2.03 A Conversation with Blake Minor
This week Jimmy talks to Texas theatre teacher, Blake Minor about his journey to teaching theatre, technical theatre, and his own theatre education podcast, Minor Wisdom! He also checks in with his student teacher Emma on how her first full class teaching experience went last week!
Blake’s Recommended Resources:
The Reminder App on your phone!
Jimmy Chrismon:
You're listening to episode three of season two of THED Talks. I'm Jimmy Chrismon, your host. THED Talks is a podcast for theatre teachers and theatre education students. Each week I'm going to bring you stories and interviews from experienced K-12 theatre teachers, current theatre education majors, and professors of theatre education that hopefully will warm your heart, renew your faith in teaching and provide resources to better your practice in your theatre classroom. Thank you so much for listening. I've got a great episode for you this week , um, my episode this week, I had talked to Blake Minor. Blake is a theatre teacher down in Texas. Um, we actually met on one of the technical theatre educator Facebook groups and uh , he messaged me and asked me to appear on his podcast Minor Wisdom. So I encourage you to go check that out when you're looking for your next episode of THED Talks on your favorite podcast provider. But, Blake asked me to appear on his show. And so while we were talking, I let him know that I would love to talk to him sometime on THED Talks. And he said, well, why don't we do it now? So I hurriedly turned on my sound equipment and captured a really fun interview with him, talking about some technical theatre things as well as his journey to where he is with what he's doing and why he's doing Minor Wisdom. So I hope you enjoy my interview with Blake Minor. So Blake, tell me a little bit about what, what you do and , uh , kind of where you are with what you do at your school and maybe a little bit of the sparknotes journey of how you got there.
Blake Minor:
Yeah, so I'm the , uh , this is, I'll be entering my seventh year as the director Dulles High School down in Sugarland, Texas , uh , in Fort Bend ISD. And uh , this will be, it'll be my 10th year teaching. So I spent a year in Dallas, wanted to come back to Houston. I'm a native Houstonian , uh, and went to Dallas against my will to court at that time. Well now my wife, but I was there to court her and be like, Hey, come back with me. So , uh, I made that sacrifice and you know, if you don't have to go to Dallas just don't, but anyway, that's a different story. But , uh, so I w I was there for a year and then I came to Katie I SD , which is very well known in this state for having uh , Amazing Sports , uh , successful sport and sporting teams and such. I actually hated it. I just despised being there and was sitting around with a couple of high school friends. One I'm still very, very close with. She's one of my best friends and telling them how much I hated it. And her husband , uh , is a member of the group Straight, No Chaser, which is not a Capella group. That's why I was talking about Bloomington earlier and uh, she said just shot out of shot in the dark. Would you ever want to design lights for them? Cause that's my background is lighting design. I was like, I've not thought about that at all. I , that was the first time that ever crossed my mind that I would do anything other than education. I thought , well, here's my chance . So three years later, I , uh, I have a one year old at home thinking I can't keep leaving her because I've been living , living on a bus practically for three years of my life now touring with the a cappella group. And then I got the job at Dulles and I've been here ever since. So I , I went to high school for the performing and visual arts. So my high school background is heavy into theatre. Uh, I went to, at that time, a really well known middle school for theatre. Uh, before that, my parents put me in a clown camp a couple of times. So, so I've been doing theatre all my life, but I've, I've, I started out as an actor and then out of convenience became a technician. And 20 plus years later, I've been designing and being a technician professionally and haven't acted too too much. Uh, every once in awhile I'll , I'll try my chops at an Improv , but I , I'm , I can't remember. I mean, like, I barely remember your name. Like that's just how bad my memorization. So , uh, you know, I'm just not very , I haven't, I haven't worked that muscle, but yeah. So that's where I am.
Jimmy Chrismon:
Before we jump into talking about your , your tech theatre work that you're doing , um, I wanna know, cause I know you, like you just said you were, you were a high school theatre kid, did it in college, now at your , your profession. Talk to me a little bit about what you, how you saw the, your growth as an artist and, and, and your experiences in educational theatre through the years. Um , and has that changed over now that you're teaching it? So, u h, without throwing anybody under the bus, yeah, it has changed, but i t, it was, it was definitely a roller coaster. It wasn't an uphill climb by any means because, because my training in high school was such a conservatory style of training. You spend three hours a day in your art area and this is for all the art areas. You spend three hours a day in your art area and then the other three and a half, four hours you w ere doing academic. But you know, talk about a school, you know, my school right now, we spend 50 minutes in our art area, right? You know, that's, you've take theatre one, you're in there for 50 minutes and u h, I've got t o, I've got a handful of kids that have two theatre classes, but that's, I can count them all i n one hand. So that experience really spoiled me.
Blake Minor:
And so I went off to , um, Sam Houston State University, and again, this is back in 2000. So things have changed since then, but they had a very young lighting program and that's really what I wanted to do. I had not shopped around for universities, which is a huge mistake. Uh, I set my sights on going to Sam Houston State University and about a month into it, my professor of, my lighting professor had to go work on another project, you know, as, as you want them to do that , you want them to stay professional and , and keep working in the real world. And asked me to watch a mandatory class. I'm a month into college and you don't mind you, I'm amongst other lighting. One kid, you know, so it's not a bunch of, it's not a bunch of these like Broadway professionals by any means. It's dancers, it's actors, it's, you know, so I did know a little more, but they didn't have a graduate assistant. They didn't have another adult to come in. I couldn't drink alcohol. I barely knew how to vote, you know, like, I mean like, but here I am at a university, kind of guiding kids on lighting. And so a red flag went up. I decided I was gonna leave there and I went to University of Houston and my goal was to not do theatre at all, to do business and get more education when it came to the business side of things so that I eventually could own and manage my own theatre. And I realized math is hard. And so I, so I left business and went into theatre and was like, screw it. I, you know, I got to do what I know. And so UH ended up being an amazing program and , uh, so much so that I've considered going back for Grad school. And , uh, Kevin Rigdon who is there is a Broadway lighting designer with , uh , Tony nominations and you know, so I got to learn from him. And so that's the back going back up. And then I was out in the real world a little bit while in university setting, doing community theatre. I had 12 par cans to light this, you know, children's show with the director saying I want to slight in that light and this and this color that color and I'm want Gobos and I'm like, these don't make dope. You know. So there's the, in the, in the professional world, professional quote unquote, you know, there's my going dipping back down the struggle of, well I don't know how to make chicken, you know, what out of you know, or chicken soup or chicken south, whatever. I don't even know. Horrible. I've just got with the cliches, but you know, it was, that was a dip down. And then I got an education and as I said earlier, theatre education, I didn't like my first couple of years I have been beyond spoiled where I am now. I mean, our facility is not state of the art, but we make it, we make it better. Like we , uh , I've got my kids trained to appreciate what they've got and we also, I'm a frugal Jew, so I spend money , um , very conservatively and don't, you know, we , we don't work beyond our means and we've got toys here. Now mind you, there's there technical toys, you know, there they are for scenery, lights and sound and stuff. We don't really do much towards costumes, just bring something from home. But , uh, you know, we, we've got all these things here now and we're still the kind of middle of the road department when it comes to finances, but we look like we're the top of the line just because of the way we've been able to manage and use our resources throughout the years. And that's, that's a huge up. Administration is way too good to me. I don't know what I did right. I don't know if I gave him a winning lottery ticket years ago. I Dunno what I did, but then that's not blowing smoke. It's just the truth. I've said it multiple times, so they can't give me, it's not like they can give me a raise, you know, so I could say, I can say they're horrible. I could say they're good. Either way. They're not going to give me a raise.
Jimmy Chrismon:
Well, cause I , I know , um, from my experience, I, I was a strong acting directing teacher and I had to, I had to teach myself a lot of, of the technical aspects. Um, and in my Undergrad I did , I, I didn't get as solid of a background in that as I would've liked. And when I worked on my masters , I really tailored my program to to kind of beef those skills up. Um, so when I took, went back to my classroom, I ha I had a better skillset . What about those teachers out there who, who don't have that tech background? And I, the question I'm gonna ask could honestly probably be like a week to a semester long workshop that you can do with teachers, but do you have just a couple of, of, of ideas and suggestions to , to help those non technical theatre teachers? Um, to really do some good things with their kids.
Blake Minor:
Yeah, I mean the, the, the short answer is Youtube. Uh, it's, it's, it's so powerful and there are so many great resources , uh, on the Internet now that walk you through step by step. I mean, I even, and I think you and I are of similar age, so you might appreciate this, but Bob Vila, right? I have adopted some videos and these are from what, the late eighties, early nineties. I've adopted some of his videos even to show kids how to barely, how to build steps, right? Building steps is one of the most annoying, tedious, that's not hard, but it's just not fun. Right? And so I've, I've shown them videos on how to build staircases or , or just even just two or three, just little steps. Um, and those are old, old videos, but that's just, I just steal them from Youtube. And I also, you know, the reverse classroom idea, I give them the assignment to say, Hey, go just go watch, go watch this stuff. Go figure it out, figure it out as a very, well that's an HSP VA like if that could be a shirt that's like the slogan of HSP VA theatre, at least back when I went there, it was figure it out because you can like, you literally, you can go out, especially now, and that was back in the nineties especially now you can go and figure it out. You can go find out information about stuff. And so as an, as an educator that doesn't necessarily have the background, so I don't have a directing background. So you and I are opposite. So I have to , and I direct to you and I like to, I think it's fun because I direct around my tech rather than just the tech directing around the acting. So I've had to sort of figure that stuff out the same way that there's a Youtube series. It's a , uh, they talked about technique and all this stuff and they're all, they're all from Britain, but they , they have some great resources on directing, on , uh , looking for these shapes, these levels, this and that. And that's the kind of stuff that I've gone to. So I would say the same thing for , for , for somebody that's on the opposite side that needs more tech background. Now all that said there's a safety element involved with tech, right? So you, you have to always have that in the back of your head. Like there's a, there's a thing that I always tell my maintenance people. All right . And I tell my students this and even other teachers here, cause I'm our district's theatre facilitator, so I have to, to kind of coach up some of our other high school directors. And so I tell them use the four letter s word as much as possible if you really, really need it and that's safe. So this is not safe for my students. And the minute you throw out the word safe, maintenance is busting down the walls to get into wherever you are that you're saying is not safe. And that's a powerful word. This isn't safe. So as a director, as an acting director, you have to always have that and kind of in the back of your mind, don't just go and leg up a platform with two screws and it's a 16 foot tall platform and you threw in two screws on this, two by four and you're like, oh well it standing, you know, that's not necessarily safe. So that's, that's always something that you gotta keep in mind is if you're not sure that that's probably the best way to do it. You can always ask , uh , somebody, it's also amazing. Sorry to ramble on about this. You just, you said to yourself though, to start, it was , I could go on for for a whole month , but the people at now, Lowe's and home depot, right, those are powerful tools as well. Just going up to people and go to the right. Don't go to the paint guy and ask them how to, how to build a platform, you know, cause they're in those areas for a reason, but they build things to last, right? So they build houses, they build furniture, and they build things that you want for years and years and years. We build things. Like I always told my sister when she's like, can you build something for me? I'm like, yeah, but it's going to come down in three weeks because I was , I wasn't trained to make stuff last forever. So you have to uh , go use those people as well and, and say, hey, if you were to build, let's say you build an eight foot by blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, whatever you give them the schematics, they could tell you some, some tips on the best practices for that too. So anyway, long answer, but again, you said it.
Jimmy Chrismon:
I opened the can so. That's good. That's good information. I think that's good stuff for people to hear. I want, I know we met on a Facebook group and over the discussion about podcasts and you're on mine , but I was just on yours. So tell , tell us a little bit about your podcast.
Blake Minor:
Yeah, so it's called minor wisdom. It is super niche. It's , it's about educate. I'm trying to get it away from just theatre education. Right. But it's a theatre educators podcast and similar to yours, it's, it's telling that background. But my , all of my connections are in Texas and so I've got some heavy hitters in Texas. I know a lot of people. It's kind of like only knowing Jerry Jones and , and Bob Linear, but, and then that's it. Well, Bob Linear RIP, but it's like only knowing two owners of a football team and then saying, I know everybody in football, but so I know a lot of people in the Texas theatre world just because I'm a, I'm a schmooze. I'm a networker. But the , uh , the podcast really caters towards that and uh, does a lot for that community. Uh , I've got a lot of good feedback from other teachers. People I've never met. I'm going to be sitting down in a couple of days with a , a theatre teacher that just happened to see me. I, I made some Schwag , uh , uh, some Schwag, some swag swag is different, but I made some swag and he saw my shirt and he was like, what'd you do? Minor Wisdom. He's like , yes I do. So we're having a conversation in a couple of days, but the, the, the interviews are limitless. I mean, I can interview educators and theatre educators and I can interview administrators and I , you know, so it's really, it's, it's, for me, it's Super Cathartic and extremely fun because I'm sitting and talking with people that , that A want to talk and B want to talk about stuff that I'm interested in so I can, we can banter for, I could banter for hours with a lot of these people and it would be so boring on a podcast, but it would be just fun for me. And why not throw a microphone in front of them and record it .
Jimmy Chrismon:
That's right. That's right. Well, I've , I've enjoyed listening to the episodes I've started so far. I've got , I think I've gotten through about three or four of them. Um , but it's definitely on my , I've subscribed to it and I'm definitely listening to them and I'm enjoying them. So thank, thank you for what you and Ditto. Ditto with yours. I loved your title. Uh, I think that's a great, like, you know, it's a play on the TED talks thing, but it's, it's, it's a great, it's a very creative title. Mine is like egotistical. It has my own name in it , but, but it works. I mean, it works. And Yours is very, I love, and I mean just from what we've chatted with here on Skype, I really enjoyed seeing you and knowing a little bit more about you now from this. That makes way more sense. And , and it really captures your personality from what I'm, from what I'm gathering so far and I really enjoy it.
Blake Minor:
Yeah . Thank you very much. And same to you. I've listened to a couple of yours now and , uh , uh , I don't know these people, which is even more kind of , you know, that's the other thing about you and I's podcast that maybe differs a little bit, is you're interviewing, you're kind of going to broad scope, right? Uh, and I'm interviewing, I'm humanizing a lot of people. So like I'm interviewing people that up to this point for 2000-2500 theatre teachers in the state of Texas only know those people by email. Right. And they don't have a face with a name. They don't even have a voice with the name. Obviously it's a podcast. They're not going to get a face. But they, they, I'm now asking them questions like, Hey, what do you like to eat? And, you know, and it, and it makes them become more approachable and , and humanizes them a little bit more rather than just being an email response. Yeah . So, yeah.
Jimmy Chrismon:
Well, I appreciate what you're doing, keep it. Keep it up. Can you tell me one of your favorite stories from teaching? A funny story? [inaudible] horror story, touching moment changed your life moment. Anything.
Blake Minor:
Those are all different.
Jimmy Chrismon:
whatever you want to share.
Blake Minor:
We've got , um, uh, I've got , uh, well, yeah , I've got a , I've got a disappointment story. Let's see. A horse. I've got orders. I've got a lot more horror stories and disappointing stories than I have with , uh , heartwarming, you know, this year, especially my, my group of seniors that I graduated this year, we're in , I've said it to past senior groups too , are , we're the best. The , this group was far and away just the best. I mean, they really were, there was no drama in the drama department. They, the most dramatic thing that happened was one best friend , uh, took another best friend by her shoulders and shook her and said, get her act together. Like just said, come on and get your act together. She didn't use the word act, but she just, you know, and, and sugar and that, and I had to be like, hey, you know, leave her alone. And that was, that was it for the entire year as far as me saying, Hey, drama , uh, you know, there's, there's drama in the drama department. That was the only piece. Whereas in the past few years, we've had to have heart to hearts with kids. Do you really want to be, you know, all this stuff this year , none of that. They all were so driven to just be better, just be good at what they're doing. They were committed to it. They showed up on time, they showed up to rehearse. You never had you , you rarely had to call kids. They were just amazing leaders. And so this year, out of all those years, I just, it's, it's re , it's gonna be a tough act to follow in the past. You know, you always have these kids that say, how are you going to replace me? It's like, well, easy . You pull the next kid up and be like, this person's gonna replace you . You know, like, but this group is sincerely a group that is going to be very, very difficult to replace. And I think that other classes know that other, you know, the, the juniors and the sophomores know , wow. That , you know, that's gonna be a tough group to follow. Tough Act to follow. That was heartwarming. The other side of things, cause I want to share one story that that was not a , it's , it's a disappointing story . So we do a stand up comedy night in my school that a few years ago I had a student who wasn't much of an actor, but he wanted to be a standup comedian, wants to write for us SNL , which that's a dying thing now. But he asked me if we could do a standup comedy night cause he just wanted to be on stage. And I said sure, why not? You know, I didn't have to do anything.
Speaker 4:
I'd turn on some lights and we made it look kind of uh , the ambience was kind of fun then and just had a fun night. I said, you guys keep it school appropriate. Don't, don't make it dirty. It's hard to do comedy when it's not dirty and Raunchy. That's why Seinfeld is so good at what he does. Um , but we didn't have a lot of rules and we , but we crowned the champion at the end of the night with, of course, cause I'm a big wrestling fan, a wrestling title belt, but a chick , a children's one, not that $500, you know, real replica. But it was that tiny one that you can get for 20 bucks a RIP toys r us. But the , uh , uh , we had done now done that year after year . We'll fast forward to this year and one of my like top students now to give you an idea of this kid, he's a, he's hilarious. His name is Anas, but it's spelled Anas and so people, I'll call them heinous of course. Right. And it's, he , he's doing his company on stage and he's a great kid. He's like just uh , he's like a son to me. His son I've never had, and he's , he's also Middle Eastern, so that didn't , that doesn't really work out too well, but he does some Raunchy comedy for his comedy night and he knew I was disappointed in him and it was because of anxiety. He just got really nervous on stage. He got, you know, it all rushed in at once that he was on , on stage in front of probably about 80 people hold. And he went straight to dirty and that was his like go to joke that he had to go to. And it was just, it was very disappointing. And so that was, that was like the how , again, we talked about roller coasters earlier that was the high and the low of this year was this great group of seniors and then that moment happened and he and I are cool now.
Blake Minor:
You know, he knew I was very upset and no , if you want a kid to respond well to you, tell them you're disappointed in them. Don't say, Hey, I'm really mad at you. You say no, I'm disappointed, I'm disappointed. I'd expect some different from you. And that really just kind of, Ugh, it really hits those kids. And I think most educators know that. But if there's like a new educator listening, use that disappointed word sparingly. You can't use it all the time. But if you truly are disappointed kid and a kid can see that in you and they look up to you and idolize you, then that will really hit him hard. Cause he, he's, he was super apologetic, wrote me this, just awesome, sweet note later. So it was, you know, he , he's, he's in my good graces again, but it's something now we can go back and look on and laugh about it. So
Jimmy Chrismon:
yeah, I have a , I have a really a kid who , um , was really close to me and he , he, he, his father was not part of his life. So he, his freshman year he adopted me and he said, you're , you're my dad now. And yeah , I still get Father's day cards from him. He's 26 now. And uh, but he , uh, he was in a production of Rent that I did. We did the regional premiere of Rent , uh, several years ago and he played Mark and he made some acting choices during La Vie Boheme that we had not rehearsed and were some things that could , uh, potentially hurt his fellow actors. And , uh, when we got to I, after I saw it happen, I just marched myself backstage and I waited for him to come off for intermission and , and he was high fiving everyone cause they all had a good time with it. Nobody got hurt. And I said, you outside now. He met me outside and I said, I just want you to know how disappointed I am in what you did. Yup . And like his world just shattered. And, and he , even to this day, he's like, I remember that. We do what we rehearse. We don't, we don't change things. Cause you told me you were disappointed in that rings in my ears even to this day. So yeah, that , that disappointment Card will get them. Aside from, from what you talked about a little bit a little bit ago with the Youtube and other things that you, you use Lowe's and Home Depot. What's a resource to theatre teachers need in their life right now that you use?
Blake Minor:
It's, it's kind of , sorry , that's gonna sound so silly and stupid and kind of a cop out . I'm a huge, huge advocate of the Reminder app on my phone and it , it, it has changed my life to be able to say to my phone, I don't even have to type anything. I just have to say it . And, and it is, again, it goes back to the ease . I'm, I , I, you could go into the, to the whole month thing that talking for a month, I could talk to you for a month about how frustrated I get with adults that don't know how easy everything is now. Um, and, and then they, they can't answer an email or a text message, even though I, like I'm staring at my phone right now. I probably have had maybe five or six text messages since you and I've been talking for the past 40 minutes, but I'm not gonna respond to them. Right. But in a couple of minutes I will and, and, and I'm not waiting until tomorrow. I'm not going to wait until next , uh , Tuesday to do it. Like it's so easy to , to do that stuff in the Reminder app itself or any sort of Reminder, you know, I don't know what the galaxy phones or you know, those, the , the non iPhone, cause I'm just a bit spoiled myself. But that tool is so powerful and necessary in the world of theatre education because you, you, somebody put in that same group that , that you and I sort of met in on Facebook. Somebody put a breakdown down of what , uh, a professional theatre does compared to what a theatre educator does and how the umbrella encompasses all of that. Not just producer, not just direct or not just stage manager, but you are all of the above, right? Sometimes you are actors, sometimes you are designer technically , you know, so a theatre educator has to kind of have their ducks in a row. And one of the best ways to do that is to be able to simply just put in a reminder in your phone to say, do this. You got to make sure you do this. I've woken up, as I'm sure you have in the middle of the night thinking, oh no, you know, tomorrow's the first of my, of my week long tech week, right? I forgot to do this. If I don't do this, then this can't happen in , this can't happen. So I need to make sure I do this. And so I just quickly get on my phone at 1:00 AM whatever it is, say what I need to say or type it in. So I don't wake my wife up and put in that reminder. The Reminder app is, it's just, it's just so necessary . I don't know if I could do what I do without having that tool. Having that to to to kind of set me up for the day. And same with calendar. So scheduling, you know, just being able to, to manage your schedule. So some , my answer your question is, is your phone, I guess being the tool that I use the most is my phone and it's not me being a millennial because I don't classify myself as one cause I don't cause I think I was born before but you know, people change when they're , the millennial clock started. But anyway, it's not me like ignoring somebody or playing a game or being on Twitter. It's, I'm doing, I'm trying to keep up with my life. And then you have on top of that, cause I have two little girls, you know, you've got their schedule, then you've got your personal life and you , you know, you want to go grab a beer or two with your friend every once in a while . But don't forget to show up to the bar, you know, like, you know, so there's all this, there , all these different balls that you have to juggle and your phone is sitting right there to be able to do that for you. Now maybe going back a little bit to answer more than the classroom setting. We are very primitive at my school and that's my fault. Like I do that on purpose. I keep things, my tech director in high school, use the acronym KISS, keep it simple, stupid, right? Or some people have said , keep it stupid simple. It's one is calling you stupid one is, you know, saying, keep this , keep the thing. Uh , stupid simple. Uh, I like to call people stupid. But the , the, the KISS method of keeping it simple is what I would say. Don't my, my, we don't have, we don't use text books . Earlier I talked about the, the video technology that we use and , and you know, I'm, I'm staring at my projector right now, so I'll turn that on and we watch something and it's not a cop out because it's there. You know, if in the eighties and nineties when I was learning theatre, if that technology was there and that ability to see these videos was there and readily available, I fully believe that my directors would have used it. So , uh, but we still keep it very simple. We , we do, everything starts with a safety check, you know, in my tech classes. So it's , there's no true technology when we go to it. I will say, and I don't know if this answers your question or not. One of the more fun yet powerful education tools that I've used is competition. So I create competition in my classroom and say, you guys have, you guys have a day to build a standard eight by four Hollywood flat and Broadway flat, right? You've got to build both cars because if you build them in order, it can build them. You can use the same wood, right? So you've got to build one, take it apart, build the next one, and whoever does it right and fastest gets gets 100. And that's how you get your 100. Right. And I don't, and if you build it wrong and it's falling apart and the glue is still dripping and it's just, you know , nasty. It's not like I fail the kid. Right. I mean, they still get an A for effort, but, but they, they don't really at the beginning of the year, especially when they're in my room, they don't know that they're still gonna get a pretty good grade. When I start the competition, they think, oh, if you don't do it right, you're going to fail. And that's not the truth. Right. That'd be cruel and unusual because we're an education not in like, you know, it's , it's just not, it's not right. But we still do competent. We always been competitions in my classroom. Um, we compete with , uh , we hook up in a , in , I've got it back here. We , we hook up a simple lighting. Uh, I've got a small dimmer pack with a couple of source 4 juniors, a couple of LEDs, really tiny American DJ, like $20 lightboard from Amazon. And I say turn these lights on and that's, and I don't tell them how to hook it up. That's, that's their introduction to lighting is I just say turn these lights on and I've had kids spend 30 minutes trying to figure this out and I've had kids spend a minute and a half that figure it out and what they don't get is that they want to be the last kid they, they, because I'm training them like, hey, you gotta be observant, right? That's part of the process. Sit here and watch the , the, your classmates do this because then you're going to be faster hopefully next. But some of these kids, they go off or they sit in a corner and I'm like, I don't police anything. If they want to go sit in a corner and listen to music and you know, talk to their friend on snapchat, perfectly fine, but your grade is now going to suffer because you're not being observant. You're not sitting with the class and being observant. I've got five kids that are just sitting there taking notes, like plug this into that plug. And then when they get up here and they do it like that, the kid in the corner is like, well how did they do it so fast? Well, they were sitting up here watching. That's that . That's a lesson on observation, right? I didn't say you couldn't do that. So it's, you know, that's a super competition as a fun, powerful tool. And every once in a while I'll, luckily my kids don't listen to this podcast. I mean one's only seven, but she , uh, she'll every once in a while will bring home like candy and stuff and I don't want candy in my house. It's just a parent thing that , so I'll bring that to school. And then whoever, like if it's competition day, that'll be like an incentive. Here's, here's a bag of m and m's that really should've gone into my daughter, but she doesn't need it. So enjoy. So that's about it. Yeah.
Jimmy Chrismon:
Well, what are your parting words of wisdom for new teachers or even experienced teachers in the field?
Blake Minor:
I would just say, oh, for new teachers especially, you know, everybody's going to, you're going to be overwhelmed. It's just, it's just going to happen and it's how you kind of get through that and get out the other side , um, and just grow knowing that, hey, this is going to end. You know, there, there's that the nice thing about education, I don't know about in the university setting, I think you guys go through uh , summers as well with kind of summer programs and such, but it slows down I'm sure a little bit. But you know, there is always a light at the end of the tunnel. There is, you know, you are only doing this for nine months and then you kind of get to recharge or nine and a half months and you get to recharge and then you get to go back and do it. And there are all these resources at your fingertips that you can take advantage of to kind of ease your time in this field knowing full well, and this is again cliche. We're not in this for us. We're in this for the students. We're here to educate students and make them better. And you can treat them the way that you hear this a lot in the parenting world. I want my kid to have a better life than I had. So it's the same philosophy in education. I think you, you want to give these kids something, a better education than maybe you had. Even if your education was stellar, you still want to try and get to that point where they have a , a better time in your classroom. Culture is everything, you know, keep in t he climate of the culture. A nd, u h, I just, I , I'm not a yeller. I'm not a screamer, but my kids know when I'm mad and, and the c limate's a huge, huge thing in my classrooms. U h, give a kid a high five and t hen make a joke out of it when you take t he the hand sanitizer a nd be like, I d unno w hat your hands have been, you know, like, like have some fun with it, you know, b ut, but they still appreciate that high five. There's a video of me right now on online of , uh , at graduation we have a six A school and down to here that means that there are over 2,500 kids in our school, about 2,500. And so we had a graduating class of almost 700 kids and I'm high fiving half the group because only half of them walk by me and then immediately walked on stage and there's a veteran teacher sitting there, he goes, squirts, you know, give you a hand sanitizer because he knew I needed it. So, but, but, but all those kids, you know, it's just, it's just about them smiling, you know, having a good time. So that's about it.
Jimmy Chrismon:
Awesome. Well, thank you so much for talking with me today. It was great to meet you and all the best with your podcast. Yeah. Thanks you too man. Well, I really enjoy my chat with Blake and I appreciate him being on the show and for having me on his. So make sure you do check out Minor Wisdom, check out on apple podcasts or any of your favorite podcast providers. My episode is there. He and I chatted back in like in June I believe, May or June. Uh , and I've been saving this interview , uh, with a whole group of technical theatre interviews that are coming up. Kind of here is my, my first little unit of some tech theatre that we can all use. So I hope you got a lot out of that. I enjoyed chatting with him and I wish you all the best for your school year, Blake. I'm going to turn my attention now to my student teachers. I was only able to get one of them on the phone , uh , to , to talk about last week. Um , but I, I'll have Kelli for you next week, but this week we're going to chat with Emma for a second. When I caught her, she was in Starbucks with her sister and she was doing some lesson planning. So she stepped out to go to her car and uh , to, to phone in and just chat with me for a minute about how her week went, so here's my conversation with Emma.
Emma Harmon]:
this week was great. I got to lead a block period of my acting one class and I found out that morning and it was Scott like saying, hey, you don't have to say yes, but what if you led this entire block period? And I was terrified, but on the outside I smiled and I was like, I would love to and I'd said yes because I thought that I thought that it would be like the best way to do it would be to just jump in. And plus because I had my prep periods in the morning, I was kind of relieved cause I was like, okay great. Now I know what I'm going to do with my life this morning. And so I went in there and it was, it was like my students were so kind to me and it was so fun and it was only fun after I kind of said like, you know what, y'all, I planned this this morning. Um , this is the longest I've ever taught and I'm seriously so excited, so let's do this. And they were like, yes, Ms. Harmon. And they were applauding and it , it was just like the culture of the classroom is so fun. Um, so like today, yeah, it was a great week. Yeah, it was a great week .
Jimmy Chrismon:
Yeah. So was it a healthy dose of fear and excitement
Emma Harmon]:
It was. I t was, and I was really proud of myself afterwards because it didn't go perfectly, but it was, it went well, you know, and I'm someone that's pretty hard on myself. So just l ike doing it and knowing that students learned and got things out of it was, it was really satisfying.
Jimmy Chrismon:
Well , good. So what was the challenge that you hope to tackle for going forward?
Emma Harmon]:
Going forward? It's, it's side coaching. It's something that we do so much in acting class. And I think it's a really, it's something you need to practice a lot is being able to quickly identify what the student needs help with and what is the best strategy to use with them.
Jimmy Chrismon:
I think that's , that's a great thing to identify because you will be doing that a lot. And I don't, I don't know that I specifically, and I don't know that we as a faculty do a good enough job of , of telling you, hey, you're gonna have to do a lot of this so pay attention and get some practice then . So that's good for me to hear going forward to , to encourage the underclassmen and what they're doing is they're growing and maturing in this program.
Emma Harmon:
I think the most comparable thing that we get in the program is our directing experience. Um, but something that I realized too is it feels different doing it in the classroom setting than doing it in the extracurricular setting. And it's the same reason why I've been more comfortable with the older students than the younger students is because the older students are already with you. Yeah. They already have that vocabulary. They're already committed. It's the newbies that are like, I don't know what you mean. Yeah . That's the teaching part. So
Jimmy Chrismon:
yeah. And that's learning how to put the stuff that you know and that those other kids already do really well and simplifying and breaking it down and actually teaching them that stuff. So they're those students in the next couple of years,
Emma Harmon:
that's, that's what Scott said to me. He was like, you need to realize that you, you're the one that's taking them from that place to the other place. And I was like, Oh yeah , that's true. The
Jimmy Chrismon:
Well it sounds like it was a good week. And uh, I, I know that I've checked in with you a couple of times during the week, but I'm happy to hear that your teaching went well and things are going well. Well, there you have it folks. That's this week's episode of THED Talks. I hope you enjoyed it. Hope you enjoyed checking in with Emma and that a , you got a lot out of my conversation with Blake Minor. Do check out his podcast, Minor Wisdom, find that on your favorite podcast providers, but you can also find THED Talks on your favorite podcast providers. We're on Apple Podcasts on iTunes, Google Podcast and Google Play, Spotify, Stitcher, Anypod and Tunein. So go on, subscribe to the show, rate us and review us. Uh, feel free to email me anytime with ideas for the show or um , thoughts about the show or if you want to be a guest on the show, I'd love to hear from you. That email address is thedtalkspodcast@gmail.com. You can find us on all your favorite social media on Twitter @ theatre edtalks. on Tumblr thedtalks.tumblr .com . Find us on Facebook, THED Talks, Instagram @thedtalkspodcast and of course our website, www. thedtalks .com . Thank you so much for listening. Thank you Joel Hamlin and Joshua Shusterman for the use of your music for the show Magnetize and Flip the Record. Really grateful to you guys and I hope you're doing well in school. But, thank you teachers for listening. Thank you, Theatre Ed students and Theatre Ed professors for listening. Keep tuning in. Keep checking us out, keep sending in your thoughts and keep interacting with us on social media. Thanks for joining us. I hope you have a great week.
Speaker 3:
Thanks for joining us. Hope you have a great week.
