was an amazing experience and very unique as we are unable to experience physical theatre to this extent in an everyday class. Every activity we had done led up to another and further enhanced our understanding of physical theatre and its involvement in many aspects of our expression and performing a piece.” - Khusi RANA, Year 13

“I found it very interesting and useful to create a story through physical devised work. I personally have not done [this] before but found very beneficial especially when having trouble creating a story.” - Sophie TELFORD, Year 13

02/09/2019

Last Friday at 3:30pm, Additional 6 - our Year 12 DP Theatre students - began working on their 24 Hour Play. They had 24 hours to devise, rehearse and perform an original piece of theatre titled 'Time'.

30/08/2019

Our very first production of the year!

Tonight, the Drama Department and Year 12 students will be staying at school overnight devising a play in 24 Hours. The performance will be at 3.30pm on Saturday 31st August in the Black Box studio - see you there!

27/06/2019

On the 25th of June, Discovery College hosted the annual ESF Post-16 Drama Conference, which was attended by students and teachers from five ESF schools; Island school, South Island school, West Island school, King George V and Renaissance College. With over 50 students attending, we certainly had a full house!

The day opened with a short welcome ceremony, an introduction by Mark Beach and an icebreaker activity that had the kids laughing and playing together as if they had been friends for years. This was followed by four workshops led by professional practitioners, all based in Hong Kong, teaching the students authentic practices which will inform their learning through their respective senior education programmes such as IBDP, CP or BTech in Theatre. In groups of around 13 students, workshops were held around DC in the Theatre, White Box studio, Black box studio and Michael Fraser's Design room.

Marsha Roddy, led a workshop on set design, where students built miniature sets based on emotions, transitions and mood as stimuli. Zani led a workshop on clowning, where students danced in the dark, wore their red noses and learned about being open, making meaningful eye contact and slow head turns between silly walks. Victoria Akhurst, from Dance for Life, taught students some simple dance moves which they then developed into stunning choreographies, each telling a moving and emotional narrative. Simpson and Katie worked with students to morph simple lengths of cloth into a multitude of different objects, finally settling on a pair of soft googly eyes which, when affixed to a master puppeteer hand, became the life of little characters.

Our year 12 students attended with great enthusiasm and were perfect role models of behaviour, engagement and active participation, and they had a fabulous day. Our thanks to them for being so welcoming to other ESF students! Of course, we extend our thanks to all the staff who helped too - the wonderful receptionists who made sure everyone was welcome and signed in, Michael for the use of his room, Steven for arranging the wifi, and Jay and the canteen staff for providing a much-enjoyed lunch for our hard-working workshop leaders.

As this an annual event, next academic year we look forward to the ESF Post-16 Drama conference hosted at Renaissance in September for our newest Year 12 cohort.

26/06/2019

Theatre-in-Education (TIE) is a term coined in the 60's and typically includes a theatre company performing in an educational setting (i.e. a school) for youth, including interactive and performative moments. TIE seeks to educate young people on issues that are relevant to both them and their communities, for example; bullying, environmental preservation, and peer conflict resolution.

Continuing on from the success of last year, this year we developed this unit further with our Year 11 Drama class, focusing on TIE and the fostering the relationship we have with our special ESF sister school Jockey Club Sarah Roe School (JCSRS). The students at JCSRS all have complex learning needs, and yet all love Drama as much as our students do!

In collaboration with colleagues at JCSRS, we built a unit of learning which focusses on our DC students creating, performing and supporting original theatre works specifically designed for a young special needs audience, set into the current JCSRS learning unit of inquiry. The unit was focused on 'Looking after myself' and had themes of personal hygiene, personal safety, and making the right choices for ourselves.

Our year 11 students researched the relevant issues, explored similar materials for the allocated age groups and then, in groups, created a short play with accompanying activity to support the learning.

On the 11th of June, our Year 11 Drama class culminated the TIE unit with a trip to JCSRS to perform six pieces of theatre and run their activities with students across the age groups of 5-19. Our students did a great job, and learned so much from the process. Their empathy, friendliness and teaching skills were heartwarming to watch, and the students at JCSRS all loved the performances and interaction with our students during their activities.

In response to the feedback received from last year's students, Holly Manning, the arts coordinator at JCSRS, and I decided to integrate our students more during the day -so in times when they were not performing, our DC students spent time with specific classes, experienced the Sensory Integration Room, and assisted in the Living skills room and in the cafe run by their students.
We are very pleased with the outcome of this unit - and as always, I couldn't be prouder of my year 11 Drama students!

- Danielle Veilleux