As you prepare to go back to school (or maybe already are) some of our educator colleagues are offering their top tips for the year. In fact, these tips are SO GOOD, these educators have published whole books around them! And maybe some discount codes will be given…. Meet the guests below!
Virtual, recorded, and PWFF. Registration required.
Join:
Jimmy Chrismon author of Trauma-Informed Practices in 9–12 Theatre Education
Dr. Jimmy Chrismon is an award-winning theatre educator with over 17 years of experience in K-12 and higher education. He currently serves as Associate Professor of Theatre Teacher Education at Illinois State University. A former public school teacher in the Carolinas, he has also taught at Winthrop University and CPCC. Jimmy is a director, actor, intimacy director, and certified mental health coordinator. He hosts the internationally recognized THED Talks podcast and is the 2022 Johnny Saldana Outstanding Theatre Education Professor. His first book, Trauma-Informed Practices in 9–12 Theatre Education, was published by Routledge in June 2025.
Trauma-Informed Practices in 9–12 Theatre Education bridges education, mental health, and the performing arts to provide 9–12 theatre educators with a comprehensive guide to creating safe, supportive, and creative learning environments. Co-authored by a seasoned theatre educator and a licensed mental health clinician, the book explores trauma-informed practices tailored specifically for theatre classrooms, including both acting and production processes.
Chapters address fostering student resilience, collaborating with caregivers and school communities, and integrating concepts like consent and intimacy direction to ensure ethical, inclusive practices. Educator wellness and self-care are emphasized alongside strategies to support students who may have experienced trauma.
With practical exercises, discussion questions, and evidence-based insights, this resource balances therapeutic guidance with actionable professional development. Core themes include trauma-informed pedagogy, holistic production processes, community engagement, ethical theatre practices, and teacher sustainability.
Ideal for use in classrooms, after-school programs, and theatre departments, this book equips educators with tools to empower students while maintaining healthy boundaries and fostering a culture of care in the performing arts.
Dr. Ayshia Mackie-Stephenson, author of Intimacy Directing for Theatre: Creating a Culture of Consent in the Classroom and Beyond.
Dr. Ayshia (she/her) is an intimacy choreographer, vocalist, performance artist, and award-winning poet from Brooklyn, NY. She uses theatre and new media to investigate race, sexuality, and human rights. Her critical and creative work appears in Routledge, Black Camera, Qualitative Inquiry, Boston University Press, International Review of Qualitative Research, Theatre Topics, Howlround and Research in Drama Education. Dr. Ayshia has intimacy directed and/or led workshops for productions at Trinity Rep, The Huntington, Fresh Ink, Jewel Box Theatre in NYC, Arts at the Armory (Somerville), LSU, Northeastern, Company One, StageSource, and the DC Black Theatre & Arts Festival. Education: MFA from CalArts; PhD from UMass Amherst. youtube.com/c/DrAyshiaTV
Intimacy Directing for Theatre provides much needed strategies on how teachers and artists can do intimacy work in the classroom and rehearsal room that is safe and just.
This book puts forth intimacy work that is based on human rights and consent for everyone, fully integrating justice with intimacy directing. It offers practical advice on how instructors can do intimacy work in their courses and productions that is based on consent and racial and gender justice. Each chapter is written by an instructor and professional practitioner who offers their perspective and experience on how to cultivate a space that is safe and intersectional, as well as respectful of students’ race, gender, sexual orientation, and other integral modes of identity. Chapters contain "low stakes" exercises that help to keep the rehearsal room safe, consensual, and inclusive.
Intimacy Directing for Theatre is an excellent resource for Theatre & Performance instructors and practitioners who want to create and sustain a culture of consent in their classrooms and rehearsal rooms.
Molly W. Schenck, author of Trauma-Informed Creative Practices in Dance Education
Dr. Jessica Zeller, author of Humanizing Ballet Pedagogies
Jessica Zeller, PhD, MFA, is the author of Humanizing Ballet Pedagogies (Routledge 2025) and Shapes of American Ballet (Oxford 2016). Her research on ballet pedagogies appears in the Journal of Dance Education, Dance Chronicle, (Re:)Claiming Ballet, and the forthcoming Oxford Handbook of Ballet Pedagogy, among others. Zeller is a Professor in the TCU School for Classical & Contemporary Dance and a Past President of CORPS de Ballet International. She facilitates pedagogy workshops for faculty, students, and administrators in higher education and across the profession. Learn more about her work at www.jessicazeller.net.
In Humanizing Ballet Pedagogies: Philosophies, Perspectives, and Praxis for Teaching Ballet, Jessica Zeller offers a new take on the ballet pedagogy manual, examining how and why ballet pedagogies develop, considering their implications for students and teachers, and proposing processes by which readers can enact humanizing, equitable approaches.
This book supports pedagogical thinking and development in ballet. Part 1, Philosophies, offers a contextual reading of ballet pedagogy’s historic relationship to ideals, and it describes an alternative approach that takes its meaningful purpose from the embodied knowledge of participants in the ballet class. Part 2, Perspectives, looks at how the teacher’s presence and behavior shapes the ballet class. It draws from a new survey of ballet students that illuminates the direct effects of pedagogies and proposes future directions. Praxis, Part 3, includes three theoretically based approaches that can be applied directly or adjusted to readers’ contexts for teaching ballet: yielding to student agency and autonomy, ungrading graded ballet classes in higher education, and practicing reflection for growth. Grounded in the wide range of people who participate in ballet, themes of equity, ethics, and humanity are at the heart of this book.
Moderated by Nicole Perry, author of the upcoming (2026) Care-full Creativity in Theatre and Dance Education: Consent-Forward, Truama-Informed, Psychologically Safe Pedagogy.
Virtual and recorded. PWFF.