DANIEL Wood’s post as regional manager for Bigfoot Arts Education Yorkshire will see him turn his attention to York this month, in preparation for a Bigfoot Out Of School Drama Club starting at the Grand Opera House, in York.

“We expanded in May last year to cover the entire region, and it’s suddenly got very busy, with a big leap from 70 to 2,000 schools, so I’ve been dashing around on trains,” says 24-year-old Daniel, who manages 15 workshop leaders.

Children aged seven to 11 are invited to become a Bigfooter at the Grand Opera House, under the scheme that uses drama and the arts to develop children’s creative skills, boost confidence and make their imaginations “as big as a friendly giant”.

Roald Dahl’s Fantastic Mr Fox will form the basis for workshops involving improvisation, role-play, theatre games, mime, music, voice and movement, and the club will culminate in a final open workshop, wherein the group will share the work they have created with family, friends and teachers.

Early booking is recommended for the club sessions, which will run from February 24 to March 31, then April 21 to May 26. All those interested are advised to phone general manager Lizzie Richards on 01904 678701 or email lizzie.richards@livenation.co.uk for further information, and places can be booked on 0844 847 2322.

Daniel, from Scunthorpe, is familiar with York, having worked at the York Dungeon on seasonal contracts when he was 17 and he finds himself coming full circle.

“As well as the Bigfoot club at the Opera House, I’ve now come back to the Dungeon, using Bigfoot to create a schools’ workshop programme that provisionally is being called The Terrible Timeline Workshops,” he says.

The Dungeon work is separate from the Bigfoot Out Of School Drama Club, which will be part of the biggest arts education programme in Britain.

“How I would say we differ in what we do at Bigfoot is that we’re more about using drama to develop skills such as confidence, creativity, imagination and teamwork,” says Daniel.

“We definitely emphasise singing, dancing and acting but we don’t use set scripts; we let children come up with their own ideas, so it’s child-led, using a concept called organic theatre. The key thing will be to have fun while exploring Roald Dahl’s fantastic stories.”

Daniel was always drawn to educational theatre projects, having trained at the Central School of Speech and Drama, where he focused on using drama to educate and on writing and directing theatre for children, before working as creative manager at Alton Towers and now for Bigfoot.

“Children are so impressionable and theatre is such a powerful tool for so many reasons,” he says.