question about judge comment

[smachel]

my students got this comment from a judge on saturday:

in prose -
"play with verbs"

in solo -
"play with verbs, sometimes pronouns"

same guy.

any insight? the only thing i can think of is that he wants more emotion to match the words that they're saying. but what's really going through my mind is playing basketball with pronouns.

[s.cambra]

I could be completely wrong, but it might be that the judge
was saying to try coloring the words differently and
experimenting with putting different emphasis on the words.
My coach always tells us to find the most important word in a line
and emphasize it. So my guess is that the judge was just saying to
play around with the delivery of the lines a little, focusing on
the important words in each line which tend to be verbs and pronouns.
That's my guess, but like I said, I could be completely wrong.

[NFox]

Just to build on what S.Cambra said, when I writ something like that on a ballot, I generally mean something akin to "affect your voice in order to mimic the word itself."

In a less confusing way (I'm good at being confusing), if the word is "Ran" try saying it fast as if your voice is running out of your mouth. Alternatively, if the word is "crawled," say it agonizingly slowly.

For words that aren't so literal, just try emphasizing the word in as many ways you can think of, with different inflections.

Generally, if you just have fun and literally "play with your voice" through inflection and modulation, you and your student should have no problem finding a new, more interesting way of interpreting a word...and maybe the entire piece.

I hope this helps.

Nick Fox

[smachel]

thanks! this is what i was thinking as well, but it was just such an odd thing to read the way it was written.

[actorman13]

A way that I could see it being read, is the judge wants you to act out the verbs. I ate a sandwich, so act out eating the sandwich. The bug flopped to the floor, mime a bug. I think the best interpretations often mime the action they talk about, creating a little silent scene for us to watch.