John Abrams is a showman, with considerable expertise in playing to a tough audience.

That’s because John, a professional magician and performer, is also the creator of the multiple award-winning program “Amazing School Assemblies“.

John, who performs 400 school-assembly shows a year, has entertained and engaged more than 2 million schoolchildren, in 216 Southern California school districts. His website reveals rave reviews from educators, as well as listings of the honors his shows have garnered–including Discover Magic’s Golden Wand of Excellence for outstanding children’s programming.

His Amazing School Assemblies shows include valuable life lessons, interwoven with comedy and magic.

Among his offerings are “The STEAM Show”, which blends real-world learning in science, technology, engineering, art and math with considerable fun and magic; “The Bully Game”, a live game-show formatted anti-bullying program; and “Random Acts of Character”, which teaches essential lessons in character through magic, juggling and audience participation.

John is also the author of “The Handbook for School Assembly Performers“, available on Amazon.

And he’s scheduled to give a showskills workshop presentation at the KIDabra Conference for KIDshow and family performers, on August 12th in Atlanta! (Here’s the link for more information about KIDabra 2026.)

John talked about his background, offered a closer look at his shows and gave some tips for managing a live performance or presentation.

On this edition of Over Coffee® we cover:

• How John was first inspired to become a performer;

• How he began doing school assemblies;

• How The STEAM Show came about;

• His recollections of his first performance of The STEAM Show;

• How his own children reacted to his performances;

• A closer look at the ways The STEAM Show explores science, technology, engineering, art and math;

• How John updates his content to keep it current;

• Some of his collaborators and their contributions to The STEAM Show;

• Where he’ll be speaking and performing in the future;

• Tips on doing a school assembly successfully;

• How to deal with difficult audience members;

• Audience control tips;

• How to get a message across effectively to a specific audience;

• How to troubleshoot if something goes wrong during a live performance;

• A closer look at The Bully Game;

• An important distinction, in dealing with bullying;

• How the Random Acts of Character show works;

• One of the areas of character which John explores with his audience during that show;

• What’s next!;

• What to know, about booking him for a show.