Evaluation of the KONGLA project

Nika Stepankova and Ales Launer about KONGLA and its outcomes for language learners.

The project was exceptionally successful: during four days of performances it was attended by more than six hundred pupils and students. First of all, the project had pedagogic aspirations: to motivate pupils and students to learn German, and via drama performance it showed them basic models of both verbal and non-verbal communication. The main asset was a simple and understandable story built on situations that are known to young people from everyday life, for example meeting somebody in the park, a kiosk seller, a bar musician, a TV competition concerning language, etc. The actors’ precise pronunciation (they were native speakers of German), interactive insertions, chanting of nineteen most frequent words in German… – all of these headed towards the activation of the pupils’ knowledge already acquired at school. The actors even mentioned the Czech words of German origin and basic differences in grammar of the both languages. Moreover, the performance was very lively and entertaining. Interactive performances on the Czech theatre scene are quite rare. The Czech audiences prefer anonymity and passivity, which is the result of TV culture. Therefore, it is a pity that not many schools, but quite a small number of them take advantage of an interactive performance when such an opportunity appears.

Nika M. Stepankova, MA in Czech language and Music (Pedagogical Faculty, Masaryk University in Brno), Head of the Domino Project, Head and Director of the Domino Theater, Fomer Head and founder of private Kindergarten and elementary school in Brno specialised in drama education

Ales Launer, MA in English language and literature (Faculty of Arts, Masaryk University in Brno), Deputy of the Domino Project, Head of the Domino School, Former Senior lecturer at Department of English and American Studies, Faculty of Arts, Masaryk University