Online Lesson

Music, Maestro, Please: Show Business and the Factors of Production

Introduction:

When you go to a movie or see a theater show, have you ever wondered about the variety of jobs and skills people must have to make the performance a reality? What about the variety of material objects that are necessary for the "show to go on?"

Recently, the city of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania opened a $300 million dollar center for the performing arts, the Kimmel Center. For this lesson you are going to take a virtual tour of the new center and then think about all the productive resources that must come together to create the magic you experience enjoying the performing arts.

Task:

• Explain the three types of productive resources necessary to produce a good or a service.
• Identify and categorize examples of human resources, natural resources, and capital resources necessary to produce a musical theater production.
• Recognize that the production of any product or service requires a combination of the factors of production.
• Develop skills in and appreciation and understanding of the arts, language arts, listening, speaking, reading, writing, and cooperation with others

Process:

1. Many people do different jobs, using many kinds of tools and equipment to produce the products and services students use. Please consider the following questions:

• What kinds of work must people perform in order to teach a lesson?
• What kinds of materials (goods) do we need to teach this lesson?
• What natural resources or raw materials are required for this school to exist?

2. A teacher, paper, pencils, desks, blackboard, land (the school is built on), trees (to build the desks) are all productive resources. Productive resources are required to produce what economists call a good or service. Arts Lesson-Visual1 provides visual aids designed to help you understand productive, human, natural, and capital resources. The visuals are divided up into four parts, take some time to explore them.

• Visual 1A Productive Resources: Goods and Services.
• Visual 1B Human Resources.
• Visual 1C Natural Resources.
• Visual 1D Capital Resources.

3. Discuss with the class the production of any good or service requires some combination of these three different resources. Challenge yourself to find examples of an event, activity, or product in your own life that uses all of these different resources.

4. Have you ever been to a musical theater production? Discuss what you saw, the work that was involved in producing a musical, and the equipment needed to produce the show.

5. Work in groups to identify and sort out the human, natural, and capital resources necessary to produce a musical show.

6. The class needs to divide up into three groups. (The class may also divide up into groups in any multiple of three: 6 groups, 9 groups, etc.) Each group needs to work on one handout to identify the resources that are necessary to produce in a musical show...

• Each group will identify a different resource; human, capital, or natural.
• Each group will complete the appropriate student handout according to their assigned resource: Student Handout 1 Human Resources, Student Handout 2 Capital Resources, and Student Handout 3 Natural Resources.
• Be sure to review the instructions and the list, making sure to define terms you may be unfamiliar with.
• Allow your group time to analyze the list and to categorize the assigned resource.

7. Each group needs to inform the class of their findings, by writing a list of their resources on the chalkboard, under the appropriate headings: Human Resources, Capital Resources, and Natural Resources.

Conclusion:

1. What did the human resources, natural resources, and capital resources come together to produce? [The show.]
   
2. Give examples of people doing other kinds of work. What are they producing or what services are they providing? [Doctor producing healthy people, musician producing music, clown producing laughter, etc.]
3. Give examples of natural resources. [Air, land, stone, trees, etc.]
4. Give examples of capital goods needed to produce toys or a McDonald's Happy Meal. [Plastic, cardboard, buildings, stoves, booths, play areas, etc.]

Assessment Activity:

Place students in groups to list the human, capital, and natural resources necessary to produce each of the following:

• A sporting event (football game, baseball game, swim meet, etc.)
• A birthday party
• A trip to Disney World
• A batch of chocolate chip cookies

Extension Activity:

Explore the World Wide Web to find performing arts centers in your community and/or state. Write a three paragraph summary on one of the performing arts centers that you find. In your essay please include; upcoming events, ticket prices, and identify examples of human, natural, and capital resources necessary to produce the upcoming events.