Exploring the Efficacy of Using Theatre Techniques in Teaching Business Communication.

Raina, Reeta

Introduction

The tectonic socio-economic and cultural changes have changed the configuration of the societies across the world, and more importantly are effecting "radical reconstitution of the concepts and mentalities of the world" (Scott ,2000:1). Today, the higher educational institutions\universities are faced with the new challenges how to survive in the new brave world. All the stakeholders including academic leaders, teachers, students and parents face a complicated mix of challenges and opportunities in the 21st century (Silva, 2008). The institutions of higher education are no longer seen as the custodians of knowledge or gatekeepers of information. Technology has given access to all kinds of knowledge to the students just at the press of a button. Knowledge now streams in from everywhere. This texting generation are connected through a million modes of social media. Thus technology is pushing the teachers to reevaluate how they can bring the greatest value to the students in the class. The old model of teaching learning enterprise which is almost 600 years old has become irrelevant today. Mazur (1990) comments that lectures are a way of transferring the instructor's lecture notes to students notebooks without passing through the brains of either. Teachers of great repute have observed that learning is never internalized by students when taught through the lecture mode. They may do well on textbook based problems, have all the formulas and bag of tricks to apply, but when it comes to solving real life problems, they flounder.

Educators, researchers, and policy makers have advocated student involvement for some time as an essential aspect of meaningful learning (smith and et.al, 2005). Education, according to Mazur (1990), is not only information transfer, but it involves making sense of and assimilating that information. More and more faculty are finding that the traditional lecture no longer suits them because the older "transfer of information" model of instruction, seems to have lost its sheen and relevance with the fast advancement of technology (Aladjem, 2012). Today, therefore, is strong need to revisit and revamp the entire teaching/learning model in order to make it more effective. There is need to shift from the prevalent form of pedagogy- the lecture style of instruction to more innovative, interactive and experiential learning model.

1.1 Why This Study

These days, many higher institutions are experimenting with Theatre techniques as an alternative to the traditional lecturing style of teaching, as here, the focus moves away from lecturing to more physical and imaginative activity of each student. Experiences in the arts--in dance, drama, music, and visual arts play a valuable role in helping students to achieve their potential as learners and to participate fully in their community and in society as a whole. Participation in the arts contributes in important ways to students' lives and learning--it involves intense engagement, development of motivation and confidence, and the use of creative and dynamic ways of thinking and knowing (Nadeem & Mohsin, 2012). Moore (2004) found that recent brain research proves that emotions are linked with learning and when a student connects to the concept emotionally, he will have a better understanding of it. When we teach using the arts we are linking prior experiences with new stimuli. Teaching using drama brings emotion and learning together. Glow and Johanson (2009) reaffirmed that the Arts (including theatre) were central in the health and vitality of any community, claiming that the Arts are often the generators of change, providing intercultural dialogue and provoking conversations that challenge the status quo and the 'saturated consciousness' (Apple, 1990) that becomes a malaise in any society. It is well documented that the intellectual and emotional development of children is enhanced through study of the arts. Through the study of dance, drama, music, and visual arts, students develop the ability to think creatively and critically. Participation in the theatre can also broaden students' horizons in various ways. Through study of the arts, students are given unique opportunities to engage in imaginative and innovative thought and action and to develop the ability to communicate and represent their thoughts, feelings, and ideas in numerous ways (retreived on 3rd March 2016. https://www.edu.gov.on.ca/eng/ curriculum/elementary/arts18b09curr.txt.)

It is said that corporate can be to a great extent compared to theatre since people are engaged in an ongoing drama that is being played on the larger stage of society (Evers, 2013). Individually and collectively, within and without, people are in a dynamic and dramatic relationship that is now planned or rehearsed and now improvised. Giardella & Ross (2006), substantiating the same, observes that "An actor on stage can be compared to a business leader: they both face uncertainty, ambiguity, and an unclear scenario where the most unexpected of all things can happen.... but improvisation help managers respond adequately to unexpected and uncertain situations". According to Giardella and Ross (2006), many business schools are starting to realize that theatre techniques are useful as a teaching strategy. "There is a demand for this kind of active learning: where students get up, do, and try new approaches."Further, highlighting the importance of using theatre techniques as a teaching strategy offers several advantages for both teacher and student and it is generally believed that student's interest in the topic is raised. Research has shown that "integrating experiential learning activities in the classroom increases interest in the subject matter and understanding of course content" (Poorman, 2002, pg. 32). Fogg (2001) tells of a college professor who felt that his history classes were boring and not involving the students. After trying out a role-playing type game one semester, he observed that students were much more interested in the material. However, differentiating between the role play and the theatre techniques, Cojocariua and Botnaru (2013:154) pointed out that "unlike role-play, the technique of creative dramatization is a less formal technique, its actions being the result of the actors' improvisation. A simple way to start a creative dramatization is to play group characters: for example, an old person, a little girl etc. Also, it trains the child to work in a team, develop creative personality together with his colleagues."

It results that drama techniques provide an alternative to approaching the educational act. Learning to participate is an important skill for students to learn in today's multi-stakeholder world. According to Brierley et al (2002) the role play method (theatrical technique) develops a greater understanding of the complexity of professional practice and enables students to develop skills to engage in multi-stakeholder negotiations within the controlled environment of the classroom. "Drama is powerful because its unique balance of thought and feeling makes learning exciting, challenging relevant to real-life concerns, and enjoyable" (Wagner, 1998).

Giardella & Ross (2006) highlight that the skills and crafts that actors have used for hundreds of years can in reality aid communication in corporate venues. Various theatrical activities like pantomime, jazz chants, role play and simulations, fairy tales and folk tales, improvisation, reading plays, watching or listening to plays, staging plays, and writing plays can be used to make them aware of body language and non verbal communication as well as the ability to be authentic in the moment and take risks. Control on facial expressions, kinesics, gestures, eye contact, voice modulation, word stress pitch variation and pauses are required equally by a corporate in his business meetings as any actor needs in his performances. But the MIT expert Giardella (2007) explained that "although it is sometimes believed that businesspeople might not be familiar with these kinds of exercises, I find that they are generally excited about the idea of doing something new and learning these skills. They quickly become engaged and open to the experience. Every business organization has physical setup like the stage for a theatre performance. Every employee is a theatre artist, every project is a play. The innovative approach of theatre arts help the students solve problems in collaboration with others, to develop skills in critical thinking, and to communicate effectively with language, physical expression, and visual images.

In fact, Joyce and Weil (2000) observed if judiciously worked upon, theatre skills can go a long way in developing caring and effective business communication skills. The key to being an effective player in corporate processes is to learn to observe, sense and listen to the unfolding drama at workplace.

2. Methodology

2.1 Research Design and Objectives

Albeit, technology has made available number of teaching techniques to teachers but it's felt that "Role Play/Drama' (theatrical technique) is also an effective technique of teaching especially it is found to be most effective tool in enhancing communication skills of students at any level of education.. Hence, the present study (qualitative in design) was documented with the objective of sharing the classroom experiences of the course titled" Effective Communication through Theatre Technique" taught to post graduate students of a business school. The course was developed essentially to experiment if this-participatory art form w' ill contribute to the learning of the professionals-helping them assimilate and make sense of the knowledge learnt in communication theory classes. The objectives of the course taught were:

To develop interpretive ability and importance of holistic perspectives

Develop right attitude and skill set

Develop active listening

Know how to communicate effectively

2.2 Sampling

This one credit course was developed by the author with the help of another faculty from National School of Drama (NSD) who has his groundings in theatre. The course was to be delivered in thirty lectures (30)--each lecture of one and a half hour duration. The course as an elective was offered to post graduate students of a leading business school in the NCR(National Capital Region). Total of 143 students opted for this course. The students age varied from 23 to 27 years. These students were enrolled for two years MBA programme. They have already covered one year and now were in their final year at the school. The students earlier had already gone through two core courses in Communication where they had been taught various facets of business communication including listening skills, nonverbal communication, intra and interpersonal communication, public speaking etc. However, the course contents of this elective were more or less the same as that of the core courses except this elective introduces theatre based activities that should help future managers build distinctive communication skills, offer a practical 'tool bag' which will empower students to be themselves, remove their negative self-consciousness, and many of the other blocks which impede effective communication in meetings, presentations and sale.

2.3 The Process

The classes were conducted in a room emptied of all furniture. All chairs, desks and tables were removed. Now the whole class was divided into four sections, each section having a strength varying between 3340 students. Each section was taken one at a time. Both the faculty used to be present in the classroom one from the institute and one from the NSD (National School of Drama) engaging with students simultaneously. Generally, the faculty from NSD would make the students do exercises, role plays and the regular faculty from communication area would invite a discussion and then at the end would highlight the importance of that particular activity--its relevance in terms of explaining the underlying communication concepts.

First day, first class, some ice breaking sessions were conducted. The students were asked to walk in all directions in that empty classroom covering the whole space. First they would walk bare feet and leisurely at the speed of 5 and then gradually they were asked to increase their speed from 5\km to -10\km-, 20, 30 40\ kms. After that, the students were asked to draw a circle at the count of 10. Now each one of the student was asked to introduce his \ her name but by doing some funny, awkward action. This exercise was initially done with some reluctance as they were not ready to shun their inhibitions. They were not comfortable doing it in front of their friends and teachers. However, the teacher herself took the lead. She introduced her name doing some awkward action along with it. This gave the student's confidence and they started the whole activity doing all kinds of funny activities while introducing their name. This activity helped them feeling relaxed and helped them in shedding some negative inhibitions. The students were all smiling, wiggling and giggling in delight, laughing and just enjoying themselves. The energy in the room had palpably changed. The class was now awake and ready to work together. As a way of modeling a subsequent exercise, students were asked to create body sculptures. Students formed improvised "photographs/sculptures" of one-word themes: earth, family, some mechanical device-rail engine, fan or clock . As they joined the exercise one at a time, students were directed to link physically to form the sculpture or an image. This exercise demanded that students rely on one another physically to form an idea. Some students would make an image of rail engine and they were asked to ensure the sounds they produce were in sync with their actions. At the end of all the sculptures, these images were unpacked. What did they learn from this exercise? They admitted that the biggest challenge for them was to persuade people to agree to their suggestions while forming an image. Poor performance reflected poor communication and poor teamwork. This exercise stirred up student responses. It was important to acknowledge all impressions of the sculptures and images. Students realized that multiple interpretations were possible for a simple image. Then four/five students were asked to portray their self through an image that nobody knows about it; the self-people think about him/her and his /her ideal self i.e to display their personal; social and ideal self. They were posed the questions: What do they find compelling about them? What felt untrue to them? A discussion followed after this activity and it was suggested that if there is any gap in these three images, these needs to be bridged.

Now, the teacher could feel the students were in a receptive mood. The tone and tenor of what to expect in the class was set. Thus the teacher then worked on introducing another related communication topic of common perceptual errors. In order to emphasize on students how several perceptual errors that can lead to inaccurate attributions and to troublesome communication, another dramatic situation was given to them. The students were again instructed to walk in all directions. Then they were to stop and were asked to close their eyes. Now they were told to imagine different characters like a 15 year old boy playing at recesses in a government school. Each boy\girl were asked to act the same. Most of them came out with the stock responses. Now again they were asked to play the role of a 15 year old boy but this time the boy\girl is from a public school. Most of the students responded the same way. Now again, they were to play first the role of a girl and then the role of a boy lost in a jungle who suddenly sees a lion confronting them all alone. The students were asked to respond how the boy and the girl would react to the situation when confronted with a lion in a jungle. Again majority of the students showed girls as being weak who would try to cry for help while as the boys in these situations would respond by challenging the lion.

Now after having done this exercise, the teacher asked the students as to how would they interpret this activity? All kinds of explanations followed, however, they missed the important point how we in real life commit perceptual errors, especially how we stereotype people in our real life situations. The teacher would then explain to them how people tend to do an exaggerated or distorted generalization about an entire category of people that does not acknowledge individual variation. It was further emphasized how stereotypes form the basis for prejudice and discrimination.

Next, through improvisation exercises, the teachers demonstrated how to develop effective responses to conflicts and stressful situations as well as the ability to see a conversation from another person's perspective. Again, exploiting drama techniques to help students improve the intercommunication, inter-knowledge and empathic relationships, they were given a task of preparing a short skit. This time, the class was divided into several groups, each group having 7-8 students. Now each group was given instructions to identify some notorious character who could be real or drawn from the religious scripture, history, or from some popular stories known to all. It could be some kind of anti-social, criminal or a smuggler\murderer type. They were asked to prepare an improvisation on the character that each group has chosen. But each group was to present the story (through drama) that would focus on the compelling, inimical circumstances that forced the said character to indulge in such nefarious acts. The students picked up all kinds of bad character like Ravana from the epic Ramayana, a real life character the rapist Ram who was accused of having raped brutally a delhi girl, again a real time terrorist and don Dawood who is known for his nefarious acts etc. and they would try to portray them in a more humane and compassionate manner. As students "live through" experiences of others in imagined situations, they learnt to understand a variety of points of view and motives and to empathize with others. This exploration of the "as if" in roles and worlds helped students (as expressed in their log books) deepen their understanding of humanity and issues of equity and social justice. Pretending to be someone else involves an act of the imagination that is of central importance in the development of the ability to understand others. Students also learnt to use language effectively to communicate a character's emotional state and point of view.

Role playing is a key component of the drama curriculum. Improvisation techniques were also used to improve communication. "One of the improvisation tools involve the use of "status" in interactions. Many times, in the business world, people don't change their status when they speak. One person keeps a high status, while the other one has a low status. In dynamic and effective conversations, each person moves freely from one status to another to help gain trust, set limits, or influence the forward momentum of the scene. In theatre, this is called "status changes," which means that the actors in the scene keep changing from high to low status or from low status to high status with great fluidity as they influence each other. This ability was practiced by students through exercises. One of the students was asked to remain seated on a chair. Now each students was told to persuade the seated student to leave the chair for him\her. In order to make it real, the seated student was instructed not to leave the chair unless and until he \she genuinely felt like leaving the chair. After this exercise, the students were given to understand how status changes offer a vital tool for negotiators and leaders who wish to create productive dialogues as they influence others. There were other exercises done to help students assimilate how people can be influenced and make them move from the latitude of rejection to latitude of acceptance.

These creative exercises balanced research and reading and helped to develop critical thinking skills as well. In another theatre exercise a mirror exercise was used to put across the point how interpersonal needs drive our behavior. Some of us have the tendency to control the other interactant and some of us just wish to be included in the group. The exercise invited two participants to face one another and maintain eye contact as they "mirror" each other in non-verbal motions and gestures. A young girl student was paired with a young boy student. He found it difficult to follow her when it was her turn to lead. They both said it was hard for them to look into the eyes of the other. Basically, they had great difficulty trusting and being in sync. Their honesty coming out of this exercise (which required their BODY to reveal what their mind would not in cognitive or discursive learning) led to a heated and meaningful class discussion about gender difference and fear. This mirror exercise however between the same genders turned out to be more fun for the students. They enjoyed teasing each other but the comfort level between the two was not lost.

Similarly, to make them understand how we communication through our body-English, they were asked to imagine as if someone from top is controlling them with His hooks. The person above them fixes theses hooks on their different parts of their body. Sometime the hook is on their chin, and the person above them pulls their chin upwards. They were to push it downwards-always opposite to what direction he would pull it and the hooks kept shifting from one to another part of the body. Post this exercise, different students were asked to play the role of a majestic king, a beggar, a student who has just been declared first in some competitive examination, etc. in front of the whole class. The king, the beggar, the happy student would take a walk around the class and the rest of the class was to locate the hooks on the respective bodies of these actor- students. This, gave them an idea how through our body posturing, we let the outsiders read or interpret our state of mind. If we are sad, feeling low, our body hooks accordingly sag and if we are happy, confident, our body hooks are always in the upward direction. They realized that posturing is another form of nonverbal communication and if they have to create a positive impression on people, it is important they stand straight, slouching or hunching of shoulders will send wrong message across.

Another classroom activity was centered around students working on their volume, tone, speed etc. They formed a circle and a glass tumbler was kept in the close vicinity of one student. He was told to throw his voice in the center of the tumbler. Another student would then keep moving the tumbler away from that particular student and the latter has to raise his voice so that it drops into the center of the tumbler. This was repeated with each one of the student in the group so that they understand the importance of adjusting their volume. The students were also given some breathing exercises like inhaling and exhaling. In order to learn about the tone variations, students were asked to express the emotion of anger while counting from one to ten and then they were to express the happy emotion starting from eleven to twenty and the in reverse order. This gave them the feel that one needs to change the tone matching with their emotions. They were told by the instructors that each word has an associated emotion and one has to consciously let that emotion be revealed and let it be felt by the other person/ the audience. Further, through varied exercises, students learnt to be more sensitive to body language and nonverbal cues including eye contact, frequency of glances, blink rate, gestures, facial expressions, tone that make them the best presenter.

3. Discussion and Conclusion

After having conducted full credit course (having thirty sessions, each session of one and half hour) the students were told to submit their log book. At the start of the programmes, students were given the instructions to prepare their log book for each session, documenting what did they do in that particular session and what was the learning. The logs were submitted at the end of the term. Majority of the students had given a very positive feedback. The analysis of the content revealed that the learning through theatre medium was a liberating experience for them that helped them to overcome their negative consciousness and experience the sense of freedom from those archaic irrational biases and prejudices that prevent them from achieving their best. They had mentioned that this participatory art form contributed to the learning of these professionals. It helped them in developing holistic and correct perspectives and educated them not to fall prey to misplaced notions or wrong understanding of life or themselves. Further the analysis of the content also indicate that the course also helped them in developing various peoples' skills that will help them to communicate better and connect with multi-stakeholders. They experienced that a control on facial expressions, kinesics, gestures, eye contact, voice modulation, word stress, pitch variation and pauses are required equally by a corporate in his business meetings as any actor needs in his performances. Pretending to be someone else involves an act of the imagination that is of central importance in the development of the ability to understand others. As students "live through" experiences of others in imagined situations, they learnt to understand a variety of points of view and motives and to empathize with others. These techniques gave students a voice and helped them feel comfortable in experiencing their opinions. They could act out a character, become emotionally involved in it, and really express themselves. As Edmiston and Wilhelm (1998: 60) observed that reflection is often a step that is overlooked in traditional teaching methods. "Students do not just act in drama--they also reflect on the meanings of actions as they consider the consequences for different people. Reflection is dialogic when the students evaluate actions from the point of view of a person affected".

Theatre is a tool, a journey, and a magnifying glass. Through it, students can reimagine their lives and their world. Teaching students using the body, memorization, enactment, and characterization is an opportunity to witness to the richness and complexity of our lives. In the course described, students study business communication experience. Through using theatre as a pedagogical tool, the intellectual art of studying expands outward to include an experience of the self and other. In this way, they begin to touch the mystery and meaning of life . This is bodied knowledge.

Every business organization has physical setup like the stage for a theater performance. Every employee is a theatre artist, every project is a play. If judiciously worked upon theatre skills can go a long way in developing caring and effective business communication skills. It can be inferred from the ongoing discussion that the study and practice of theater are valuable components for the budding managers. Practicing of theater technique will encourage the future managers to solve problems in collaboration with others, to develop skills in critical thinking and ,to communicate effectively with language ,physical expression and visual image.

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Reeta Raina

Professor, FORE School of Management, New-Delhi.