Storytelling and Story Drama Programs Celebrating Cultures from Around the World. Available Online! Storytelling and Story Drama Programs Celebrating Cultures from Around the World STORIES ON STAGE programs combine storytelling, drama, and song to explore world cultures. Our gifted performers become a variety of characters while bringing a story to life. Students "get into the act" too by participating in this riveting experience. STORIES ON STAGE programs are performed by one actor with audience participation. Programs are designed for audiences with a maximum of 200 students, unless otherwise specified. Choose from a variety of programs listed below, celebrating different cultures from around the world. Contact us or request more info for details! Bullies and Heroes: Folktales from Japan with Ali Oliver-Krueger Grades 3 - 8 Ali Oliver-Krueger weaves stories from her Japanese-American childhood with traditional Japanese mukashibanashi (Long-Ago Stories). What does it take to be a hero? When an ogre bullies a village, ordinary villagers must step up to become everyday heroes. This storytelling performance may be requested to be performed as an in-person or an online program. Silly Smarts: Folktales from Japan with Ali Oliver-Krueger Grades PreK-2 Ali Oliver-Krueger weaves stories from her Japanese-American childhood with traditional Japanese mukashibanashi (Long-Ago Stories) in this funny and heart-warming east-meets-west storytelling series. The stories in Silly Smarts emphasize the importance of using your smarts, and the pitfalls of being too smart for your own good and confusing "smart" with "wise". This storytelling performance may be requested to be performed as an in-person or an online program. A Journey Through Latin America with Marian Licha Grades K-6 This program weaves stories, song, and Latin American folk traditions together, including stories of the foolish and delightful Juan Bobo. This storytelling performance may be requested to be performed as an in-person or an online program. The Magic Tree PreK-5 A funny, uplifting story adapted from a Zambian folk tale. The animals of the grasslands are in terrible trouble—it hasn’t rained in ages, and everyone is hungry and thirsty! Their only hope is to find out how to get the fruit from a mysterious magic tree, but they must journey across the land to learn how...and they have to remember the secret on the long journey back! This storytelling performance may be requested to be performed as an in-person or an online program. Featured Plays Stories on Stage World Music Family Programs < Back to InterAct in Schools

Arts are for everyone ... and everyone learns through the arts! InterAct Story Theatre is a multidisciplinary arts-in-education organization and touring theatre for young audiences. InterAct Story Theatre Arts are for everyone, and everyone learns through the arts! interacting with our communities local performances, family workshops and community events interacting with students & learners arts education and arts integration programs for students and teachers interacting online interactive performances, school programs and community programs presented through virtual/online platforms FREE performances for kids and families! Wheaton Family Theatre Series Season 12: 2027 Dancing Our Way Through Books led by Kelly King Saturday, January 16 at 11 a.m. & Sunday, January 17, 2027 at 2 p.m. Event held at Highland Elementary School - 3100 Medway Street, Wheaton, MD 20902 FREE and open to the public! No tickets or registration needed. Join Kelly King, InterAct Story Theatre teaching artist and founder of Contradiction Dance Theatre and The Movement Movement as we'll explore a kid-friendly story through creative movement and dance. Kids get to practice reading skills while moving, dancing, and sharing stories with our families and friends. No prior dance training needed...just bring your body and get ready to move. What a fun way to dance away the winter blues! Best for ages 3 and up. Visit our Wheaton Family Theatre Series page for our list of programs New * Now * Next • Stay Tuned! We're busily planning for the rest of the fall and the second half of the 2026-2027 school year. Please continue to check this website for new Information. • Interested in bringing InterAct Story Theatre to your school or community event? We’re selecting now for classes and events. Click here for information on KidStory Theatre , our annual May stage festival and drama-based writing program celebrating stories written by kids for kids! • Our next Wheaton Family Theatre Series program is January 16 & 17. FREE event for kids and families! • Follow us on Facebook, and Instagram to stay up to date on the latest info!

InterAct Story Theatre’s Wheaton Family Theatre Series is a free, monthly performing arts series that runs each year fall through spring. Season 10 of Wheaton Family Theatre Series. Wheaton Family Theatre Series To keep up on the latest news about InterAct’s Wheaton Family Theatre Series Season 12 and get reminders about our next program dates, join our mailing list . We also invite you to check out our past seasons 1—11 by clicking on any of the season buttons! Season 12 Season 11 Season 10 Season 9 Season 8 Season 7 Season 6 Season 5 Season 4 Season 3 Season 2 Season 1 < Back to Community Page Season 10: 2024—2025 Past programs: Event held at Highland Elementary School - 3100 Medway Street, Wheaton, MD 20902 FREE and open to the public! No tickets or registration needed. This October, Tom Teasley, award-winning percussionist, world musician and composer returns to Wheaton! Tom dazzles audiences with an inspiring cross-cultural musical journey around the world, weaving ancient musical traditions with modern technology. A unique performance not to be missed! Great for all ages. Saturday, October 5 & Sunday, October 6, 2024 Award-winning world musician & composer Tom Teasley A Journey Around the World through Music Event held at Highland Elementary School - 3100 Medway Street, Wheaton, MD 20902 FREE and open to the public! No tickets or registration needed. In November we welcome Story Tapestries back to Wheaton Family Theatre Series. Their program features the dynamic Hip Hop artist Jamaal "Mr. Root" Collier. Jamaal's interactive and engaging Hip Hop-based performance is challenging, fun and entertaining! Each member of the audience has an opportunity to 'GET INVOLVED' with call-and-response, steady beat chants, pop quizzes, beat production and even some group dancing! Jamaal explains the importance of expressing yourself and explains how some legends of the culture have done the same. This performance is fun to watch but it's even better when you GET INVOLVED! Saturday, November 9 & Sunday, November 10, 2024 Story Tapestries featuring Jamaal "Mr. Root" Collier Event held at Highland Elementary School - 3100 Medway Street, Wheaton, MD 20902 FREE and open to the public! No tickets or registration needed. This January, celebrate the start of the New Year as InterAct Story Theatre’s Artistic Director, Ali Oliver-Krueger leads kids and adults in exploring a favorite folk tale together through movement, drama, and song. Everyone’s a part of the story in this Family Arts Workshop! Best for ages 3 and up. Sunday, January 12, 2025 A Family Literacy Fiesta with InterAct's Ali Oliver-Krueger Books Alive Saturday, February 22, 2025 Event held at Highland Elementary School - 3100 Medway Street, Wheaton, MD 20902 FREE and open to the public! No tickets or registration needed. Join Kelly King, InterAct Story Theatre teaching artist and founder of Contradiction Dance Theatre and The Movement Movement as we'll explore a kid-friendly folk tale through creative movement and dance. Kids get to practice reading skills while moving, dancing, and sharing stories with our families and friends. No prior dance training needed...just bring your body and get ready to move. What a fun way to dance away the winter blues! Best for ages 3 and up. Dancing Our Way Through Books led by Kelly King Event held at Highland Elementary School - 3100 Medway Street, Wheaton, MD 20902 FREE and open to the public! No tickets or registration needed. The Legend of Pufferfish Pat: A Tall Tale for Mad Times is a play set in the Old West, looking at how we deal with anger and other big feelings. When Pat gets angry, he blows up like a Pufferfish, which gets him a new name and a reputation that he doesn't want. With the little town of Gravy Gulch heating up for the annual gravy cook off, it's more important than ever that he keep his cool! Where can he go to find folks who might understand? The play is performed by actors appearing as a multitude of characters, with the whole audience becoming cowpokes and townspeople right from where they sit! Best for ages 5 and up. Saturday, March 15 & Sunday, March 16, 2025 The Legend of Pufferfish Pat: A Tall Tale for Mad Times Saturday, April 5 & Sunday, April 6, 2025 Event held at Highland Elementary School - 3100 Medway Street, Wheaton, MD 20902 FREE and open to the public! No tickets or registration needed. InterAct Story Theatre welcomes back our friends from Happenstance Theater as these charming vintage clowns play circus animals, sing as a human calliope, do a classic circus mirror routine, invent a number of ridiculous “entrées,” perform live music, and execute a preposterous slow motion number involving a pie! All ages. Photo credit: Leslie Swan Photography Happenstance Theatre: PREPOSTEROUS! Event held at Highland Elementary School - 3100 Medway Street, Wheaton, MD 20902 FREE and open to the public! No tickets or registration needed. All year long, InterAct Story Theatre artists create stories with kids, and invite them to share their epic stories with us. This May, we’re choosing some of our favorite stories written by kids over the years, as we present a series of short plays and stories performed by our InterActors. We can’t wait to see what kids dream up each year! Best for ages 4 and up. Saturday, May 17 & Sunday, May 18, 2025 KidStory Theatre Festival A theatrical celebration of stories written by kids for kids Mail List

InterAct Story Theatre’s Wheaton Family Theatre Series is a free, monthly performing arts series that runs each year fall through spring. Season 11 of Wheaton Family Theatre Series. Wheaton Family Theatre Series Season 11: 2025—2026 To keep up on the latest news about InterAct’s Wheaton Family Theatre Series and get reminders about our next program dates, join our mailing list . We also invite you to check out our past seasons 1—10 by clicking on any of the season buttons! Season 12 Season 11 Season 10 Season 9 Season 8 Season 7 Season 6 Season 5 Season 4 Season 3 Season 2 Season 1 < Back to Community Page InterAct Story Theatre's Encore Performance Bobtail Bong Bong A Monkey's Tale Saturday, October 18 & Sunday, October 19, 2025 Event held at Highland Elementary School - 3100 Medway Street, Wheaton, MD 20902 FREE and open to the public! No tickets or registration needed. Bob the Monkey is the smartest monkey in the land, and they want everyone to know it! Bob the Monkey wants what they want and they want it NOW! But...why is everyone mad at Bob? Bob didn’t do anything! In this interactive forum theatre experience for kids and families, audiences follow Bob’s madcap misadventures and help Bob figure out where they went wrong and got in trouble monkeying around. Led by InterAct Story Theatre’s Artistic Director Ali Oliver-Krueger, audience members make suggestions about how Bob could do things differently, and watch Bob and friends role play out their ideas. Can Bob flip the script and turn things around? Can Bob make things better by making better choices? Does it work? What happens next? Best for ages 4 and up. Happy Theater: The Light House Saturday, November 15 at 11 a.m. & Sunday, November 16, 2025 at 2 p.m. Event held at Highland Elementary School - 3100 Medway Street, Wheaton, MD 20902 FREE and open to the public! No tickets or registration needed. An interactive storytelling show with shadow puppets. On an island in a faraway sea, a little girl tends a lighthouse and never ever smiles…Until one day, when she must set out for the horizon beyond the sea! With live ukulele tunes, a ticklish octopus, and a little help from the audience, this interactive shadow puppetry tale celebrates kindness, magic adventures, and friendship. Inspired by the artist’s collection of lighthouses, this show by Happy Theater is about finding your own light, and how your light can help even faraway friends through a hard time. Best for ages 4 and up. Dancing Our Way Through Books led by Kelly King Saturday, January 10 at 11 a.m. & Sunday, January 11, 2026 at 2 p.m. Event held at Highland Elementary School - 3100 Medway Street, Wheaton, MD 20902 FREE and open to the public! No tickets or registration needed. Join Kelly King, InterAct Story Theatre teaching artist and founder of Contradiction Dance Theatre and The Movement Movement as we'll explore a kid-friendly story through creative movement and dance. Kids get to practice reading skills while moving, dancing, and sharing stories with our families and friends. No prior dance training needed...just bring your body and get ready to move. What a fun way to dance away the winter blues! Best for ages 3 and up. Books Alive with InterAct Story Theatre's Ali Oliver-Krueger Saturday, February 7 at 11 a.m. & Sunday, February 8, 2026 at 2 p.m. Event held at Highland Elementary School - 3100 Medway Street, Wheaton, MD 20902 FREE and open to the public! No tickets or registration needed. This February, InterAct Story Theatre’s Artistic Director, Ali Oliver-Krueger leads kids and adults in exploring a favorite folk tale together through movement, drama, and song. Everyone’s a part of the story in this Family Arts Workshop! Best for ages 3 and up. InterAct Story Theatre's Jewel the Great Saturday, March 14 at 11 a.m. & Sunday, March 15, 2026 at 2 p.m. Event held at Highland Elementary School - 3100 Medway Street, Wheaton, MD 20902 FREE and open to the public! No tickets or registration needed. InterAct Story Theatre's new play for elementary-age children and their families. Jewel is new to the small mountain town of Highview, where she struggles to fit in and make a name for herself. How can she get everyone to see her the way she wants to be seen? And what can she do when nothing seems to work, and everything she tries seems to blow up and make things worse? Children in the audience participate right from their seats, becoming members of Jewel’s community and helping Jewel along the way with problem solving. Best for ages 5 and up. TAHIRA The Storyteller Saturday, April 18 at 11 a.m. & Sunday, April 19, 2026 at 2 p.m. Event held at Highland Elementary School - 3100 Medway Street, Wheaton, MD 20902 FREE and open to the public! No tickets or registration needed. TAHIRA isn’t just a performer; she’s a tapestry artist, intricately weaving tales and melodies into experiences that ignite hearts and minds. TAHIRA’s high-energy performances are more than entertainment; they’re journeys of human brilliance revealed through laughter, tears, and the unifying power of music. With every song and story, she champions the arts as a catalyst for social change, lighting the way to a brighter future. All ages. KidStory Theatre Festival A theatrical celebration of stories written by kids for kids Saturday, May 16 at 11 a.m. & Sunday, May 17, 2026 at 2 p.m. Event held at Highland Elementary School - 3100 Medway Street, Wheaton, MD 20902 FREE and open to the public! No tickets or registration needed. All year long, InterAct Story Theatre artists create stories with kids, and invite them to share their epic stories with us. This May, we’re choosing some of our favorite stories written by kids, as we present a series of short plays and stories performed by our InterActors. We can’t wait to see what kids dream up each year! Best for ages 4 and up. Mail List Past programs:

InterAct Story Theatre’s Wheaton Family Theatre Series is a free, monthly performing arts series that runs each year fall through spring. Season 12 of Wheaton Family Theatre Series. Scroll Down Wheaton Family Theatre Series Season 12: January—May, 2027 To keep up on the latest news about InterAct’s Wheaton Family Theatre Series and get reminders about our next program dates, join our mailing list . We also invite you to check out our past seasons 1—11 by clicking on any of the season buttons! Season 12 Season 11 Season 10 Season 9 Season 8 Season 7 Season 6 Season 5 Season 4 Season 3 Season 2 Season 1 < Back to Community Page The Wheaton Family Theatre Series is a FREE public performing arts series for kids and families celebrating the rich diversity of our arts community. In season 12 of InterAct Story Theatre's Wheaton Family Theatre Series, we will present a series of interactive family events, for the Wheaton community, in theatre, dance, storytelling and world music completely FREE to the public! Thanks to the partnership support of Highland Elementary School and support from a plethora of community members; and funding from Maryland State Arts Council, Arts and Humanities Council of Montgomery County, and individual and corporate donors. Dancing Our Way Through Books led by Kelly King Saturday, January 16 at 11 a.m. & Sunday, January 17, 2027 at 2 p.m. Event held at Highland Elementary School - 3100 Medway Street, Wheaton, MD 20902 FREE and open to the public! No tickets or registration needed. Join Kelly King, InterAct Story Theatre teaching artist and founder of Contradiction Dance Theatre and The Movement Movement as we'll explore a kid-friendly story through creative movement and dance. Kids get to practice reading skills while moving, dancing, and sharing stories with our families and friends. No prior dance training needed...just bring your body and get ready to move. What a fun way to dance away the winter blues! Best for ages 3 and up. Books Alive with InterAct Story Theatre's Ali Oliver-Krueger Saturday, February 20 at 11 a.m. & Sunday, February 21, 2027 at 2 p.m. Event held at Highland Elementary School - 3100 Medway Street, Wheaton, MD 20902 FREE and open to the public! No tickets or registration needed. This February, InterAct Story Theatre’s Artistic Director, Ali Oliver-Krueger leads kids and adults in exploring a favorite folk tale together through movement, drama, and song. Everyone’s a part of the story in this Family Arts Workshop! Best for ages 3 and up. InterAct Story Theatre's Not My Monkey Saturday, March 20 at 11 a.m. & Sunday, March 21, 2027 at 2 p.m. Event held at Highland Elementary School - 3100 Medway Street, Wheaton, MD 20902 FREE and open to the public! No tickets or registration needed. Everything's topsy-turvy under the big top in InterAct Story Theatre's NOT MY MONKEY. The new circus leader is trying her best to lead her zany crew of circus folk, but there’s a new problem every time she turns around, and no one wants to pitch in or even try to get along. "Not my circus, not my monkeys!" they say. To make matters worse, the monkeys have broken loose and are wreaking havoc everywhere! How can everyone work together to catch those monkeys, when no one thinks it’s their problem to solve? And how can the community work together to stop the monkey madness? Everyone in the audience gets into the act right from where they’re sitting, becoming part of the community of performers and townspeople who need to tackle this hair-raising problem. Best for ages 5 & up. Guest Artist MORE INFO COMING SOON! Saturday, April 17 at 11 a.m. & Sunday, April 18, 2027 at 2 p.m. Event held at Highland Elementary School - 3100 Medway Street, Wheaton, MD 20902 FREE and open to the public! No tickets or registration needed. KidStory Theatre Festival A theatrical celebration of stories written by kids for kids Saturday, May 15 at 11 a.m. & Sunday, May 16, 2027 at 2 p.m. Event held at Highland Elementary School - 3100 Medway Street, Wheaton, MD 20902 FREE and open to the public! No tickets or registration needed. All year long, InterAct Story Theatre artists create stories with kids, and invite them to share their epic stories with us. This May, we’re choosing some of our favorite stories written by kids, as we present a series of short plays and stories performed by our InterActors. We can’t wait to see what kids dream up each year! Best for ages 4 and up. Mail List

Staff Workshops & Trainings. Professional Development for Teachers, Artists, and Care Providers. Online programs available. Staff Workshops & Trainings As experts in arts integration and linking the arts with classroom learning, InterAct Story Theatre provides professional development opportunities for teachers, artists, and child care providers. For information about professional development residencies, intensives and institutes, please click here . If you'd like to know about our 60-minute, 90-minute, 3 hour or full professional development workshops, please scroll down! InterAct Story Theatre is an approved provider of Core of Knowledge training through the Maryland Office of Child Care; if you are a Maryland provider or center interested in hosting a training, please contact us or request more info about which trainings are eligible for Core of Knowledge clock hours. New training workshops are being added. Please check back soon, or contact us or request more info ! REQUEST MORE INFO Professional Development for Teachers, Artists, and Care Providers Books Alive for Little Ones: Building Language and Literacy Skills through Drama and Music Grades preK-1 and early childhood care providers With Ali Oliver-Krueger Early Childhood teachers, Head Start teachers, and child care providers are asked not only prepare children for school readiness to provide expert care, but also to implement a wide variety of classroom curricula. In this workshop, participants will explore how imaginative exploration of books and stories through drama and music can help build language and literacy skills, and will learn techniques they can use to lead children in acting out stories in their own words. (OCC 3 curriculum clock hours) Creating Casual Opera in the Classroom: Building Reading Comprehension and Writing Skills through Music & Drama Grades K-5 and 6-8 With Ali Oliver-Krueger In this workshop emphasizing character traits and motivations, mood, emotions, and interior monologue (for older students), teachers learn techniques through which they can lead students in examining text, making inferences, and then applying those inferences to create casual classroom operatic scenes. This work is especially strong for Reading/Language Arts and Social Studies, and has been implemented successfully with students from ages 4 and up. Drama Games for the Student Brain Grades K-5, 6-8, 9-12 With Ali Oliver-Krueger In this training, participants learn simple yet engaging strategies that can be implemented in the classroom and adapted or expanded to address a plethora of goals and objectives. Particular emphasis is placed on articulating the rationale for drama gaming in the classroom and on providing participants with concrete strategies they can use right away to promote learning and help develop a wide range of skills. (OCC 3 curriculum clock hours). Picture This: Creating Effective Classroom Tableaux Grades 4 & up With Ali Oliver-Krueger A hallmark among strong readers is the ability to visualize and develop mental images of the actions and events described in texts. The creative drama strategy of tableaux fosters visualization skills and encourages students to develop and present strong sensory images, thereby strengthening understanding of text and allowing students to gain a deeper connection to the text. This strategy can be adapted to a variety of content areas, and is especially valuable in working with informational text. This workshop is also available as part of a professional development arts coaching residency. Reader's Theatre for Young Readers: A Creative Drama Approach Grades PreK-2 With Ali Oliver-Krueger Readers Theatre offers students opportunities to interact with text and build oral fluency. It provides repeated reading practice, which is a key factor in building fluency. Repeated reading practice also improves students’ and enthusiasm for reading and confidence in themselves as good readers. But how to implement Readers' Theatre with young readers whose skills are just developing? In this training, Ms. Oliver-Krueger leads participants through a creative drama-based process in which teachers develop and perform engaging readers' theatre scripts with their students. In this workshop, teachers discover how to create and host an imaginary talk show, "Books Alive!", in their classrooms. Students portray characters from a book and answer questions in role. The questions encourage the students to make predictions, draw inferences and examine the theme of the text. An amazingly fun way to achieve and assess reading comprehension! Jump Start Creative Writing Through Creative Drama Grades K-5, 6-8, 9-12, adult education With Ali Oliver-Krueger Sometimes the hardest part of writing is just getting started! In this professional development workshop led by InterAct Story Theatre’s Executive & Artistic Director Ali Oliver-Krueger, participants learn by playing and creating stories on the spot, exploring strategies that spark creativity and address prewriting skills, oral composition and discourse, speaking and listening skills. We'll engage in warm-up activities for getting brains moving quickly and flexibly, and strategies for facilitating brainstorming and collaborative composition, and tips for dramatizing stories as a way to review and identify points of revision. These include concrete, easy-to-apply "bite sized strategies" that teachers can apply quickly in a few minutes, expand into full arts-integrated lessons and units, or even use to springboard students into creative projects and deeper exploration of content. Music Detectives: Practicing Inferencing Skills through Music and Active Listening Grades K-5 and 6-8 With Ali Oliver-Krueger The ability to look beyond what is explicitly stated in order to make inferences is one of the key characteristics of strong readers, and is consistently one of the biggest challenges faced by struggling and reluctant readers today. This powerful strategy combines active listening, movement, and music to give students valuable practice in making inferences. Participants will learn the process of a Music Detectives lesson: learning and applying basic elements of music to examine musical samples, searching for clues, reading between the lines to make inferences, and then citing specific evidence from the "text" to support their theories. By giving students a chance to practice making inferences away from written text, we help students gain skills in predicting, drawing conclusions, and hazarding educated guesses, so that they can bring those skills to written text with greater confidence. Reading Between the Lines: Building Inferencing Skills through Music and Drama Grades K-5 and 6-8 With Ali Oliver-Krueger This workshop combines the strategies of Music Detectives and Creating Casual Opera, offering teachers a comprehensive approach to building reading comprehension and writing skills through drama. Teachers learn techniques to prompt inferences through active listening, acting, and simple composition. These strategies can be learned and applied by non-musicians and music enthusiasts alike! Black Belt Tableaux: Advanced Tableaux Skills for Assessment and the Common Core Grades 3-5, 6-8, 9-12 With Ali Oliver-Krueger Tableaux and Living Statues are among the first creative drama strategies that many teachers learn for integrating drama with classroom curriculum. But are you and your students getting the most you can out of this powerful and endlessly adaptable strategy?Designed primarily for teachers who have had some exposure to Tableaux, Living Statues, and/or Artful Thinking routines, this workshop explores advanced adaptations and extensions such as Conflict Webs and Statues, Internal/External Conflict, The Human Video Feed, Tableaux games, and effective uses of Tableaux as Assessment. In the half-day and full day workshops, teachers also have an opportunity to discuss and workshop ongoing work with this strategy, to brainstorm with Ms. Oliver-Krueger and their peers for ways to fine-tune and freshen up existing plans. This workshop is also available as part of a professional development arts coaching residency. A Creative Drama Approach to Reader's Theatre Grades K-8 With Ali Oliver-Krueger This workshop introduces simple creative-drama based techniques through which teachers can lead students in developing, planning and performing Readers' Theatre presentations rooted in literary text or content curricula. Readers' Theatre offers students opportunities to interact with text and build oral fluency. It provides repeated reading practice, which is a key factor in building fluency. Repeated reading practice also improves students’ and enthusiasm for reading and confidence in themselves as good readers. The process of developing and performing original Readers' Theatre scripts also gives students a fun, creative way to not only build their understanding of a text or topic but also demonstrate their understanding to others. Informational OPERAtunities: Exploring Informational Text through Music and Drama With Ali Oliver-Krueger Informational text can sometimes feel dry, and motivating students to dive in can seem like a daunting task. How can we inspire students to embrace informational text with the curiosity and zeal of artists? Many of the best composers, playwrights and performers dive into informational text and research to create artistic work by reading between the lines to imagine the actions, emotions, motivations and conversations. In this workshop, teachers learn techniques through which they can lead students in approaching informational texts like artists: examining sources, building knowledge, making inferences, and then applying those inferences to create casual classroom operatic scenes that breathe life into the topic through music and drama. A portion of the workshop is dedicated to brainstorming and planning practical applications for the classroom; teachers are encouraged to bring an example of informational text or curriculum planning materials they might like to explore with their students. < Back to InterAct in Schools

Arts Education & Arts Integration: Classroom Workshops. Elementary School. Available Online! ELEMENTARY SCHOOL These are just a sampling of the many arts-integrated workshops we do each year. All of these workshops can be expanded into a 2-, 3- or 4-day classroom residency in which the students explore the content area in depth through the arts. This allows us to provide a sequentially structured arts learning experience so we can really maximize student learning and create a deeper, more meaningful arts experience. REQUEST MORE INFO Arts Education & Arts Integration: Classroom Workshops We are constantly designing new workshops! In fact, most of the workshops you see here were originally designed because someone asked us, "Hey, InterAct...can you do a workshop on ___________ to address __________ objective?" WE LOVE THIS. It's really our favorite thing to do. The answer is almost always, "Sure. Let's put our heads together and see what we can create!" So, if you would like an arts integration experience for your students that you don't see here, please contact us or request more info so we can design something for you! Music & Creative Opera; Dance OPERABUILDING Grades 2-6 Students learn the basic elements of opera and explore how opera uses music and drama to tell a story. InterAct's Executive Artistic Director Ali Oliver-Krueger leads students through this lyrical adventure. Maximum 25 students (1 class) per 60-minute session. Note: This innovative and exciting workshop can be expanded into OPERAtunities for Writing, a 3-5 day residency linking creative opera with Writing and Reading Literature or Reading Informational Text. Drama BOOKS ALIVE Grades PreK-5 Books come to life as students explore age-appropriate text from children's literature or folklore through creative drama, and dramatize the text in their own words. Books Alive workshops can be designed to fit a variety of themes, topics, world cultures or curricular goals. Please contact us with your questions and ideas! Maximum 25-27 students (1 class) for each 45-minute session. RESPONSIVE PLAYMAKING & PLAYBUILDING Grades K-5 Through a variety of creative drama and short-form devising techniques, participants investigate a text, theme or curriculum topic as artists, and then collaborate in devising a short story, drama, or theatre piece in the classroom (or virtual classroom!). This is a great way to foster collaboration, social emotional skills and 21st century skills through theatre while building content knowledge. Responsive Playmaking can also be booked as a residency with multiple sessions with or without a sharing or informal performance. All stories are submitted for InterAct’s annual KidStory Theatre Festival, a celebration of stories written by kids for kids...and the best of the best are performed by professional actors at our festival in May!. The workshops are modified for varying grade levels. Maximum 25-27 students (1 class) for each 45-minute session. Drama (continued) DRAMA GAMES FOR THE SCIENTIFIC BRAIN Students build content knowledge and vocabulary through experimentation and drama gaming. The workshops are designed to meet specific benchmarks and indicators. Please contact us so we can design a workshop for you! Recent workshops have dealt with such topics as Motion and Force; Tectonic Plates and Earthquakes; The Digestive System; Atoms and Elements. A VISIT TO A COLONIAL VILLAGE The classroom is transformed into a colonial village as students take on their roles as colonists, each with a colonial occupation. Students learn and share information in-role about their occupations and display their wares in this fun and informative creative drama experience. Maximum 25 students (1 class) for each 60-minute session. Grades 4-5 GREEK AND ROMAN MYTHOLOGY Students explore mythology, the gods of Olympus, and the some of the cultural influences behind Greek and Roman mythology. Maximum 25-27 students (1 class) for each 60-minute session. Grades 4-8 TALL TALES: STORIES OF WESTWARD EXPANSION Tall Tales are exaggerated stories about the taming of America's West. Students dramatize key moments of a Tall Tale and explore its relationship to our nation’s growth. Maximum 25-27 students (1 class) for each 45-minute session. Grades 3-6 Early Childhood Elementary School Middle & High School Students < Back to InterAct in Schools

Parent-Child Workshops & Family Literacy Events. Available Online! Parent Workshops & Literacy Events InterAct Story Theatre's Parent-Child workshops and Family Literacy events offers parents and caregivers ideas they can use at home to build literacy and language skills through the arts. Parents observe teaching artists work with their children, and then learn how they can play, sing, and act with their children at home. A fun and educational experience for all! In most cases, programs can be presented both in-person or virtual. Click on the Request More Info button below! We are currently developing and piloting several new family programs rooted in drama, music, dance, and puppetry, so please check back! REQUEST MORE INFO Parent-Child Workshops & Family Literacy Events Sing and Swing a Story PreK and up Parents and children sing, dance, act and play together as they explore a children's book. Designed for playgroups with children ages 0-3 years old, this special program also helps children with language development, fine and gross motor skills, and self-regulation. Story Can Theatre PARENT-CHILD WORKSHOP FOR GRADES PREK-1 Parents and children participate in a delightful workshop in which a story is told through miniatures and toys (see Story Can Theatre Workshop description above). The children dramatize part of the story and the parents make several effective storytelling activities that they can use at home to promote literacy and thinking skills. This popular program is being used in schools nationwide. Building Dialogue and Community One Story At a Time AN INTER-GENERATIONAL STORY SHARING EXPERIENCE FOR CHILDREN GRADES 3 AND UP AND ADULTS Telling stories is a meaningful way to transmit history, values and cultures in families, schools and communities. In this workshop, participants tell, listen, and retell stories in a process designed to celebrate our stories and build community across the generational divide. This workshop enhances oral language, listening skills, prewriting skills, and builds bridges between storytellers from ages 8 to 108. Songbuilding PARENT-CHILD WORKSHOP FOR GRADES PREK-K Parents and children share in a rich music experience as they sing songs and learn about various musical instruments (See Songbuilding Workshop description above). The parents then create their own personal lullaby for their children. The lullaby focuses on their wishes, dreams and hopes for their family. A CD of both the songs sung in the workshop and the melody of the lullaby is given to each family. A warm, rich and meaningful family event. Literacy Fiesta! Bringing Read-Alouds to Life A LITERACY WORKSHOP FOR PARENTS AND CHILDREN Research shows that reading aloud with our children is one of the most important things we can do to help build strong readers. But how can we make read-alouds fun and engaging for you and your children? And what if we’re not so comfortable reading for ourselves? In this workshop, parents participate with children in fun arts-based activities with a book, then learn tips and techniques for engaging children in lively and fun read-alouds at home—even if you don’t love reading for yourself! Different workshops are available for early childhood, primary, and elementary school-age children and their families. < Back to InterAct in Schools

Professional Development Residencies. Arts Coaching Residencies. Student Residencies PLUS Professional Development Workshop(s). Available Online! Professional Development Residencies REQUEST MORE INFO Arts Coaching Residencies--I Do, We Do, You Do Available Online! In these popular and effective residencies, an InterAct teaching artist works hand-in-hand with classroom teachers. They plan lessons together integrating drama with the on-going curriculum. The teaching artist demonstrates a lesson and on succeeding visits co-teaches with the classroom teachers. The design of this residency follows the guidelines for best practice procedures for effective staff development. The residency has been implemented successfully in school systems nationwide. Please contact us or request more info for details. Student Residencies PLUS Professional Development Workshop(s) Available Online! Many of our Professional Development workshops can be combined with student workshops to create an extended artist-in-residence experience that benefits students and teachers alike. This is often a great first step for schools and teachers who would like to explore arts integration in the classroom: An InterAct professional development workshop on a particular strategy, followed by a series of student workshops in which InterAct artists apply that strategy in the classroom, modeling the strategy for teachers so they can see it come to life with their students. Interested in knowing more? Please contact us or request more info for details. < Back to InterAct in Schools

One Gold Coin–Una moneda de oro Click Here to read the review by Theatre Bloom Five Stars! September 12, 2016 “Working to serve the company’s mission of actively involving young audiences in the production in a way that is interactive, Director Ali Oliver-Krueger and her performance team of three achieve the high standard set by this statement and the result is a fantastical time for everyone in attendance. From pre-show Gold-Coin making activities to the chance to be a part of the plot by singing, gesturing, and other interactive moments, Oliver-Krueger ensures that everyone who sees the show gets the maximum InterAct Story experience from doing so.” < Back to Press

About these residency sessions/videos: This virtual residency is a recreation of an in-person residency conducted with kindergarten students in Spring 2020. The residency was designed to integrate creative drama (story dramatization and responsive playmaking) with Math (Counting & Cardinality; Operations), Speaking & Listening, and Reading Literature. Like our other programs, our residency design process applies principles of Universal Design for Learning (UDL) and best practices in working with students who are ELL/ESOL to create programming that is flexible and allows students to participate meaningfully in the least restrictive, most supportive environment possible. The original residency was 4 30-minute sessions long; virtual sessions were adapted and piloted with a planned structure of six 15- to 20-minute sessions in mind, based on the needs and scheduling constraints shared by our school partners. For the purpose of these review videos, each video fuses together what would be two 15-20 minute sessions into one 30-minute session, so reviewers can see the entire story or story-building process if they so choose. The six sessions of this residency are planned as follows: Session 1: What is acting? Warm-up; use voice, body, imagination to become a character in today's story; share first 1/2 of story; reflect, closing ritual, and transition to classroom teacher for next activity. Session 2: Warm up; assess recall of the first half of the story, and reinforce recall as needed; share 2nd half of story; sequence the main events of the story; reflect; closing ritual, and transition to classroom teacher for next activity. Session 3: Warm-up, introduce acting tools and skills chart (Imagination, Voice, Body, Imagination, Cooperation, Concentration), review story as actors; dramatize story using Group Role Drama or Simultaneous Drama as appropriate to needs, progress and skills of students; reflect, closing ritual, and transition to classroom teacher for next activity. Session 4 and Session 5: After warming up and reviewing acting tools and skills, the teaching artist leads students in students working together to create a new, original story based on the story we learned and acted out in sessions 1 - 3. In this residency, students create a sequel for "Rooster's Off to See the World", in which Rooster goes on a trip to a new setting. We create the first half of the story in session 4, the second half in session 5. Sessions close with reflection, closing ritual and transition. Session 6: Following the same basic procedure as Session 3, students dramatize the sequel they created. The residency closes with final reflection, ritual closing, and transition. Online Residency Submission for MSAC review: Rooster’s Off to See the World (K-2) Thank you for reviewing this online performance for addition to InterAct Story Theatre’s AiE Roster listing! InterAct Story Theatre has visiting performances for a wide range of educational and family audiences. This program was designed for students in grades PreK-1, some of whom are with a teacher in a classroom, and some of whom are at home with a family member. Advance Planning and Technical Preparation A Technical Rider outlining the program coordination and tech rehearsal process is uploaded below. In addition to this tech packet, partner organizations also receive access to asynchronous learning materials on InterAct’s web portal and/or Google Classroom for the workshop/residency, and links to feedback forms. CLICK HERE FOR TECHNICAL RIDER CLICK HERE TO WATCH "DAY 1-2" VIDEO: INTRODUCING THE STORY/DRAMA + MATH! CLICK HERE TO WATCH "DAY 4-5" VIDEO: CREATING A SEQUEL

InterAct Story Theatre in Schools: Touring productions and arts-in-education programs for learners of all ages. InterAct in Schools Scroll Down Touring productions and arts-in-education programs for learners of all ages Since 1981, InterAct Story Theatre has brought a wide variety of educational, interactive performances, plays, and assembly programs to schools, libraries, and community venues, all throughout the area, delighting children, families, and educators alike. InterAct Story Theatre is partnering with schools and community partners across the country to deliver in-person and virtual/online options for workshops, artist-in-residence programs, performances, family programs, and professional development opportunities for educators and artists. Follow the links below. In most cases, programs can be presented both in-person or virtual. If you don’t see what you’re looking for, ask us about designing a program just for you and your students! One of our favorite things to do is to design programs with our partners...in fact, many of the programs you see on our website were originally designed in response to requests by parents, teachers, kids, and community partners. Contact us or request more info to talk with us about how we can present or design an in-person or virtual/online arts program for your school or your community. We’re cooking up some new and creative programs—so check back with us or join our mailing list to stay in the loop with the latest information! REQUEST MORE INFORMATION Performances & Assembly Programs Arts Education & Arts Integration: Classroom Workshops Arts Education & Arts Integration: Artist-in-Residence Programs Out of School Time Programs KidStory Theatre Parent Workshops & Literacy Events Staff Workshops & Trainings Clinics & Master Classes Professional Development Residencies Back to Home Page Add to Mailing List