Taking drama further

Read

Baldwin, P. (2008) The Primary Drama Handbook. London: SAGE Publications Ltd. – Chp.4: A Time & Place for Drama, Chp.5: Planning ‘Whole-Class’ Drama
Farmer, D. (2011) Learning Through Drama. Drama Resource.
Neelands, J. & Goode, T. (2000) Structuring Drama Work. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

Reflect

Consider how you might assess pupils during today’s workshop – Observing
What are the challenges of assessing a practical (and usually collaborative) subject? – A lot of comments to provide. Busy time throughout lessons. Hard to provide comments for their next steps. Not as much written content.
How might you overcome these challenges? – Videoing performances and making comments afterward. Letting children see their work back and making their own judgments. Letting children peer asses – provide partners from different groups (Number 1 assess other Number 1 performance)

Engage with the reading under ‘Assessing Drama’ on the VLE to inform your thinking.

Use of benchmarks. 2. The Creativity Across Learning 3-18 report. 3. Assessing Creativity

Extend – Drama Conventions

Provide examples of how you might use this convention in class. You may also want to consider any organisation or management issues.

Teacher in Role – Teacher can take part in a make-believe situation and by doing so can challenge and validates the children’s involvement.“When I sit in this chair I will be the King”. Hot seating is recommended to try first if you are unsure. This can be used across the curriculum such as a figure from history, a character from a story to the role of a painting from art (Farmer, 2014) However, children will have to be responsible enough that the teacher can be engaged in the moment and not worrying over other students misbehaving.

Role on the wall – A collaborative activity. The outline of a body is drawn (encourage children to practice this?) on a large sheet of paper, which is stuck onto the wall. Words or phrases describing the character are then written directly onto the drawing or stuck on with sticky notes. This drama technique can be carried out as a group activity or by individuals writing about their own character. You can include known facts such as physical appearance, age, gender, location, and occupation, as well as subjective ideas such as likes/dislikes, friends/enemies, opinions, motivations, secrets, and dreams. Facts can be written outside the silhouette and thoughts and feelings inside. Key lines can be added. The class can add more info as they discover more about the character over time. Used to learn about historical people (link to history interdisciplinary). Ideas for improvisation or rehearsal. The strategy works well in combination with hot seating (Farmer, 2016)

Thought-tracking -Children verbally express their understanding of a character (what they are thinking). Can build confidence in talking in front of peers and enables children to be imaginative in putting themselves in other’s shoes. Thought tracking is a natural follow-up to still images and freeze frames. Children create and imagine and then the teacher (or could involve children) taps them on the shoulder and the actor speaks the character’s thoughts and feelings out loud. This can be both objects, humans or animals. Teacher and audience can ask specific questions to see how they feel towards another character or what their dreams and aspirations are. Thought- tracking can easily be employed in the classroom with children at their desks.

Flash backs and flash forwards – Actors are asked to improve a moment which could have occured seconds, minutes, days or years before or after a dramatic moment. Provides depth to freeze frames and improvisation so children must have prior experience to this. Can be used to show what led up to a particular moment, how it might be resolved or how it may lead onto additional challenges. The technique helps to flesh out a dramatic moment or create the beginnings of a story.

Open and close – good way to introduce blackouts without the equiptment. Uses still images to tell a story – separate class into groups and ask for a certain number of images to be created (3 to 5). Either teacher or pupil says Open and Close between each frame.The audience should close their eyes while the first group gets into position. When the group has its first image ready, the designated person says ‘Open’. The audience open their eyes for a few moments and look at the scene. Now the same person says ‘Close’ and the audience close their eyes again. Quickly, the group moves into the second position and the audience are asked to open their eyes when the group is ready. The process is repeated until all the still images have been shown. The technique has a similar effect to watching a series of photographs or a flickering film.

Mantle-of-the-expert = (MoE) involves the creation of a fictional world where students assume the roles of experts in a designated field. of the Expert is based on the premise that treating children as responsible experts increases their engagement and confidence. Can be used to explore an issue such as a team of archaeologists to excavate a newly discovered tomb in Egypt. The children may be involved in mimed activities, improvisation, research or discussion. While the focus is on the enquiry process, it can often lead to real outcomes such as writing letters, printing leaflets or selling products. They can perceive a real purpose for learning and discovering together in an interactive and proactive way – providing them with the skills and knowledge they can apply to their everyday lives. MoE encourages creativity, improves teamwork, communication skills, critical thought and decision-making.

– Using strategies for cross-curricular learning –

Farmer, D (2014). ‘Teacher in Role’ Available from: https://dramaresource.com/teacher-in-role/ Accessed: 5.2.19