Chicago High School for the Arts – Acting I

Mar 2026 · 2nd Semester

Students explore making strong choices and taking risks as individual performers and as an ensemble, using improvisation as a foundation in the first semester and story theatre in the second. The basics of character development, scenic construction, and dramatic agreement are explored using body, voice, and imagination to create fully realized and committed characters. Using techniques drawn from multiple theatrical backgrounds and pioneers, students heighten their connection to sensory life, environment and relationship in order to strengthen their creativity, imagination and understanding of human behavior. They develop skills related to scenic objectives, listening, impulse, problem solving, physical and verbal communication and given circumstances. They take the skills developed through improvisation in the first half of the year and apply them to text work in the second semester.