For Teachers: Polyglot Theatre Professional Development Workshop

Presented by Polyglot Theatre and Arts Centre Melbourne

This professional development session is a unique opportunity to connect directly with the expert artists from Polyglot Theatre who create and deliver When the World Turns in specialist and special development schools across Victoria.

Participants will be guided through highly interactive and collaborative exercises, inviting them to experiment with instinctive, sensory approaches. They will gain a deeper understanding of how Polyglot uses biophilic principles and theatrical techniques to create transformative environments for children in their own school settings, and explore how the educator can facilitate authentic agency and become the learner, participant and observer.

Through Polyglot’s distinctive philosophy and process, and focus on child-led practice, participants will develop new skills and ideas in interpreting and building on the responses from all children.

When the World Turns, a collaboration between Polyglot Theatre (AUS) and Oily Cart (UK) was originally commissioned by Arts Centre Melbourne for major arts and disability festival Alter State 2022. It is a fantastical, theatrical production created for and with young people with complex disability, leading a participatory audience into a sensory state of mind and body. In 2023, a schools version was developed. The partnership between Arts Centre Melbourne and Polyglot to take the show directly to the young people with and for whom it was made – those who often face the greatest access barriers – achieves new levels of accessibility, and was nationally recognised in August 2024 with a PAC Australia IMPACT Award.