Spotlight on Drama Club at Greenfield School

As the school day ends, a group of students race from every corner of the building and burst into the auditorium at breakneck speed: 15 impossibly energetic youngsters, ages six through eight, scuttling across the hardwood stage. Club leader Dani Lencioni calmly steps to the front of the pack and, as if yielding a magic wand, utters one word: “neutralize.” All fifteen sets of hands clap twice and the room falls silent. So begins every Tuesday session of the ASAP Drama Club at Albert M. Greenfield School.

Lencioni proceeds to lead the group through lessons filled with wacky games, side-splitting role play, and off-the-wall oral exercises. Second grader Aloshade explains, “When I make my voice very small I sound like a mouse, and when I make my voice really big I sound like a giant!” Hidden in each activity is a different element of Lencioni’s well-planned drama curriculum, one that exposes youth to basic theatrical concepts such as character, story, and voice.

Second-grader Isabella says that she likes rehearsing for plays and all the hard work that it entails. When asked about learning her lines she says, “I say them for three hours and then I memorize them. It’s kind of hard at first, three hours feels like 100 days!” Of course that discipline pays off on opening night when she, “feels relaxed that the play has finally come.” And at Greenfield the play comes more often than not, with four student productions taking place each school year.

Parents and teachers at Greenfield note the students’ overwhelmingly positive response to the school’s two drama clubs. Shameera Simmons, the mother of a second-grader in the club, says that her daughter tugs on her sleeve every Tuesday morning and reminds her, “Mom, Tuesday, drama!” Second grade teacher Mr. Sommerville also sees the club as a motivator for students that “enriches their participation in school.”

Parent Lisa Criniti-Ciervo attests, “The sense of community the program has sparked at Greenfield is incalculable: parents working together on props and costumes; families and peers coming out on performance nights to enjoy the students’ performances…I could go on!”

Principal Dan Lazar concurs: “Being able to offer our students this type of enrichment makes our school a better and safer place…it is evident that the children and community love the program.”

Lencioni sees drama as a spark plug for the students’ imagination, a catalyst that “gets them to use their creativity in new ways.” The students are “learning how to be confident in their bodies and confident in front of others.” In fact, she says that drama club at Greenfield school is all about one word: “confidence.” Well, maybe that and “neutralize.”