A group of Hunter region home-schooled children will experience the magic of live theatre for the first time when they perform in The Wizard of Oz in October.
Maryann Webb, founder of online resource Hunter District Families, is co-producing and directing the musical, which will be staged at Overflow Church in Medowie.
She came up with the idea to create a creative and collaborative experience for home-schooled children and says she was "overwhelmed" by the number of children who turned up to audition earlier this year.
"We had to run two lead casts as a result of the interest, bringing our total cast to over 40 members, aged between six and 16," she told the Newcastle Herald.
"Ninety-five per cent of them had never performed in front of an audience before.
"We've discovered so much talent and seen each child's self-confidence and self-esteem improve phenomenally over the past seven months. There is always a huge buzz in rehearsals, especially now as we are drawing nearer to the performance dates."
Mrs Webb said the rehearsal experience alone had given the children performance skills and "opened up wonderful friendships between cast members and also within the parent community".
Luka, 9, who plays Dorothy said: "This is the best thing that has even happened to me, oh, apart from my baby sister being born."
"This is the first show I've ever been in and it has been great," said Jono, 12.
Tameka, 13, said the experience had "honestly improved my acting abilities and I have overall really enjoyed the experience. I have made so many friends".
Mrs Webb said the parents of children taking part in The Wizard of Oz production had "thrown themselves into areas like set, props, crew, costumes and fundraising".
The musical's promotional poster was designed by Georgia, a 13-year-old cast member.
"It has been such a pleasure to watch the kids grow into their own little performers," choreographer Zahli Kerr said.
"Working with home-schooled kids in a production is something I had never done before and I was excited to be part of the new experience. I'm very thankful for the connections it has lead me to make and I cannot wait to see the final product in October."
Mrs Webb, who completed a Bachelor in Drama before embarking on a Masters in Teaching, said the project had reignited her passion for the creative arts.
"We take our older children to as many productions as possible," she said.
"We often see school productions and musicals as my girls love to see other children perform, but they also make really affordable theatre experiences.
"After seeing one local school musical last year, our girls commented 'We wish we could be in a musical' and I made a passing comment 'Well let's put one on!' and that comment stuck - the director hat went on and after months of rehearsals, here we are six weeks away from our performances."
The Webb family moved from Sydney to Port Stephens five years ago. She recently retired from a 15-year career as a primary school teacher and is now home-schooling her four children.
"We made the switch to ultimately spend more time as a family and to soak up these moments together," she explained.
"The home-school lifestyle often means school work is finished by midday, freeing us up for the rest of the day to do the things we love, and for our kids this means more time working on their interest areas, such as dance and sport."
She founded the Hunter District Families website (hunterdistrictfamilies.com.au) to connect home-schooling families and engage them in learning experiences across the region.
"When we started our home-school journey, we were super keen to get out and adventure with other home-schooling families in the Hunter," Mrs Webb said.
"Although there are many incredible learning opportunities out there, finding suitable ones to match our family's interests, kids' ages and our location proved tricky. This set me on a mission to help connect families to activities which are fun, engaging, rich in learning and affordable.
"Furthermore, I wanted to encourage and support home-schooling families to connect and get involved in their local community."
She says home-schooling is a "rapidly growing community" in Newcastle, the Hunter Valley, Lake Macquarie and Port Stephens.
"The Hunter region is now one of the largest home-school networks in Australia."
