Chol Theatre's Imaginary Communities

‘The purple plants!’ shrieks one student loudly and drops on to the floor clutching reams of purple fabrics; other children dash over to her, there is chatting and exclaiming erupts around the classroom. The TA looks over nervously. Spontaneous conversations are happening, a young boy wails ‘nooooo’ dramatically, is someone actually crying? Everyone is talking at once. ‘I can't believe it’ one girl mouths to me over the din. I am standing in middle of it all, happily in ‘out of control’ control.

The students are not misbehaving, far from it, they are reacting in role to a plot development in a story – their own story – that we have been co-creating for four weeks now as part of ongoing Imaginary Communities work from Chol, which I am privileged to be part of.