Hip Pocket Theatre

This is a program which has been ongoing since 1984 and is performed in the Adolescent Psychiatric Department of Cook's. Our outreach staff members visit Cook's on Saturday mornings for 2 hours, performing theater games and activities which encourage skills of daily living, such as teamwork, patience, abstract thought, communication, trust, development of the imagination, observation, listening and responding appropriately, control of the body and mind to achieve certain tasks, and the list goes on.

Story Soup follows Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills guidelines for English and literature in first through third grades. Using the device of two chefs preparing soup, "Story Soup" encourages children to participate first in the identification of ingredients to create soup, and then in the identification of ingredients to create a story. What are the elements? Who, what, when, where, and how. There is a beginning, middle, and end to a story. A story has a problem that is resolved. All of these elements are introduced to the students and they learn how the ingredients are contained not only in a story, but also in movies, poems, nursery rhymes, and songs. They are encouraged to use these ingredients to create their own works.

At this point, the actors include the children in the acting out of the story as it is being told. This process has been used in groups as small as thirteen and as many as one hundred and fifty, and allows for the inclusion and participation of all children in the group.