The work sees two performers explore how a variety of everyday, very familiar objects can be used in weird and wonderful ways. Think paper telescopes, foil moustaches, human hoopla and much much more!

The performance experience starts as soon as the audience enters, with a game of I Spy, led by the performers. On a particularly tricky round of the game, the dance begins as one performer notices a terrifying monster behind them. The pair try every which way to hide from the beast until suddenly they realise there is nothing at all to be scared of; his gruesome spots are just scrunched up pieces of paper, his scaly skin is just kitchen foil (with incidentally is great for making interesting sounds and slippery snakes), and his legs are made of something that nobody would have guessed!

The piece takes the form of lots of short dances, each one discovering another everyday object until, finally, all that is left is a big pile of Thingamajigs!

Previous young audience members said:

‘I think you should do it again!’ ‘It made me feel happy’

‘My favourite bit was when they played with the foil’ ‘Thank you, I liked it.‘

Parents said:

‘We didn’t know what to expect at all so it was really refreshing to see something completely different. Yeah, good fun.’

‘Absolutely fantastic!‘

And teachers said:

‘I saw a different side to lots of the children, for example when the children were becoming ‘monsters’, one little boy who is usually very shy, came out of his shell and got into character ‘roaring’ with his friends. It was great to take a step back and see what the children would do with the resources.‘

‘It really gave them an opportunity to think about how they can move their bodies in different ways and use materials for imaginative purposes.’

The performance involves some audience interaction and is 30 minutes in length. It can either be offered alongside workshops for the children watching to take part in (giving them the chance to try out movement ideas from the show as well as encouraging their own explorations with the objects that are used), or as a stand alone event.

For more information about staging a Thingmajigs performance at your event or school, please get in touch using the details on the contacts page.

The children certainly enjoyed this style of learning, and were always very enthusiastic about going to the sessions. It was observed that more reserved children were participating and putting their hands up to contribute more often than they usually would in a maths lesson.
We chose to work with topics that the staff identified as often being sticking points for year 1 children – time, money and place value. There was a continual sense of development; different ways of facilitating free explorations of maths concepts were explored, games were devised and human clocks and coins were made!

Each activity was evaluated by the young people taking part, and a case study was written at the end point to assess how the findings of the project may be used to inform the school’s delivery of maths in the future.

Staff have been left with the inspiration to teach maths physically, and have already put this into practice since the end of the project by using children’s bodies to teach 3D shapes. All Year 1 staff have said they will definitely teach maths physically in future, and are even considering the possibilities of how they could do this in other subjects. Staff also left the project with a feeling of liberation to give things a go, to experiment with new ways of teaching and see what happens, and identified that the freedom to do this was key to this project.
Some comments from staff working on the project included:

‘Thank you for all your hard work and ideas.‘
‘You have been fab to work with – a real inspiration.‘
‘It’s been great fun!‘
‘Come back soon!‘

The project was kick-started with the delivery of a staff inset day, aiming to give all teaching staff some fresh ideas when teaching dance. The day was a great success with participants commenting

‘I found the build up from scratch very interesting and helpful. The whole session was fun and relaxed and informative. Thank you’

‘Thank you very much for a very effective training day. It was well planned, varied and fun! Just what we were looking for.’

For the bulk of the project, we worked with years 2, 3, 4, and 5.
With the Y2 and Y3 children, we explored different ways to make movement in unusual spaces around their school. This involved making dances going over and under chairs in their classrooms, joining together two trees at the front of school using a long line of bodies and diving over and moulding our bodies into snow sculptures during the wintry weather.

With the Y4 and Y5 classes, we have created dances based on topics they are doing in the classroom. Y4 have been learning about Aztecs and Chocolate and so this has developed into dances about jumping for cocoa beans, showing a production line (including a human conveyor belt!), and making rhythms to move to using chocolate bar wrappers.
Y5 have been reading The Tempest, and this has developed into dances about storms, plotting, and some great comedy trios.

Pictures to follow soon!

There will be one session for 2-3 year olds and their parents, and one for 5-7 year olds. The sessions are entitled ‘Busy Bodies’ and will lead participants through an exciting exploration of the human body. Stories, songs and objects will be used alongside creative movement and arts activities designed to encourage children to identify body parts and to investigate new ways of moving.

Once again, we will be working with techniques used in Philosophy for Children and seeing how movement can enhance and complement this work. We are also very excited to be working along 3 other practitioners from different backgrounds on this project with whom we hope to share skills and maybe develop some new approaches.

We hope to post more information about this once the project gets underway!

We worked alongside Nick Nuttgens, a Philosophy for Children practitioner to see how our two disciplines may work alongside each other.The first phase of the project involved us working with KS2 children, initially to develop key dance skills such as body awareness, balance, projection and appreciation.

We then explored a topics that were being studied in the classroom such as Ancient Egypt (Y3 and Y4) and Africa (Y5). During this phase of the project we incorporated elements of Philosophy for Children, particularly questioning, and developed movement from these ideas. At the end of this phase, each group shared a performance incorporating elements of dance and P4C.

In the final phase of the project, we focussed on developing the confidence and ability of the staff in delivering dance sessions in order to ensure a legacy would be left once the project ended. This phase was particularly successful as we worked closely with staff to plan, deliver and evaluate sessions.

During the 2009 Summer term, Spiltmilk Dance have been working in Firth Park Community Arts College, and King Edward VII Lower School. At Firth Park they have been leading an all boys group who have created a great piece that has been performed at a range of events. At King Edwards they have done sessions outdoors, using the landscape of the playground as stimulus for movement, and this is due to culminate in the creation of a film.
The projects have been a great success and they company are looking forward to starting new ones in 3 other Sheffield secondary schools from September.