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Kari Mjaaland Heggstad


LECTURE: Thursday, 18. 10. 2018 from 10.30 to 11.30


about children’s creativity and critical thinking in drama

The lecture focuses on some of the general principles for drama in education (DIE) / process drama: The importance of protection, working within a penalty-free zone, equality, collectivity, improvisation, exploration and reflection. Through theory and practical examples, I will discuss how we through fictional frame can stimulate children’s curiosity and imagination and help develop their creativity and critical thinking in working within the frame of DIE/process drama. 

A parallel and connected focus is on the challenges the facilitator/teacher meets in such processes. How can the facilitator secure this space for participatory learning? How can s/he create drama processes which stimulate and help develop each participant and the group? Which creative and artistic skills do the facilitator need? How can s/he facilitate the practical work in a democratic and open way – in kindergartens or class rooms?

WORKSHOP: Thursday, 18. 10. 2018 from 17.00 to 19.00



workshop for primary and secondary teachers

The pre-text for the workshop comes from an old chronical. I have applied it in three different ways or traditions.  Here we will explore the theme through process drama and experience how a group gradually steps into a fiction, creates a society and deals with the situations that occurs. We will use different strategies in the collective work and sum up the workshop through the focus on imagination, creativity and critical thinking.

WORKSHOP:Friday, 19. 10. 2018 from 15.00 to 17.00



workshop for preschool educators

The workshop will offer an example of how the teacher can use a children’s game as pre-text for a process drama.  The session shows how a game with strict rules can be transformed into a dramatic narrative and give the children possibility to create a fiction and be active participants in it. We sum up the workshop by discussing the facilitator’s challenges in a session like this as to opening up for each child’s imagination and input – but also move the group on to a next step. This workshop has also been adjusted to school children up to the age of 12-13.




WORKSHOP: Saturday, 20. 10. 2018 from 9.30 to 11.30


workshop for upper primary and secondary teachers 

370,000 people are reported missing in the UK each year. 70% of them are under the age of 18 years. Is your curiousity aroused? Would you like to know why they go missing? Where they go to? What happens to them? This workshop will illustrate how drama can be used to explore questions that relate to young people’s concerns and personal experiences. Drama may be no better placed to answer difficult questions than any other area of the curriculum but what it does very well is use curiousity and creativity to empower young people to think about how issues relate to them and how that makes them feel.


katrine Heggstad


LECTURE: Friday, 19. 10. 2018 from 9.30 to 10.30

"FROM TEXT TO THEATRE" -ways to trigger curiosity and focus

“From text to theatre” is a methodology-device for drama teachers. The approach aims at opening up theatre scripts to young people before they go and watch a play. The lecture will address the potential of this methodology. Ideally “from text to theatre”-projects are in collaboration with a theatre institution; getting access to script and rehearsals. The drama teacher creates a workshop for young people, based on observations and reading the script.  Important questions when planning: Is there a need for an historical context, a thematic context for this play? Which parts of the text seem crucial? Which dramatic forms fit this performance? How can I best open the material for young people without spoiling the performance?  


These workshops have the potential of sharpening a focus on what you see, hear and sense, when experiencing the performance. The approach triggers curiosity and it involves everyone in the classroom in a bodily, verbal and sensuous way.

WORKSHOP:Friday, 19. 10. 2018 from 15.00 to 17.00


workshop for primary teachers 

This workshop introduces the participants to Astrid Lindgren’s children’s novel Brothers Lionheart, which addresses child death and the imaginative place after death called Nangiala, which is the land of fairytales. The workshop was originally developed as a “from text to theatre”-workshop for age 8-11. The poetics of the story is explored through teacher’s narration, writing in role, humming, ritual, collective improvisation and teacher-in- role.




workshop for preschool educators 

The story which is explored is about friendship. The joy of having someone to play with, and also difficulties around friendship. How can you know a friend is a friend? Through the workshop we explore the life of the two main characters in the children’s novel Waffle hearts, by Maria Parr. We play, we mime, we create still images, etc. This workshop is designed for age 3-5, 6-8, 9-11. This workshop will give examples on how the same story can be targeting different age groups through different approaches.