Here’s a clip of students in The Robert Louis Stevenson School’s Shakespeare class rehearsing and presenting staged reading of scenes from Macbeth as part of the school’s Arts Week.   The students spent classes reading the play, unlocking the meaning of Shakespeare’s language and focusing on how to share it with an audience.  They cast their production, designed it, rehearsed it and then performed it in front of a school wide audience.

Through a partnership with Roundtable Ensemble, The Essentials had a teaching artist work closely with Stevenson School’s Shakespeare and English teacher over eight sessions to create and teach a curriculum for the Macbeth reading.

Stevenson seeks to prepare bright underachieving adolescents academically and developmentally for college. These are students who have been unable to negotiate the academic, social and emotional pressures of the typical high school environment. Stevenson students may have struggled with adjustment difficulties, problems with peers, mild depression or anxiety.  It’s amazing place, and worth learning more about their mission and successes.