Clowning and Teaching...

I've always wanted to teach, along with perform.

4 years ago I began subbing.  I needed to make more money, it's tough to make a living as a full time clown.  Subbing worked for me, I needed an on call job that didn't interfere with clowning.

Subbing is not very difficult for me, standing in front of a group is easy, keeping kids attention is easy.  The hard part is when I have to do discipline.  I don't ever like being the hard ass.  But sometimes you have to in a high school Chemistry class...

I think there is cross over between being a clown and working as a substitute teacher.

I started documenting my life as a sub.  I spent all of last year documenting being a sub by filming myself on my lunch breaks.  Take a look, tell me what you think.  Please subscribe on youtube.  I release my 2 minute episodes twice a week.

Enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/user/heymrsub

Another Post About Fun with Balloons!

My posts about balloons get the most attention, so...I'll do more on balloons.

But as always, if you have ideas, please post them.  If you have questions, please post them, if you have  a germ of an idea and want me to help flesh it out, post it.

My goal with this blog has always been to become a teacher.

Balloons and magic...

Balloons on their own are very magical.  A balloon transforms from a small lump to a giant round object.  If you don't tie a balloon, it turns into a projectile and flies around the room you can blow up a balloon and it will take the shape of a heart, a geo, a smiley face, an alien.  If you let out a little air, it becomes a fart creator.

Remember being little and how neat it was to see a balloon that blew up and it said "happy birthday" on it?

If you are amazed by the balloon, it will become a magical item.

When you do the needle through balloon, ASK "what happens when a needle touches a balloon?"  You can be as surprised as your audience, popping balloons are shocking, putting a needle near a balloon and not having it pop is tense, it's magic.

Balloons are colorful.  What can you do, with the colors of a balloon?  You could do a simple magical force (forcing their choice), get a color, put the color into a bag, say abracacabra
and pull out a doggy of that color.

Color changing balloon.  This is a neat trick where you blow up a balloon, put a needle to it and it changes color when you pop it.  To do this trick, you put one balloon inside the other, then blow up the inside balloon.  The slight trick is to give a little room to the outside balloon by blowing a bit of air in there.

What could you do with a trick like this?  Hold up a blue balloon, call it green.  Get into an argument with the kids about the color, get mad at the balloon, then try and pop it and it turns green.

Draw an unhappy face on the balloon inside (before you blow it up).  Talk about how you hate popping balloons, pop it and there is an unhappy face inside.

Do you have ideas with balloons and magic?  Share them below!  You can help others or maybe I can give you new ideas!

Got Questions? I've Got Answers!

You may notice I had a gap last month and the month before.

Going through a mid-clown life crisis.  Wondering if clowning is the best use of my time anymore.

I'd like to become a guru.  I would like to become Yoda and live on a mountain top of cotton candy.  I need to get some respect in my life!

So HELLO out there.  I'm sitting here waiting to answer your questions.   I want nothing in return (right now.  Like Rumpelstiltskin, I may ask for your first born or a review).  

I look at what's being read on my blog.  People like the balloon articles.  Go ahead, tell me your routine, I will try and pump up your routine with jokes or clean up the routine.

Questions about comedy.  Please ask.  When I'm not writing this blog, performing or staring at Jon Stewart.  I write jokes.  I also listen to comedy constantly.

Kids hitting your big old clown shoes?  Go ahead ask me how I can help.

I'm available, funny and free.

Post your questions in the comment box below.  

Keeping Children Engaged

A child can sit with a Barbie Doll or watch Wall E over and over.  Children are more capable of sitting and watching entertainment than adults, way more.

Children are singularly focused.  (Think Old McDonald.  He had a chicken, THEN he had a sheep, THEN he had a cow).  Children will focus on you if you keep the message simple and silly.

Keep your character focused, it takes a lot of energy to stay focused what you're doing but it's why you do what you do.  

If you are losing children's attention, consistently, it's pretty likely you have too much going on. Children can't follow the routine, so they leave, physically or mentally.   Don't have children try to remember a color, then remember a number, then the day of the week and that your name ends with a z.

 Card tricks don't work with children for this reason.  It's just too much and out of their development.  If your routine is like a card trick, remember the red 10 of diamonds, now it's lost in the deck and I shuffle.  That's a ton of information to process.  I got bored and lost just writing that sentence.

If you took a card trick, for children, it would go like this.  What color is this elephant card?  Red? Fred? He's dead? (reinforced the color by repeating it and rhyming it).  Now I'll take this red dog (it's an elephant), again reinforcing what the card is.  I'll put him with all the other animals in the zoo.  Uh oh, the zoo keeper left the gate open now the animals run out, they are everywhere.  (shuffling).  The animals are all mixed up.  Where is that elephant, (he's not in the deck), I can't find him... (look in your sock).  Hey there's an elephant in my sock.

That's basically the same card trick as when a magician takes your card and it ends up in a lemon or in his jacket pocket but singularly focused for children with a silly ending, it ends up in your sock.

If you keep it simple you can find lots of comedy with the kids.  With the routine I just made up, you can get the animals wrong, the children will laugh, you can get the colors wrong, the children will laugh, you can count wrong, you can count in Spanish, you can drop all the cards, you can forget the animal you were looking for.  Underneath, the children are focused on the red elephant and that they will see it again.

The clown comedy comes from being forgetful, from being lost, from getting things out of order.  The routine will work because it's one simple idea, where is the red elephant?

Take any routine you do, it should be very simple.  "I'm going to juggle"  "I'm going to make this rabbit disappear", "I'm going to put the colors of the flag in this bag and make a flag of the US".  On top of that simple message, you can create lots of laughter for the children and keep their attention for longer than you thought possible.