Clowning by Numbers with Kindergartners

How Do You Play a Drum?
photos by Liam Breck

"I see her! It's Barbara!" I'm hailed by tiny voices as I sneak across the gym before my show begins. Seven of the 60 kindergartners know me from my

EMTs: Excited Munchkin Team

zany Cambridge Performance Project after-school circus class. The whole room feels empowered by our friendship and throughout the show children dash onto the stage to play with me. They talk to me from the audience, chase me around the gym, and even revive me when I flop to the floor by wafting me with air from my own red fan and balloon hand pump!

While all their teachers are at an open house for incoming students, I'm presenting a new educational and interactive clown show custom built around the teachers' requests: numbers, alphabet, shapes, and colors. We make alphabet sculptures - an 'O' requires 15 children; the 'Q' calls for three more. Next, I ask them to throw all 120 of their shoes at me. They gleefully comply, lofting sandals and sneakers. Together, we count how many shoes I can hold before all their laces and velcro tumble to the floor. Later, we count how many children can sit on a clown, "1, 2, 3 . . . 9!" They jump into action. I love a show in which the kids become my fellow actors!

Counting Game: How Many Children Can Sit on a Clown?