the meaning of masabo    welcome to west africa    quick notes about côte d'ivoire    about fana soro   
about the senoufo people    about traditional music    about traditional dance    about masks   
about the balafon    about the instruments    about oral traditions    about textiles and costumes   
school performance repertoire    masks - music & dance    learning activities    learning links   

Awale (a-Wa-lay)

Fana Soro will leave 4 Awale games in his Artist in Residence classes for the students to play with in between his visits.

Similar to backgammon, the game of awale is an intellectual pastime enjoyed by Ivoiriens of all ages. It can be played by two people or by teams of more people. The rules are not difficult, but playing the game well takes a lot of practice. The awale board is rectangular with two rows of six cups each. Game pieces are 48 peas (other objects can be used.). There are several versions of the game played by the different ethnic groups, but certain features are common in all versions.

To start the game, four peas are placed in each cup. The first player starts by picking up all the peas from any cup on his/her side of the board and dropping them one at a time in each consecutive cup to the right. counterclockwise. A person scores by capturing peas, and the winner is the one who captures the most peas. A person captures peas only when the last pea dropped falls in a cup on the opponent's side that contains only one or two peas. When that happens, the player picks up all the peas in that cup and stores them for counting at the end of the game.

Suggested Learning Activities

Students will benefit the most from a concert by Masabo Culture Company if they are given a cultural context for the music, dance and storytelling they will experience during the performance or a residency. Here are examples of curriculum-based learning classroom activities developed for this purpose. 

Pre-Performance: Setting the Stage

Geography

• Use an outline map of Africa to locate and label Côte d'Ivoire, Ghana, Guinea, Benin and Nigeria. 
• Name the ethnic groups, languages and religions of Côte d'Ivoire.
• Describe life in a Senoufo village.

Cultural Traditions

Music

• Look at pictures of the balafon, borôrô, djembé and talking drum and suggest how they might be played.
• Play sound clips featuring each of the above instruments and identify them by name.

Dance

• Discuss the characteristics of Senoufo dance and costume.
• Explain the importance of masks in Côte d'Ivoire dances.

Storytelling

• Read a story from When Lion Could Fly and Other Tales from Africa or other compilation of African stories.

Post-Performance: Follow-up Activities

While some of these activities can be done without assistance from the artist, others will benefit from Fana's participation in classroom workshops or artist in residence programs.

Social Studies

• Read about the pre-colonial Empires of West Africa.
• Make a time line showing the colonial history of West Africa.

Language Arts

• Write a short story set in West Africa.
• Write a review of the Masabo performance.

Home Economics

• Food and Nutrition: Find and prepare a West African dish that would be eaten on a feast day.
• Clothing and Textiles: Show an example of the textile designs for which the Senoufo town of Korhogo is famous.
• Travel and Tourism: Research Cote d'Ivoire as a tourist destination and write an itinerary for a 7-day visit.

Dance

• Learn to do a traditional dance such as Coucou.

Music

• Sing a traditional song from Cote d'Ivoire.
• Play simple rhythms on a djembé.
• Play a folk song on a balafon.

Art

• Design a repeating pattern that could be used on fabric.

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