This unit includes activities and assessment linked to the Early Years Learning Framework. Teachers can choose to use individual activities to complement existing drama units or complete the entire unit of work with the children.

The learning activities can provide a structure to view and explore Hiccup with the children. They will provide opportunity for the children to generate class discussion and sharing of interpretations of the play.

Full outcomes for Before the Show and After the Show activities listed below. Specific outcomes listed after each activity.

Outcome 1: Children have a strong sense of identity:

1.1 Children feel safe, secure and supported

1.2 Children learn to interact in relation to others with care, empathy and respect

1.3 Children develop their emerging autonomy, inter-dependence, resilience and sense of agency

1.4 Children develop knowledgeable and confident self identities

Outcome 2: Children are connected with and contribute to their world

2.1 Children develop a sense of belonging to groups and communities and an understanding of the reciprocal rights and responsibilities necessary for active community participation

2.2 Children respond to diversity with respect

2.3 Children become aware of fairness

2.4 Children become socially responsible and show respect for the environment

Outcome 3: Children have a strong sense of wellbeing

3.1 Children become strong in their social and emotional wellbeing

3.2 Children take increasing responsibility for their own health and physical wellbeing

Outcome 4: Children are confident and involved learners

4.1 Children develop disposition for learning such as curiosity, cooperation, confidence, creativity, commitment, enthusiasm, persistence, imagination and reflexivity

4.2 Children develop a range of skills and process such as problem solving, inquiry, experimentation, hypothesising, research and investigating

4.3 Children transfer and adopt what they have learned from one context to another

4.4 Children resource their own learning through connecting with people, place, technologies and natural and processed materials

Outcome 5: Children are effective communicators

5.1 Children interact verbally and non-verbally with others for a range of purposes

5.2 Children engage with a range of texts and gain meaning from these texts

5.3 Children express ideas and make meaning using a range of media

5.4 Children begin to understand how symbols and pattern system work

5.5 Children use information and communication technologies to access information, investigate ideas an represent their thinking.

• Literacy
• Critical and creative thinking
• Personal and social capability
• Intercultural understanding

Discussion: Hey you, hiccups gone!

• Invite students to sit in a circle.
• Ask the children:
  • Who has ever had the hiccups?
  • What does it feel like to have the hiccups? What does your body do?
  • How have you tried to get rid of them?
  • Did anyone give you a suggestion to get rid of them?
• Ask children to stand in the circle. Using voice, gesture and movement, in turns, children act out inventive ways to get rid of the hiccups. Other children in the group copy and repeat each suggestion.

Outcome Links: 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, 1.4, 2.1, 4.1, 4.2, 4.4, 5.1, 5.3

• Literacy
• Personal and social capability
• Ethical understanding
• Intercultural understanding

Discussion: We are going to the theatre!

• Before visiting the theatre to see Hiccup, share from the study guide the Synopsis and A note from the Directors.
• Lead a discussion on visiting the theatre, asking:
  • Who has been to the theatre before?
  • What happens at the theatre?
  • What does a theatre look like?
• Explain that the theatre they are going to is at ___________. Ask the children:
  • How might we get to the theatre?
  • Who might you see at the theatre?
  • In the theatre:
  • What will you see?
  • How will you know the show is about to begin? The lights might go down, there might be an announcement, the audience might go quiet or the actors might begin the performance.
  • How do you tell the actors you are enjoying the performance? For example:
    • Listening
    • Laughing
    • Sitting forward on your seat
    • Smiling
    • Clapping
  • The audience is very important to the actors. The actors want to tell you a story. Sometimes the actors might even talk to you as the audience, ask you a question or invite you to get up and dance. They will also let you know when can sit down again. It’s important you listen to their instructions.
  • What are you most looking forward to when they visit the theatre?
    • Leaving the theatre: stay in your seats until the Teacher says it is okay to go. Listen to them carefully as they will tell you where you will be going after you leave the theatre.

Outcome Links: 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, 1.4, 2.1, 2.4, 4.1, 4.3, 4.4, 5.1, 5.3

• Literacy
• Critical and creative thinking
• Personal and social capability
• Ethical understanding
• Intercultural understanding

Activity: Australian Animal Charades

What you’ll need: 9-10 x printed images of native Australian animals.

• Explain that Hiccup will be told by actors and puppets. At times, an actor will pretend to be multiple characters, and that the actors will also operate the puppets. The puppets will be Australian native animals.
• Ask the children, ‘What does the word, ‘native ‘mean?’
• Ask children what native Australian animals they know.
• Divide the children into two groups and distribute pre-prepared printed images of native Australian animals e.g. koala, quokka, emu, possum, snake (animals they will see in the show) as well as other animals such as kangaroo, kookaburra, platypus and crocodile. Children sit facing each other with a large space in between for a game of animal charades.
• Give one group a photo card without the other group seeing. Group one (performers) will act out the animal using sound and movement for the group two (the audience). The audience guesses the animal. The performer group is then given another card and the process is repeated. The group switches between audience and performers as the game continues using the remaining cards.
• At the end of the game, the photo cards are displayed in the classroom with name cards identifying each animal.

Outcome Links: 1.1, 1.2, 1.4, 2.1, 2.4, 4.1, 4.2, 4.4, 5.1, 5.3

Watch/Activity: How are the Hiccup puppets made?

What you’ll need: craft materials and household items

• Children watch the video of puppet maker, Tamara Rewse in her workshop making and operating the puppets used in Hiccup. Click here to view the video
• Using craft materials or everyday household items, pre-prepare a basic native animal puppet. Show the puppet to the children using voice and movement and have them guess the animal.
• Children then choose an animal from the ‘Australian Animal Charades’ activity.
• Using craft materials or everyday household items, children create their own puppet to depict the chosen animal.
• Working in pairs or small groups, children create a short scene that tells the story of how one of the animals cannot get rid of their hiccups. The other animals suggest and show ways their hiccups could be cured.
• Children can draw on the voice and movement work from the ‘Australian Animal Charades’ activity to create a character for their puppet animal.
• Open up the discussion for children to share their puppet stories with the other children.
• Invite children to share moments from other’s stories that they particularly enjoyed.

Outcome Links: 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, 1.4, 2.1, 2.4, 4.1, 4.2, 4.3, 4.4, 5.1, 5.3

• Literacy
• Critical and creative thinking
• Personal and social capability
• Ethical understanding
• Intercultural understanding

Activity/Discussion: What do I remember most about my visit to the theatre?

What you’ll need: paper, coloured pencils

• Provide children with paper and colours and ask them to draw a scene they remember from the performance.
• Circulate amongst the students. Using open ended questions to draw multi-worded responses, ask them about their drawings. This is to support the children to think about the performance they have seen, to make connections and shape opinions. It also signals to the children their perspectives are valued. Examples of the open ended questions include:
  • Who is…?
  • What is…?
  • Where do/is…?
  • How do you know?
  • I wonder what that person/character is thinking?
  • How do the people/animals in this picture feel?
  • If they could speak, what would this person/character say?
  • What title would you give your drawing?
• Create a space in the room to display the drawings. Children are invited to look at other children’s drawings.
  • Open up a discussion about of what they have  depicted in their drawings.
  • Did other children depict the same thing or something different? Have the drawings prompted other memories from the visit?
• Encourage children to take their drawing home to share with their family and explain their experience of going to the theatre.

Outcome Links: 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, 1.4, 2.1, 2.4, 4.1, 4.2, 4.3, 4.4, 5.1, 5.3

• Literacy
• Critical and creative thinking
• Personal and social capability
• Ethical understanding
• Intercultural understanding

Activity: How do I get rid of the hiccups?

Activity: How do I get rid of the hiccups?

What you’ll need: a simple Koala costume such as a grey beanie with ears

• Invite children to sit in a circle.
• Ask children to think back to the suggestions they made about how to get rid of the hiccups in the ‘Hey, you hiccups gone!’ pre-show activity. Were any of the suggestions in the show the same as theirs?
• Using a simple costume such as a grey beanie or a headband with some stuck on ears, take the role of Koala and sit on a chair in front of the class. Children are invited to unpack how Koala felt when the friends provided suggestions but they did not work.
• Ask the children how have they felt when their hiccups have stayed for a while and nothing seems to get rid of them.

Outcome Links: 1.1, 1.2, 1.4, 2.1, 4.1, 4.2, 4.3, 5.1, 5.3

• Literacy
• Critical and creative thinking
• Personal and social capability
• Ethical understanding
• Intercultural understanding

Activity: If I had a tent, what would it be like?

• Ask children if they’ve ever been camping and if so, describe their camping adventures.
• Ask children to make a list of equipment they might need when they go camping.
• Children find a space on the floor with room around them to move. Remind children of the tent in the performance. What did it look like? What do they think it was made from? What would it feel like? How warm would it be inside? What would have been inside it?
• In their own space children set up their own camp site and pitch their tent. The children are invited to imagine they are out in the Australian bush on a solo trek. It is the end of the day and so they:
  • Take off their heavy backpack.
  • Have a drink after a long day’s walk.
  • Decide a good spot for a tent – it needs to be level and free from any rocks or sticks.
  • Get their tent out of their backpack.
  • Lay their tent out so it is smooth and line up the tent pegs. How many do we need? Count them as a class.
  • Pitch their tent.
  • Stand back and admire their expert handywork.
  • Take out their sleeping bag and other bits they like to put into their tent to make it feel comfortable.
  • See another camper nearby and wave hello. You ask them if they would like to come and see your lovely tent. They invite you to see theirs. Say goodbye to your fellow camper and return to your campsite.
  • Look up to the night sky. It’s getting dark and you can see millions of stars.
  • Decide after such a big day, it is time to crawl into your tent and get some sleep.
• Invite children to lie down in their space and close their eyes. Take them through the following visualisation (bush sounds can be played in the background and even turn off the lights).

“I want you to imagine you are lying down in your tent. It is night time.

You have just finished off cleaning up after your dinner and you have snuggled into your sleeping bag.

 You have made yourself comfortable and warm inside your little house. You have a little torch on, so the light is just soft in your tent.

You have had a big day full of adventure and discovering. You think about some of the favourite things you did today.

Maybe you discovered somewhere new to explore or saw an animal you had not seen before.

Remember the different trees you saw; what their leaves felt and smelt like; how the water felt as you wadded through the creek when it was really hot right in the middle of the day.

Your body is sore and tired and now it is time to rest.

As you start to drift off to sleep you hear the night noises of the bush. Maybe you hear a frog, an owl, some insects, a possum looking for some food. A distant koala call.

You let their sounds drift away and you gently fall off to sleep.

(let children lie quietly)

And now it is time to start waking up, the sun is starting to rise, and the animals and birds are also getting ready for the day. You stretch and sit up ready for another day.”

• Ask children to make a postcard to send to a friend or relative. The postcard might be a picture of their tent, or an animal they saw. Encourage children to use colour and texture in their picture. Children can either give their postcard to a friend in the class or take it home to share.

Outcome Links: 1.1, 1.3, 1.4, 2.1, 2.4, 4.1, 4.2, 4.4, 5.1

• Literacy
• Critical and creative thinking
• Personal and social capability
• Ethical understanding
• Intercultural understanding

Introduction

This unit includes activities and assessment linked to The Arts: Drama, Australian Curriculum across Foundation to Year 2. Teachers can choose to use individual activities to complement existing drama units or complete the entire unit of work with their students.

The learning activities can provide a structure to view and explore Hiccup with your students. They will provide opportunity for students to explore the play resources independently as well as generate class discussion and sharing of interpretations of the play.

• Literacy
• Critical and creative thinking
• Personal and social capability
• Ethical understanding
• Intercultural understanding

Achievement Standard

By the end of Year 2, students describe artworks they make and those to which they respond. They consider where and why people make artworks.

Students use the elements and processes of arts subjects to make and share artworks that represent ideas.

Content Descriptions Addressed

Explore role and dramatic action in dramatic play, improvisation and process drama (ACADRM027)

Use voice, facial expression, movement and space to imagine and establish role and situation (ACADRM028)

Present drama that communicates ideas, including stories from their community, to an audience (ACADRM029)

Respond to drama and consider where and why people make drama, starting with Australian drama including drama of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples (ACADRR030)

Activity: Hey you, hiccups gone!

• Invite students to sit in a circle.
• Ask the children:
  • Who has ever had the hiccups?
  • What does it feel like to have the hiccups? What does your body do?
  • How have you tried to get rid of them?
  • Did anyone give you a suggestion to get rid of them?
• Ask children to stand in the circle. Using voice, gesture and movement, in turns, children act out inventive ways to get rid of the hiccups. Other children in the group copy and repeat each suggestion.

Content Description Links: ACADRM027, ACADRM028

• Literacy
• Personal and social capability
• Ethical understanding
• Intercultural understanding

Discussion: We are going to the theatre!

• Before visiting the theatre to see Hiccup, share from the study guide the Synopsis.
• Lead a discussion on visiting the theatre, asking:
  • Who has been to the theatre before?
  • What happens at the theatre?
  • What does a theatre look like?
• Explain that the theatre they are going to is at ___________. Ask the children:
  • How might we get to the theatre?
  • Who might you see at the theatre?
  • In the theatre:
  • What will you see?
  • How will you know the show is about to begin? The lights might go down, there might be an announcement, the audience might go quiet or the actors might begin the performance.
  • How do you tell the actors you are enjoying the performance? For example:
    • Listening
    • Laughing
    • Sitting forward on your seat
    • Smiling
    • Clapping
  • The audience is very important to the actors. The actors want to tell you a story. Sometimes the actors might even talk to you as the audience, ask you a question or invite you to get up and dance. They will also let you know when can sit down again. It’s important you listen to their instructions.
  • What are you most looking forward to when they visit the theatre?
• Leaving the theatre: stay in your seats until the Teacher says it is okay to go. Listen to them carefully as they will tell you where you will be going after you leave the theatre.

Content Description Links: ACADRM029, ACADRR030

• Literacy
• Critical and creative thinking
• Personal and social capability
• Ethical understanding
• Intercultural understanding

Activity: Australian Animal Charades

What you’ll need: 9-10 x printed images of native Australian animals.

• Explain that Hiccup will be told by actors and puppets. At times, an actor will pretend to be multiple characters, and that the actors will also operate the puppets. The puppets will be Australian native animals.
• Ask the children, ‘What does the word, ‘native ‘mean?’
• Ask children what native Australian animals they know.
• Divide the children into two groups and distribute pre-prepared printed images of native Australian animals e.g. koala, quokka, emu, possum, snake (animals they will see in the show) as well as other animals such as kangaroo, kookaburra, platypus and crocodile. Children sit facing each other with a large space in between for a game of animal charades.
• Give one group a photo card without the other group seeing. Group one (performers) will act out the animal using sound and movement for the group two (the audience). The audience guesses the animal. The performer group is then given another card and the process is repeated. The group switches between audience and performers as the game continues using the remaining cards.
• At the end of the game display the photo cards in the classroom with name cards identifying each animal.

Content Description Links: ACADRM027, ACADRM028, ACADRM029

• Literacy
• Critical and creative thinking
• Personal and social capability
• Ethical understanding
• Intercultural understanding

Watch/Activity/Discussion: How are the Hiccup puppets made?

What you’ll need: craft materials and household items

• Children watch the video of puppet maker, Tamara Rewse in her workshop making and operating the puppets used in Hiccup. Click here to view the video
• Using craft materials or everyday household items, pre-prepare a basic native animal puppet. Show the puppet to the children using voice and movement and have them guess the animal.
• Children then choose an animal from the ‘Australian Animal Charades’ activity.
• Using craft materials or everyday household items, children create their own puppet to depict the chosen animal.
• Working in pairs or small groups, children create a short scene that tells the story of how one of the animals cannot get rid of their hiccups. The other animals suggest and show ways their hiccups could be cured.
• Discuss with the children the narrative structure of the story – beginning, middle and end – the final step solving the problem (in this case, getting rid of the hiccups!).
• Children rehearse their scenes and draw on the voice and movement work from the ‘Australian Animal Charades’ activity to create a character for their puppet animal.
• Open up the discussion for children to share their puppet stories with the other children.
• Invite children to share moments from other’s stories that they particularly enjoyed, such as the materials used to create the animal puppet or how voice and movement were used to demonstrate the animal.

Content Description Links: ACADRM027, ACADRM028, ACADRR030

• Literacy
• Critical and creative thinking
• Personal and social capability
• Ethical understanding
• Intercultural understanding

Activity/Discussion: What do I remember most about my visit to the theatre?

What you’ll need: paper, coloured pencils

• Provide children with paper and colours and ask them to draw a scene they remember from the performance.
• Circulate amongst the students and using open ended questions to draw multi-worded responses, ask them about their drawings. This is to support the children to think about the performance they have seen, to make connections and shape opinions. It also signals to the children their perspectives are valued. Examples of the open ended questions include:
  • Who is…?
  • What is…?
  • Where do/is…?
  • How do you know?
  • I wonder what that person/character is thinking?
  • How do the people/animals in this picture feel?
  • If they could speak, what would this person/character say?
  • What title would you give your drawing?
• Create a space in the room to display the drawings. Children are invited to look at other children’s drawings.
• Open up a discussion about of what they have  depicted in their drawings. For example:
  • Did other children depict the same thing or something different?
  • Have the drawings prompted other memories from the visit
• Encourage children to take their drawing home to share with their family and explain their experience of going to the theatre.

Content Description Links: ACADRM027, ACADRR030

• Literacy
• Critical and creative thinking
• Personal and social capability
• Ethical understanding
• Intercultural understanding

Activity: Inventing a ‘Vanishing Amazing Invention’!

What you’ll need: craft materials and household items 

• Ask children if they recall the name of Emu’s invention to get rid of Koala’s hiccups (The Hiccup Vanishing Amazing Invention).
• Working in pairs or small groups, invite the children to create their own ‘Vanishing Amazing Invention’ which will see something vanish e.g. multiple sneezes, a fit of the giggles, uncontrollable yawning or the hiccups. Children use materials in the classroom to create their invention.
• Children adopt the role of amazing inventors (can experiment with voice, movement and facial expression to convey their characters).
• In role, they present their invention to the class (audience). Children explain how their invention works by either demonstrating on a group member or a willing volunteer from the audience.
• At the end of the presentation, questions are invited from the audience. Inventors must improvise their answers and maintain their roles.

Content Description Links: ACADRM028

• Literacy
• Critical and creative thinking
• Personal and social capability
• Ethical understanding
• Intercultural understanding

Activity: If I had a tent, what would it be like?

• Ask children if they’ve ever been camping and if so, describe their camping adventures.
• Ask children to make a list of equipment they might need when they go camping.
• Children find a space on the floor with room around them to move. Remind children of the tent in the performance. What did it look like? What do they think it was made from? What would it feel like? How warm would it be inside? What would have been inside it?
• In their own space children set up their own camp site and pitch their tent. The children are invited to imagine they are out in the Australian bush on a solo trek. It is the end of the day and so they:
  • Take off their heavy backpack.
  • Have a drink after a long day’s walk.
  • Decide a good spot for a tent – it needs to be level and free from any rocks or sticks.
  • Get their tent out of their backpack – what colour is it?
  • Lay their tent out so it is smooth and line up the tent pegs. How many do we need? Count them as a class.
  • Pitch their tent.
  • Stand back and admire their expert handywork.
  • Take out their sleeping bag and other bits they like to put into their tent to make it feel comfortable and homely.
  • See another camper nearby and wave hello. You ask them if they would like to come and see your lovely tent. They invite you to see theirs. Say goodbye to your fellow camper and return to your campsite.
  • Look up to the night sky. It’s getting dark and you can see millions of stars.
  • Decide after such a big day, it is time to crawl into your tent and get some sleep.
• Invite children to lie down in their space and close their eyes. Take them through the following visualisation (bush sounds can be played in the background and even turn off the lights).

“I want you to imagine you are lying down in your tent. It is night time.

You have just finished off cleaning up after your dinner and you have snuggled into your sleeping bag.

You have made yourself comfortable and warm inside your little house. You have a little torch on, so the light is just soft in your tent.

You have had a big day full of adventure and discovering. You think about some of the favourite things you did today.

 Maybe you discovered somewhere new to explore or saw an animal you had not seen before.

Remember the different trees you saw; what their leaves felt and smelt like; how the water felt as you wadded through the creek when it was really hot right in the middle of the day.

Your body is sore and tired and now it is time to rest.

As you start to drift off to sleep you hear the night noises of the bush. Maybe you hear a frog, an owl, some insects, a possum looking for some food. A distant koala call.

You let their sounds drift away and you gently fall off to sleep.

(let children lie quietly)

And now it is time to start waking up, the sun is starting to rise, and the animals and birds are also getting ready for the day. You stretch and sit up ready for another day.”

• Ask children to make a postcard to send to a friend or relative. The postcard might be a picture of their tent, or an animal they saw. Encourage children to use colour and texture in their picture. Children can either give their postcard to a friend in the class or take it home to share.

Content Description Links: ACADRM027, ACADRM028, ACADRM029

• Literacy
• Critical and creative thinking
• Personal and social capability
• Ethical understanding
• Intercultural understanding

Introduction

This unit includes activities and assessment linked to The Arts: Drama, Australian Curriculum across Year 3 and 4. Teachers can choose to use individual activities to complement existing drama units or complete the entire unit of work with their students.

The learning activities can provide a structure to view and explore Hiccup with your students. They will provide opportunity for students to explore the play resources independently as well as generate class discussion and sharing of interpretations of the play.

• Literacy
• Critical and creative thinking
• Personal and social capability
• Ethical understanding
• Intercultural understanding

Achievement Standard

By the end of Year 4, students describe and discuss similarities and differences between drama they make, perform and view. They discuss how they and others organise the elements of drama in their drama.

Students use relationships, tension, time and place and narrative structure when improvising and performing devised and scripted drama. They collaborate to plan, make and perform drama that communicates ideas.

Content Descriptions Addressed

Explore ideas and narrative structures through roles and situations and use empathy in their own improvisations and devised drama (ACADRM031).

Use voice, body, movement and language to sustain role and relationships and create dramatic action with a sense of time and place (ACADRM032).

Shape and perform dramatic action using narrative structures and tension in devised and scripted drama, including exploration of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander drama (ACADRM033).

Identify intended purposes and meaning of drama, starting with Australian drama, including drama of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples, using the elements of drama to make comparisons (ACADRR034).

Activity: Hey you, hiccups gone!

• Invite students to sit in a circle.
• Ask the children:
  • Who has ever had the hiccups?
  • What does it feel like to have the hiccups? What does your body do?
  • How have you tried to get rid of them?
  • Did anyone give you a suggestion to get rid of them?
• Ask children to stand in the circle. Using voice, gesture and movement, in turns, children act out inventive ways to get rid of the hiccups. Other children in the group copy and repeat each suggestion.

Content Description Links: ACADRM031, ACADRM032

• Literacy
• Personal and social capability
• Ethical understanding
• Intercultural understanding

Discussion: We are going to the theatre!

• Before visiting the theatre to see Hiccup, share from the study guide the Synopsis and A note from the Directors.
• Lead a discussion on visiting the theatre, asking:
  • Who has been to the theatre before?
  • What happens at the theatre?
  • What does a theatre look like?
• Explain that the theatre they are going to is at ___________. Ask the children:
  • How might we get to the theatre?
  • Who might you see at the theatre?
  • In the theatre:
  • What will you see?
  • How will you know the show is about to begin? The lights might go down, there might be an announcement, the audience might go quiet or the actors might begin the performance.
  • How do you tell the actors you are enjoying the performance? For example:
    • Listening
    • Laughing
    • Sitting forward on your seat
    • Smiling
    • Clapping
  • The audience is very important to the actors. The actors want to tell you a story. Sometimes the actors might even talk to you as the audience, ask you a question or invite you to get up and dance. They will also let you know when can sit down again. It’s important you listen to their instructions.
  • What are you most looking forward to when they visit the theatre?
• Leaving the theatre: stay in your seats until the Teacher says it is okay to go. Listen to them carefully as they will tell you where you will be going after you leave the theatre.

Content Description Links: ACADRM032

• Literacy
• Critical and creative thinking
• Personal and social capability
• Ethical understanding
• Intercultural understanding

Watch/Discussion: How are the Hiccup puppets made?

What you’ll need: a selection of books relating to animals

• Children watch the video of puppet maker, Tamara Rewse in her workshop making and operating the puppets used in Hiccup. Click here to view the video.
• Ask the children to identify the animals they saw in the video.
• Pre-prepare a selection of picture books about animals. This is a good opportunity to introduce stories about animals from different countries and cultures, such as:
  • ‘Crow and The Waterhole’ by Ambelin Kwaymullina
  • ‘The Gift of Gold’ by Dorothy Kowen
  • ‘Koala Lou’ by Mem Fox
  • ‘Sera Learns to Fly’ by Vinitha Ramchandani and Nirzara Verulkar
  • ‘Wabi Sabi’ by Mark Reibstein.
• Before reading aloud a selection of stories, tell the children which country or culture the story originates. Use a world map or globe to invite children to locate the country or culture. If appropriate, welcome any children in class who are from that country or culture to share some information with the class.
• Ask children to discuss why these stories would be created by different cultures.
• Read aloud the stories you have just discussed as a class.
• After reading the stories, ask children to stand in the space. Using voice (experimenting with the loudness/softness, pace and pitch of their voices), movement and facial expression, children act out the animals from the books.
• Open a discussion on how voice movement and facial expressions were helpful in conveying the animal.

Content Description Links: ACADRM032, ACADRR034

• Literacy
• Personal and social capability
• Ethical understanding
• Intercultural understanding

Activity: Make your own puppet performance

What you’ll need: craft materials and household items 

• In small groups, invite children to choose one of the animal stories from the ‘How are the Hiccup puppets made?’ learning experience. Children will devise, rehearse and present the story, following the narrative structure.
  • Ask children to make their own puppet animals to tell the story from their chosen book. Children are to make their puppets from materials sourced from the classroom or everyday household items.
  • Remind children to use voice (loudness/softness, pace and pitch) and movement to bring their puppet character to life. Encourage children to find a performance space in the room where they can operate their puppets and bring their story to life.
  • Ask children to present their performances to the class.
• At the end of the performances, ask the children to reflect on the experience through a written task or as a discussion:
• • How have you used the ideas from the country/culture found in your chosen book in your own drama?
  • How was collaboration helpful in creating drama?
  • What worked best in the drama?

Content Desciption Links: ACADRM031, ACADRM032, ACADRM033, ACADRR034

• Literacy
• Critical and creative thinking
• Personal and social capability
• Ethical understanding
• Intercultural understanding

Activity: How do I get rid of the hiccups?

• Invite children to sit in a circle.
• Ask children to think back to the suggestions they made about how to get rid of the hiccups in the ‘Hey, you hiccups gone!’ pre-show activity. Were any of the suggestions in the show the same as theirs?
• Using a simple costume piece to symbolise the characters (e.g. head band or grey beanie with cardboard ears attached), play the role of Koala and sit on a chair in front of the class. Using voice (experimenting with loudness/softness, pace and pitch), movement and facial expressions to convey role, invite children to ask how Koala felt when the friends provided suggestions but they did not work.
• Stepping out of the role of Koala, ask the children how have they felt when their hiccups have stayed for a while and nothing seems to get rid of them.
• Ask a child to volunteer to take on the role of Quokka, Emu or Eddie and source an object from the classroom that they can wear to symbolise the character. Children must use voice, movement and facial expression to step into role. The remaining children are invited to ask the character:
  • Why they wanted to help Koala with the hiccups?
  • How did they feel when their solution did not work?
  • Stepping out of roles, open a discussion and ask the children if they remember some of the emotions/struggles felt by the feel during the play. For example: Quokka feeling upset at Emu for not joining her on her journey, Emu’s internal struggle between choosing between Quokka and her inventions, Eddie’s feelings of betrayal for Quokka stealing his things, Koala’s joy once his hiccups have been cured etc.

Content Description Links: ACADRM031, ACADRM032

• Literacy
• Critical and creative thinking
• Ethical understanding
• Intercultural understanding

Activity/Discussion: What do I remember most about my visit to the theatre?

What you’ll need: paper, coloured pencils

• Provide children with paper and colours and ask them to draw a scene they remember from the performance.
• Circulate amongst the students. Using open ended questions to draw multi-worded responses, ask them about their drawings. This is to support the children to think about the performance they have seen, to make connections and shape opinions. It also signals to the children their perspectives are valued. Examples of the open ended questions include:
  • Who is…? How did they use their voice/movement/gestures to create their character?
  • What is…?
  • Where do/is…?
  • How do you know?
  • I wonder what that person/character is thinking?
  • How do the people/animals in this picture feel?
  • If they could speak, what would this person/character say?
  • Is there any tension in this moment of the play? How is the tension being created?
  • What part of the play did this moment happen?
  • What title would you give your drawing?
• Create a space in the room to display the drawings. Children are invited to look at other children’s drawings.
  • Open up a discussion about of what they have  depicted in their drawings.
  • Did other children depict the same thing or something different? Have the drawings prompted other memories from the visit?
• Encourage children to take their drawing home to share with their family and explain their experience of going to the theatre.

Content Description Links: ACADRM031

• Literacy
• Critical and creative thinking
• Personal and social capability
• Ethical understanding
• Intercultural understanding

Activity: Exploring tension in Drama

• Ask children to explain what tension is in Drama (a feeling of something about to happen or conflict within or between characters). Outline to students how tension can arise in a story (e.g. tension can happen as a result of relationships, problem, a surprise, or a mystery).
• Ask children why this Element of Drama is used?
  • To move the story forward
  • To increase audience engagement
  • To aid in character development
• Ask children to identify where tension was evident in Hiccup.
• Explain that the classroom is about to be transformed into outback Australia and the children are about to go on a camping adventure with a friend. This is a good opportunity to ask children who have been camping to describe their adventures and to make a list of the sort of equipment they might need when going camping.
• Children find a camping partner and a space on the floor with room around them to move. Together they decide:
  • Their character names.
  • How the characters know each other and how long for.
  • Why they have decided to go on a camping trip.
  • Do they camp often or is this their first adventure?
• Explain to the children that you will narrate the story of these characters on their camping trip and that the children playing the characters must listen to the narration so they know how the story will develop. Sometimes the children will be asked to crate parts of the story themselves and to perform these sections of the story to class.
• Invite the children to play with tension throughout the below steps. They are encouraged to keep an eye out for when they think tension might be able to be incorporated into the scene to make it more interesting.
• Ask children to close their eyes.
  • Count to three and ask students to open their eyes, step into their character and imagine they are getting ready for their camping trip at one of the character’s houses.
  • Ask children to use voice (loudness/softness, pace and pitch), movement and gesture to create the scene where the characters are packing their backpacks.
  • Invite children to improvise the scene with their partner.
  • At any stage through the improvisation, ask the class to freeze the scene and hold the moment.
  • Using ‘touch and talk’, tap a pair on the shoulder and asks the children to continue their scene while the class out of role watch the scene as the audience.
  • Ask the children to freeze the scene and ask the audience if tension was evident and if it was, how was it used to increase the audience’s engagement. For example, was it through a problem the characters were trying to solve, or was there conflict evident in the characters’ relationship? Ask the children how did the performers use their voice, movement, facial expression or gesture to show there was tension in the scene?
  • Repeat with other pairs.
  • Once ‘touch and talk’ has been used once more, explain that the characters are about to be transported to the outback.
    • Ask children to close their eyes and count to three. Children open their eyes and the story picks up ifrom the afternoon of the characters’ first day of their trek through the outback.
    • As the characters walk through the outback, invite the characters to stop if they hear a bird or animal, point out landmarks to their partner, touch and smell a leaf of a tree.
    • Encourage the children to use movement to show that the characters have been trekking all day. Tension might be starting to become evident in the scene as the characters walk. Perhaps the character is developing a blister on the heel of their foot, maybe they are hungry.
• Ask the characters to find a good campsite for the night (children find a space in their pairs). Encourage children to show how the characters decide/not decide on a good campsite – perhaps tension is building?
• Once a spot has been decided the children:
  • Take off their heavy backpack.
  • Have a drink after a long day’s walk.
  • Pitch their tent.
  • Take out their sleeping bag and other bits and pieces they like to put into their tent to make it feel comfortable.
  • Look up to the night sky. It’s getting dark and you can see millions of stars.
  • Ask the characters to freeze. Explain that the characters have had something to eat and decided that after such a big day, it is time to crawl into the tent, snuggle down into their sleeping bags and get some well-deserved sleep. Ask children to unfreeze and perform the scene. The story continues in the following activity.

Content Description Links: ACADRM031, ACADRM032, ACADRM033, ACADRR034

• Literacy
• Critical and creative thinking
• Ethical understanding
• Intercultural understanding

Activity: Developing the tension in Drama

• Continuing on from the drama developed in the previous learning experience, introduce the tension that one of the characters in the tent begins to, for example, sneeze constantly or snore loudly.
  • Ask children to devise a scene that shows how the characters come up with different solutions to try and stop the problem. Children must consider how they use voice and movement, and place (what can they use in their tent or outside environment) to create the tension in the scene and find a solution.
  • Invite students to present their scene to the class as audience.
  • Ask the audience to respond to the performances:
    • What was the tension evident in the scene?
    • How did the characters use voice, movement and place to show the tension in the scene?
    • Which of the characters do you identify with?

Content Description Links: ACADRM031, ACADRM032, ACADRM033

• Literacy
• Critical and creative thinking
• Personal and social capability
• Ethical understanding
• Intercultural understanding