HOW TO APPROACH SPEAKING AND LISTENING THROUGH DRAMA
1.
How to Begin with Teacher in Role
The most important resource you have as a teacher when using drama
is yourself. Learning demands intervention from the teacher to structure,
direct and influence the learning of the pupils. One of the best ways to do
that in drama work is to be inside the drama. Therefore, at the centre of the
dramas, is the key teaching technique that is used, namely teacher in role
(TiR).
The teacher as a storyteller is something all primary school
teachers will recognise. Good teachers slip easily into it and use it frequently.
In its most observable guise it occurs when teaching the whole class and
engaging them with a piece of fiction. The pupil’s role will be dominated by
listening and this will be interlaced with questioning, responding and
interpreting the meaning and sense of the fiction. The teacher’s role will be
to communicate the text in a lively and interesting manner, holding their
attention and engaging their imagination.
In preparing to be this kind of storyteller the teacher must have
made particular decisions about this child. Begin by asking the class out of
role what they want to ask the child and the order of those questions. Before
the drama session, decide what attitude you are going to take when questioned
by the class.
There are five basic types of role and mostly can be illustrated
from the ‘The Dream’ drama.
1)
The
authority role
2)
The
opposer role
3)
The
intermediate role
4)
The
needing help role
5)
The
ordinary person
2.
How to Begin Planning Drama
Planning brand new dramas is complex and, while we hope to unravel
some of the complexity, the best starting point is using tried and tested
dramas first. There is even an intermediate stage in planning and that is to
take parts of different dramas and remake them as new ones. We cannot establish
a simple procedure for an order of planning. Clearly the teaching/learning
objective will drive the shape of the drama, but the engine that drives the
drama needs fuel and that fuel is a piece of strong material, a creative idea,
and that is more inspirational than an objectives-led design. This material – a
book, a piece of literature, a picture or some other subject matter, fiction or
non-fiction – will give us one or more of the elements of a good drama, a role
or roles, an interesting context or a dilemma.
The frame of a drama
We are using the idea of a frame as a way of seeing key decisions
in planning. The frame is a dynamic, interrelated and complex weaving of all
the other ingredients. It has pre-text, which is derived from the stimulus
material. In planning a drama we have to write the main frame, the scenario, in
a way that indicates the relationship of the component parts and how the
interactions provide tension and potential.
The elements of planning including:
·
learning
objectives
·
a
stimulus to learning
·
roles
for the teacher and for the children
·
how
to create tension points
·
building
context and belief in the drama
·
the
decision-making for the class
·
the
choice of strategies and techniques
Types of drama
There are two main types of this
sort of classroom drama that have evolved:
·
living
through drama, where the pupils face the events
at a sort of life rate in the here and now.
·
episodic
drama, or strategy-based drama, where the
class are led by the teacher in creating situations and events through specific
techniques or strategies and where chronology is more broken.
What about endings to dramas?
The most difficult thing can be resolving a drama satisfactorily in
the time and to the satisfaction of the class. This is to some extent in the
planning but mostly in the handling of the drama. The class must always go away
feeling they have achieved something. They need to have solved the problem.
Avoid that easy ending. We must be satisfied ourselves with the
feel of the drama at all times; it must feel authentic. It is better for the
class to have struggled with the issues and to see possible futures without the
problem role necessarily changing or the dangers being completely avoided.
Finally – the key decisions
With all plans you need to ensure that a tension moment comes early
to spur the interest of the group and that a TiR features early to model the
commitment and seriousness of the drama.
3.
How to Generate Quality Speaking and Listening
Authentic dialogue – teacher and pupil talk with a difference
What is speaking and listening ?
Speaking and listening is the most important communication form
that human beings use. Really effective oracy, developmental speaking and
listening, will help pupils build their language, their understanding, their
ability to handle their own world, making sense of it and who they are in it.
True speaking and listening for learning is effective ‘talk’, not
two separate activities, as the phrase ‘speaking and listening’ suggests; it is
an oral language interaction, which, at its best, is complex, demanding and
truly creative. Learning is a social activity and thus talk is its real source.
Writing is a solo activity, which allows the individual to distil ideas already
learned; it comes later.
How to dialogue with a class so that is :
·
Collective
·
Reciprocal
·
Supportive
·
Cumulative
·
Purposeful
What does dialogic teaching demand
of the teacher?
One of the key changes that the drama brings is a different
position for the teacher. Teachers who work through drama intervene as teachers
but also as other roles in drama, roles that are models and anti-models to
promote student language in ways that cannot be done by the teacher's language.
They are framed in the context of drama to oppose or sort out this behavior,
all driven more by the role of use. So the teacher can talk and interact with
students in many ways and with many goals.
How is listening of high quality taught through drama?
Drama is the creation of meaning in action and students must
struggle all the time to understand what is happening around them so they can
engage with it. They must understand the fictional situation that is
developing. Unless students listen, they don't know what is happening. Teachers
can provide surprises, challenges, interesting people to meet in the form of
the teacher's role; students can provide models for using language with each
other because student leaders begin to take initiative and provide input.
In drama we can get a new level of listening because of students'
interest in solving drama problems themselves. The focus of the problem or
dilemma faced by students manifests the nature of the language. To carry out
all these speaking activities, they naturally develop their hearing development
and we see this in all modes of strong and active, listening namely: open,
sensitive, reflective, receptive, receptive, supportive, attentive, collective,
creative.
4.
How to Use Drama for Inclusion and Citizenship
We will begin by defining what we mean by inclusion. We will then
present a model of how drama relates to inclusion and describe a particular
drama session which aims to ‘promote tolerance and understanding in a diverse
society’ (Ofsted, 2006, p. 7). Drama’s inclusion is embedded, first, in its
dialogical approach to teaching and learning. This is reflected in two
contracts that form part of its rubric. These are:
1.
Everyone will take part, including the teacher
both in and out of role.
2.
We
will treat members of the group with respect by listening to them and allowing
them to express their views without fear of derision or humiliation.
What can drama offer in terms of inclusion?
·
Drama
offers ‘new opportunities to pupils who may have experienced previous
difficulties’ (Ofsted, 2006, p. 7).
·
Drama
takes account of pupils’ varied life experiences and needs by using fictional
contexts and roles which enable pupils to explore the underlying issues safely.
·
For
some pupils drama may offer experiences that are different to those they
experience in the real world, for example taking the role of the outsider or
the role of the one in charge.
The concept of
drama and keeping pupils safe
There is a
perception of drama dealing with issues in a safe way because it uses fictional
contexts. It is almost as if by shifting to the fictional, a safe emotional
distance is automatically created. But what do we mean by keeping pupils
‘safe’, safe from what, and is this automatically achieved when we use drama to
teach?
We must
remember that pupils have no choice about attending school; they are required
to attend, whether they want to or not and there are consequences for pupils
and parents if they do not do so. This puts them in a particular power position
when they attend a lesson because they may well be there reluctantly. It
becomes critical for the teacher from an ethical (and survival) point of view
to negotiate how we as a class can make it work for us. On one level, the
teacher must make the content interesting and appropriate for the pupils, that
is, it should be related to their needs and structured in such a way as to grab
and hold their attention.
Having a voice in society
If we return to the central idea in drama of creating an ‘as if’
world we see that it is a world that is, at least in part, created by the
participants through their ideas. As we have seen in the planning section, good
planning creates gaps and spaces for pupils to input their ideas. If we plan
for pupils’ ideas to be part of the drama lesson and we are creating a safe
environment for this to happen, we are in effect giving them a voice to express
their understandings and perspective on the world in which they live.
Having no voice in society
What these pupils think, say and do often bears no relation to each
other. They come into the drama lesson wary of saying what they think and
reluctant to express a view or make suggestions that may be challenged by the
majority or dominant group. We cannot leave our real-world selves outside the
door of the classroom and consequently there is a dynamic relationship between
how we think and behave in the fictional world of the drama and how we think
and behave in the real world.
In the drama lesson the individual’s responses have three
components:
·
What
we think (thoughts)
·
What
we say (utterances)
·
What
we do (actions)
The
relationship between inclusion and citizenship
The PSHE and Citizenship framework
comprises four interrelated strands which support children’s personal and
social development. The strands are:
·
developing
confidence and responsibility and making the most of their abilities;
·
preparing
to play an active role as citizens;
·
developing
a healthy, safer lifestyle; and
·
developing
good relationships and respecting the differences between people.
A drama for teaching about citizenship
The drama that a number of citizenship issues are immediately
contextualised and presented to the children. Drama ensures that they have to
explore them and get involved in them, to challenge and seek solutions in a
number of ways. How much of the Citizenship curriculum does the drama open up?
The Framework for PSHE and Citizenship outlines the areas covered as:
At key stages 1 and 2, the Framework emphasizes the development of
social and moral responsibility, community involvement and some of the basic
aspects of political literacy, for example, knowing what democracy is and about
the basic institutions that support it locally and nationally, as essential
preconditions of citizenship as well as PSHE. (QCA, 2000, p. 7)
5.
How to Generate Empathy in a Drama
What is empathy?
Drama is often promoted as a teaching and learning methodology that
generates empathy in pupils, yet there is little debate about exactly what is
meant by this idea. The word empathy is sprinkled liberally throughout
education documentation and literature.
The components of empathy Component
·
the
cognitive component Component
·
the
affective component
How to structure drama
for empathetic response
·
Building
the cognitive component
·
Framing
the affective component
We can generate empathy through
structuring roles and creating a drama frame where it is likely to happen.
There are three parts to this process:
·
the
role of the teacher
·
the
role of the pupils
·
the
frame in which they are placed
6.
How to Link History and Drama
A problematic alliance
For drama there is a fatal attraction with history as a source for
its content. Drama as a medium with which to engage with the past is
established in theatre, film, literature, radio and television. In fact one of
the Key Elements in the History National Curriculum is the interpretation of
history.
We are not historians, and in writing this chapter we shared our
approach to using drama to teach history with Professor Hilary Cooper at St
Martins College. Professor Cooper’s vast experience in the world of education
and history teaching illuminated and clarified issues that exist between a
pedagogical approach firmly rooted in the creation of fictional worlds and a
subject striving to find truth and authenticity in views of the past. In using
the arts pupils are creating their own interpretation or account, based upon
sources.
Dressing up to go back in time
One popular method of ‘empathising’ in the teaching of history
takes the form of dressing up in costumes from the past. Schools across the
country plan days of ‘visiting the past’ by dressing up and sometimes actually
going to historic sites in their costumes. Alternatively, schools will suspend
the usual timetable and devote lessons and other activities to a particular
period in time. Teachers may even be locked into roles from the past (one could
almost say trapped in roles from the past), thinking, misguidedly in our view,
this will generate ‘empathy’ in the pupils with people from history.
Using drama to make meaning of the past
Let us begin by looking at three elements of historical enquiry:
● A concern with facts
● A concern with reasons
● A concern with meanings
As a teacher planning a history-related drama this does not mean
abandoning facts and reasons. In striving to accommodate the potentially
un-reconcilable dimensions of fact and fiction, we need to balance imagined
realities with authenticated realities. In other words, we need to research our
history and bring the fruits of that research to the lesson. If we are to take
on roles, and some of these roles are people who actually existed in the past,
then we must research these roles.
7.
How to Begin Using Assessment of Speaking and Listening (and Other
English Skills) through Drama
What is assessment?
The primary aim of assessment is to provide information about the
development and achievement of those involved in the teaching and learning
situation. Assessment records evidence related to students' abilities, both
actual and potential, and charts their progression. The intended audience of
assessment feedback should always include the students themselves. (Clark and
Goode, 1999, p. 15)
What is the purpose of the assessment?
To:
·
give
feedback to the pupil
·
report
to another teacher
·
report
to a parent
As we have indicated, the first is vital. Pupils need to know what
they are doing, how they can improve and to be encouraged in speaking and
listening, after all it is the primary communication skill.
Formative assessment – honouring what children can do
Since the inception of the National Curriculum, assessment of
Speaking and Listening has been formative and informal. We would not change
that approach. Our approach is not to produce league tables, but to give a
snapshot of pupils’ communication skills in order to recognise achievement and
to chart possible development. The prime requirement on teachers when doing
assessments is to listen to the pupils and to look carefully at the activity.
How do we collect data more formally?
Assessment in this context is the detailed study of episodes of
speaking and listening. We need to describe what we see and teachers need to
operate as researchers of the dialogue in their classrooms. Educational
research is becoming more encouraging of detailed description of events,
particularly when looking at classrooms in the action research method we are
advocating. We must gather and record the critical incidents and chart whatever
we notice. Teachers can work in pairs and observe each other's lessons to record
what they see. Some Preparation, Planning and Assessment (PPA) time, which
teachers in England are entitled to, could be used for this purpose. To set
this up properly, the senior management team need to become involved in
planning a whole school strategy for the assessment and development of speaking
and listening.
Analysing video recordings of drama we need to look at issues
relating to:
·
the
language used
·
the
non-verbal communication
·
proximity
to the teacher – who are the invisible pupils, the outsiders of the drama who
do not seem in any way engaged?
·
the
empathetic and affective tendencies of pupils, their speech and their actions
as they intervene
Talk for writing – the wholeness of
communication
In a school with a strong policy on speaking and listening there
will be major gains in other areas. We can get clear evidence for assessment of
the effectiveness of speaking and listening, particularly the latter, from
other forms of communication like writing or art work. In addition the writing
itself can benefit. It is important that the current re-write of the National
Literacy Strategy for England locates Speaking and Listening central to the
proper development of literacy skills, where the original version neglected to
include them at all. All modes of language learning are influenced by the
language we use every day and all the time in talk with others. There is clear
research evidence that the spoken and written relate closely, the latter being
dependent on the former for depth and detail.
This material can be used as further evidence if we were tracing
how well members of a class have listened to the dialogue. In addition, they
have been motivated to write by the drama and produced creditable pieces.
In conclusion, we know that assessing and recording speaking and
listening is a demanding task, but we would contend that is no more demanding
than other assessment if it is approached in the right way. Furthermore, we
would maintain that the absence of evidence of pupils’ speaking and listening
in a school limits their progress in all areas of literacy and is depriving
them of a key entitlement.
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