Cours Florent Youth Programs – Giving Artistic Voice to the Future
Tomorrow’s actors (and playwrights, painters, musicians, designers, dancers, directors and singers) are today’s young people. Since 2006 Cours Florent has offered programming specifically designed to foster and encourage future generations of artists and creative, critical thinkers.
Playfully Serious, Seriously Playful
Children are natural actors. They are born with a sense of wonder, a desire to explore, and a need to express themselves. Some are outgoing, some are more reserved, but every single one of them has the power to create worlds. At Cours Florent we are dedicated to encouraging this natural potential through an approach and pedagogy designed especially for youth, developed in conjunction with theatre artists and educators from around the globe.
Two programs, one for children ages 4 – 12, and another for ages 13 – 17, introduce participants to the joys of theatre and artistic self-expression. Exercises to overcome shyness, build confidence, and encourage an innate sense of play initiate greater social skills and facilitate group interaction. Improvisation games allow to access and identify emotions, improve listening skills, and embrace spontaneity. Story-telling activities and work with short scenes (adapted to each age group) promote improved social dynamics, interpretive skills, and linguistic facility.
All courses are taught in English by fully bilingual (English/Français) instructors trained in the Cours Florent Jeunesse teaching method. Applicants at any level of fluency in either language are accepted, and the instructors will adapt to all individual needs. Children have a remarkable ability to learn languages quickly, to remember new vocabulary, expressions, and idioms. This is why Cours Florent considers children as young as 4 ideal candidates for this course. Theatre, with its physical, emotional, and linguistic interplay, has long been recognized as one of the most effective methods of gaining cultural and linguistic facilty.
Youth Acting : Ages 4 – 12
In this course, children learn to better express themselves in English, using the tools and techniques of theatre. Through play and interaction with peers, they gain confidence and fluency, as well as learn improved social dynamics. Budding actors practice language skills with games, songs, and short scenes.
Thanks to specifically developed exercises, children learn to
- Confidently interact with others
- Identify thoughts and impulses and articulate them clearly in English
- Feel comfortable expressing themselves in public
- Develop their creativity Increase their capacity of concentration
- Identify and modulate their emotions
Each course culminates with a class open to parents : an opportunity to see the progress made by our little actors!
Teen Acting : ages 13 – 17
This course is geared towards students who are at least 13 and at most 17 years old. It is important to remember that the best and most successful actors and artists (and confident, happy people in general) are those who maintain their sense of wonder and joy as they grow older.
It allows native-English speakers and other students with an adequate level of fluency to discover the jewels of English-language Theatre. They will dive into the culture of “Acting in English” by exploring the works of classical and contemporary English and American playwrights.
They will be introduced to approaches used throughout the anglophone world as well as methodology developed specifically at Cours Florent by highly trained and qualified instructors, including advanced improvisation techniques, monologue preparation and scene work, and basic text analysis. They will augment their interpretive skills and linguistic facility. And they just may discover the artist within themselves.
As with the Youth Course, all programs culminate with a presentation open to the parents.
Our summer-workshops are a wonderful opportunity to discover our Youth Department and experience the unique Cours Florent approach.
