How to Approach Speaking
and Listening through Drama
Why use 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 that we include in this
book, is the key teaching technique that is used, namely teacher in role (TiR). This
chapter will set out approaches to TiR and give examples of how it works.
Many teachers see TiR as a difficult activity, particularly with older children
in the primary school. However, it is our experience that when a teacher takes a
role he or she becomes ‘interesting’ to the children, so that there are less control problems because they become engaged. Many times we have watched
trainee teachers with a class of children struggling to get attention when giving
instructions in traditional teacher mode. Yet, as soon as they move into role,
they obtain that attention more effectively. You are not effective as a teacher if you do not at some point engage fully with
the drama yourself by using TiR. Remaining as teacher, intervening as teacher,
side-coaching, structuring the drama from the outside, and/or sending the class
off in groups to create their own drama must at best restrict and at worst negate
any opportunity for the teacher to teach effectively. It is far more effective for the
teacher to engage with the drama form as artist and be part of the creative act.
It is very useful in a Literacy lesson for the teacher to use roles from the text.
The very fact that you take on a key role can provide important ways of
defining and exploring the text. How does hot-seating open up the ideas and
issues of a story to the children? Let us look more closely at the Hermia role. It
can be used with 10- or 11-year-olds as a way of introducing Shakespeare or for
other objectives.
Teacher as storyteller
The teacher as a storyteller is something all primary school teachers will recog-
nise. 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 imag-
ination. In making judgements about the quality of this method of teaching,
the critical questions will be around whether the content of the story interests
the class and holds their attention, whether the delivery of the teacher, i.e.
voice, intonation and interpretive skills, are good and, where relevant, whether
accompanying illustrations have impact and resonance. For many pupils the
times spent listening to their teacher as storyteller will remain as significant
moments in their education. The connection between the teacher as storyteller
and the teacher using drama, lies in the fact that they both use the generation
of imagined realities in order to teach.
The relationship between story and drama in education is a complex and
dynamic one. It means a known narrative can still be used, the knowledge of
the narrative is not a barrier to its usage. However, if the pupils are locked into
the original narrative it is problematic. It is the negotiable and dynamic elements of the relationship between drama and narrative that liberate the pupils
and the teacher from merely retelling the known story. A class can take part in
a drama where all of them know the story, where none of them knows the
story, or a mixture of both. As long as some fundamental planning strategies
are observed, knowledge of the story is not a barrier to participation. Broadly
these pre-requisites are:
1 An awareness of those elements of the story that will not be changed – and
agreements about these must be made with the class at the beginning or during
the drama, in other words, the non-negotiable elements of the narrative.
2 A willingness to move away from the fixed narrative to an exploration of the
narrative. The use of drama strategies to explore events and their conse-
quences, to look at alternatives and test them. In these periods the class
develop hypotheses, test them and reflect upon them.
3 If narrative consists of roles, fictional contexts, the use of symbols and
events then the teacher needs to hold some of those elements true and con-
sistent with the story so far. For example, roles and contexts may already be
decided but new events may be introduced, the delivery of a letter, for exam-
ple. How the class respond to this event is not known and it is at this point
that they become the writers of the narrative.
Preparation for the role
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. This not only provides the teacher with some security
in knowing what is going to be asked, at least initially, but also allows some
minutes to refine the planning, so that the teacher can be specific in answering
their questions. The questions will, to a certain extent, be predictable because
they are largely generated by the circumstances of the drama so far and the role
the class has taken, which will be that of anxious parents. Before the drama session, decide what attitude you are going to take when
questioned by the class. You are going to be telling them a story but it will be
as if they had just met you and it will not be the voice of the narrator re-telling
someone else’s story but in the present tense as if it is happening now. There is
no book symbolising the re-telling of someone else’s words. This is your story
re-told in a specific place (coming down the mountain path) at a specific time
(within minutes of a significant event) and from the child’s point of view, not a
dispassionate onlooker or observer of events.
This interactive storytelling has an immediacy and urgency and is working
at a different level of discourse from the read story, and yet it is still story-telling. It is essential that the teacher stops and comes out of role and reflects
with the class on what has been said, but that is also true of the more traditional mode of reading from a book. It engages the class and gives them the
opportunity to generate new questions and to make sense of what is happening
in an interactive way. They are questioning from within the story, as if they
were there. Next we consider this key skill of moving in and out of role.
Teaching from within
Moving in and out of role – managing the drama and reflecting
on it
We are describing using role as ‘teaching from within’ because the teacher
enters the drama world, but it is very important to step out of the fiction often
and not let it run away with itself. When using TiR, the teacher is operating as
a manager as well as participant and must spend as much time stopping the
drama and moving out of role (OoR) to reflect on what is happening and give
the pupils a chance to think through what they know and what they want to
do. This OoR working is as important as the role itself. It manages the role and
therefore the drama; it manages the risk, establishes where the class is and
helps pupils believe in the drama. It provides time and space for the teacher to
assess and re-assess the learning possibilities.
Let us look at an example to see how you as the teacher have the opportunity to negotiate how the role behaves with the class. This also shows a step
from hot-seating to role-playing as a demonstration with a small group. As
with all of this section of the book, we are using an example from drama based
upon ‘The Pied Piper’ (see Toye and Prendiville, 2000, p. 225).
The class in groups of five have created tableaux as families taking part in
bread-making in the kitchen. They then adapt the picture when a rat invades
the space. You set up going into role with one of the groups that you know will
handle the situation well.
OoR is very important as a way of negotiating the intent and meaning of the role and is the way the teacher can best control and manage learning. For the
class are both an audience and observers of their own activities. When the
drama is stopped they can describe, recap, interpret, think through, consider
next moves and understand what is the significance of their work.
It is very important to get the participants to look at and interpret what is
going on, frequently by stepping out of the drama. Depth in drama depends on
the very clear and regular use of OoR negotiation so that the awareness of the
co-existence of two worlds is effective at all times. Children commit to the fictional world of the drama but need always to be aware that it is fiction and to
step outside it often to look at what they are doing. Contrary to some opinions,
depth is not dependent upon maintaining the fiction all of the time, nor does it depend upon the children losing themselves in the drama. Learning depends
upon awareness, not total immersion. In fact, if the latter takes over, children
will get an experience but not understanding. In effective drama, children can actually feel the ‘as if’ world as real at certain points. The teacher must make sure that if the drama does engage in that
way, the pupils know it is a fiction at all times, especially by stopping and
coming out of role frequently. That is also a protection.
A class reflect together in order to draw conclusions and consequently can
influence each other far more in their understanding. They are in the process of
negotiating a group meaning, something that can be held true for all of them.
The relationship developed by the teacher with the class is dependent on the
movement between these two worlds. TiR changes the nature of the contract
entered into by the class.
The requirements of working in role
The teacher, working in this way, is an important stimulus for the learning. It is
not necessary to use role throughout the piece of work. It can be used judiciously to focus work at strategic points or to challenge particular aspects of the
children’s perceptions whilst other techniques and conventions are used to
support the work and develop it.
In order to make the TiR most effective, we need to look at educational
drama from the point of view of the ‘audience’, an audience who in this
instance are participants at the same time. This will help us shape up the TiR
elements particularly according to how the audience is seeing things. Here are
two responses to considering the ‘audience’ position.
An example of responding to the critical incident occurred in a session on
the drama based on Macbeth. When considering the way of showing the over throw of Macbeth, one of the class of 10-year-olds said, I want to sit on the
throne and stop him sitting on it. The teacher took this up and put two of the servants on the thrones of Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, with the rest of the
servants gathered behind the thrones. He then set up the entry of Macbeth to
the throne room. TiR as Macbeth entered slowly and stopped as though taking
in the situation. How dare you sit on the sacred seat of power! Relinquish it at once.
Of course, the pupils sat firm and outfaced him. He froze and one of the ser-
vants, picking up the idea of the situation, strode up to Macbeth, ordered him
to kneel and took the (imaginary) crown from Macbeth to carefully and ceremoniously place it on the head of the usurping servant. The overthrow was
fully symbolised, created by taking and formalising a very powerful idea from a
pupil. The class cheered as Macbeth bowed his head and the two pupils stood
up, triumphant.
Disturbing the class productively
Discovery/uncovering – challenge and focus
The ownership also arises out of the way the teacher operates. The teacher’s
function is to provide challenge and stimulus, to give problems and issues for
the class to have to deal with. The drama is developed through a set of activities that build the class role, which is usually a corporate role.
We have to help them into the drama, making them comfortable, and then
disturb that comfort productively. The fact that, as in any good play, the class
discover things as they go along provides the possibility of productive tension.
In setting up the drama we are doing what Heathcote calls ‘trapping [them]
within a life situation’ (Johnson and O’Neill, 1984, p. 119). The result of constructing the situation thus is that they can then discover what it all means.
There, and in the resulting choices and decisions, lies the learning potential,
borne out in an exciting challenge.
The key is how children are given information. They can be handed it on a
plate or they can be given opportunities to uncover/discover/be surprised by
information. In this last case there is much more involvement and ownership,
especially if they have to work to get the information from someone who is
reluctant to give it (as with Tim the Ostler in ‘The Highwayman’), someone
who only gives clues as to what is really going on (the central TiR in the
‘Macbeth’ drama), someone who does not realise the importance of the information (Icarus in the ‘Daedalus and Icarus’ drama). Hence the skill of the
teacher lies in the art of the unexpected.
Responding to your class
The art of authentic dialogue – needing to listen – two-way
responses
The class working as a community is the key to the use of drama as a teaching
method. This is another reason that the class have more ownership.
This community is made most effective by the teacher participating in role.
The art of teaching and learning should be a synthesis from a dialectical
approach. If a teacher runs drama without using TiR there tends to be a lack of
dialectic because the teacher produces the structure that the children engage
with, but the teacher can only manipulate it from outside that structure.
The teacher–taught relationship
In all teaching situations there exists a power relationship between the learners
and the teacher. The learners are bound together as a group merely by being
the learners and, of course, as there are more of them than there are of you,
they hold the power.
If the class decide as a group they do not want to learn and they wish to
make your attempts to teach them impracticable, they can do it. The power in
the classroom lies with the class. Of course, it does not look like this when the
class are responding and contracting into the tasks set by the teacher but
should some or all decide not to, the cohesion can be broken. In drama this
power relationship is made overt. We must start from the point of view that if
the class do not want the drama to work then it will not.
What we have to counter this with is a methodology that, if set up right and
handled judiciously, offers interest and engagement to hold the class’s attention. So much so that if a minority of the class start to undermine it, the
committed will demand they stop; the disrupters are seen as spoiling the enjoyment and it is not unusual to see the majority let them know this fact.
In the classroom, the pupils enter into an agreement with you the teacher
that you are in charge. This may be a tacit agreement, it may depend upon
many factors but in it the teacher is in charge and there are certain rights and
privileges attached to your role. The power relationship is asymmetric. Of
course, in drama we have the possibility of shifting the power when we are
inside the fiction because we may choose a role that has low status and has
little power. This shift in status and power is very engaging for pupils. It can
result in a different kind of dialogue from the usual teacher/pupil one and this
can be very attractive to pupils.
So what are the possibilities in terms of power and choosing a role? There are
five basic types of role and mostly can be illustrated from the ‘The Dream’ drama.
The authority role This is a role like the Duke in the ‘The Dream’ drama,
who is presented with Egeus’s problem and has to rule on it. This figure is usually in charge of an organisation and has the class in a role subordinate to
him/her. The role is fair, applies rules and governs properly, but often does not
know the full facts and issues and needs the class to investigate and enlighten
him/her. It is very close to being teacher and can be reassuring for a class, but
also has the negativity of not changing the teacher–taught relationship enough
to allow more ownership for the class.
The opposer role This is a role that is often in authority but dangerous to
and/or creating a problem for another role and, by extension, the class. Egeus is
an opposer role who is against Hermia and therefore in opposition to the class
role, as they take her side against his dictatorial treatment of her. This is a stimulating position for many pupils as the opposition of parents is something they
have all experienced. The opposer role has to be used carefully because the
response to it can be difficult to handle if it becomes too strong. We have to
know what response to expect and be able to channel it productively.
The intermediate role This is often a messenger or go-between, as the ser-
vant role used in the ‘The Dream’ drama. This role is then caught between
opposing sides and can appeal to the empathy in the class to help them out of
the predicament. In the ‘The Dream’ it might be a servant to Egeus who is sym-
pathetic to Hermia but does not know what best to do as she cannot just tell
her employer what she thinks he should do. So she seeks the help of the class
to solve her dilemma.
The needing help role This is a role like Hermia, who is in need of help to
fight the injustice of her father’s decision. This role, like the servant described
above, is the best way to get empathy from a class and most raises the status of
the class, putting them in a position of responsibility and thus generating
interest and learning possibility because the teacher is the one who does not
know what to do for once.
The ordinary person This role is in the same position as the role given to
the class. We do not have this sort of role in our ‘The Dream’ drama but the
Steward in the ‘Macbeth’ drama is like this. He faces the same problem and
danger as the other servants represented by the class. Even though he is in
charge of them, he needs them to sort it out for him and make decisions.
Therefore this is a lower status role, the teacher being ‘the one who does not
know’, a very powerful position of ignorance that teachers cannot ordinarily
occupy. It is powerful because it shifts responsibility more to the pupil roles.
Summary of points to consider
● Why we use teacher in role – pupils listen to teachers in role
● How we expand the possibilities of story and explore story
● Operating the two worlds of drama, inside and outside the fiction
● Moving in and out of role – managing the drama and reflecting on it
● Building the teacher role with the support of the class
● What, when and how to give information for maximum influence and effect
● How to dialogue with the class – teachers learning to listen well
● How we work with the class as collaborators
● Choosing the role – the low status roles offer more learning possibilities
● Handling drama – structuring for control – imposing shape and constraint
How to Begin Planning Drama
In this chapter we are going to describe and analyse the main components of
planning in drama. On this journey we will visit a number of key planning
decisions and approaches. These are:
● How to begin a plan
● The frame of a drama – first example
and Listening through Drama
Why use 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 that we include in this
book, is the key teaching technique that is used, namely teacher in role (TiR). This
chapter will set out approaches to TiR and give examples of how it works.
Many teachers see TiR as a difficult activity, particularly with older children
in the primary school. However, it is our experience that when a teacher takes a
role he or she becomes ‘interesting’ to the children, so that there are less control problems because they become engaged. Many times we have watched
trainee teachers with a class of children struggling to get attention when giving
instructions in traditional teacher mode. Yet, as soon as they move into role,
they obtain that attention more effectively. You are not effective as a teacher if you do not at some point engage fully with
the drama yourself by using TiR. Remaining as teacher, intervening as teacher,
side-coaching, structuring the drama from the outside, and/or sending the class
off in groups to create their own drama must at best restrict and at worst negate
any opportunity for the teacher to teach effectively. It is far more effective for the
teacher to engage with the drama form as artist and be part of the creative act.
It is very useful in a Literacy lesson for the teacher to use roles from the text.
The very fact that you take on a key role can provide important ways of
defining and exploring the text. How does hot-seating open up the ideas and
issues of a story to the children? Let us look more closely at the Hermia role. It
can be used with 10- or 11-year-olds as a way of introducing Shakespeare or for
other objectives.
Teacher as storyteller
The teacher as a storyteller is something all primary school teachers will recog-
nise. 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 imag-
ination. In making judgements about the quality of this method of teaching,
the critical questions will be around whether the content of the story interests
the class and holds their attention, whether the delivery of the teacher, i.e.
voice, intonation and interpretive skills, are good and, where relevant, whether
accompanying illustrations have impact and resonance. For many pupils the
times spent listening to their teacher as storyteller will remain as significant
moments in their education. The connection between the teacher as storyteller
and the teacher using drama, lies in the fact that they both use the generation
of imagined realities in order to teach.
The relationship between story and drama in education is a complex and
dynamic one. It means a known narrative can still be used, the knowledge of
the narrative is not a barrier to its usage. However, if the pupils are locked into
the original narrative it is problematic. It is the negotiable and dynamic elements of the relationship between drama and narrative that liberate the pupils
and the teacher from merely retelling the known story. A class can take part in
a drama where all of them know the story, where none of them knows the
story, or a mixture of both. As long as some fundamental planning strategies
are observed, knowledge of the story is not a barrier to participation. Broadly
these pre-requisites are:
1 An awareness of those elements of the story that will not be changed – and
agreements about these must be made with the class at the beginning or during
the drama, in other words, the non-negotiable elements of the narrative.
2 A willingness to move away from the fixed narrative to an exploration of the
narrative. The use of drama strategies to explore events and their conse-
quences, to look at alternatives and test them. In these periods the class
develop hypotheses, test them and reflect upon them.
3 If narrative consists of roles, fictional contexts, the use of symbols and
events then the teacher needs to hold some of those elements true and con-
sistent with the story so far. For example, roles and contexts may already be
decided but new events may be introduced, the delivery of a letter, for exam-
ple. How the class respond to this event is not known and it is at this point
that they become the writers of the narrative.
Preparation for the role
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. This not only provides the teacher with some security
in knowing what is going to be asked, at least initially, but also allows some
minutes to refine the planning, so that the teacher can be specific in answering
their questions. The questions will, to a certain extent, be predictable because
they are largely generated by the circumstances of the drama so far and the role
the class has taken, which will be that of anxious parents. Before the drama session, decide what attitude you are going to take when
questioned by the class. You are going to be telling them a story but it will be
as if they had just met you and it will not be the voice of the narrator re-telling
someone else’s story but in the present tense as if it is happening now. There is
no book symbolising the re-telling of someone else’s words. This is your story
re-told in a specific place (coming down the mountain path) at a specific time
(within minutes of a significant event) and from the child’s point of view, not a
dispassionate onlooker or observer of events.
This interactive storytelling has an immediacy and urgency and is working
at a different level of discourse from the read story, and yet it is still story-telling. It is essential that the teacher stops and comes out of role and reflects
with the class on what has been said, but that is also true of the more traditional mode of reading from a book. It engages the class and gives them the
opportunity to generate new questions and to make sense of what is happening
in an interactive way. They are questioning from within the story, as if they
were there. Next we consider this key skill of moving in and out of role.
Teaching from within
Moving in and out of role – managing the drama and reflecting
on it
We are describing using role as ‘teaching from within’ because the teacher
enters the drama world, but it is very important to step out of the fiction often
and not let it run away with itself. When using TiR, the teacher is operating as
a manager as well as participant and must spend as much time stopping the
drama and moving out of role (OoR) to reflect on what is happening and give
the pupils a chance to think through what they know and what they want to
do. This OoR working is as important as the role itself. It manages the role and
therefore the drama; it manages the risk, establishes where the class is and
helps pupils believe in the drama. It provides time and space for the teacher to
assess and re-assess the learning possibilities.
Let us look at an example to see how you as the teacher have the opportunity to negotiate how the role behaves with the class. This also shows a step
from hot-seating to role-playing as a demonstration with a small group. As
with all of this section of the book, we are using an example from drama based
upon ‘The Pied Piper’ (see Toye and Prendiville, 2000, p. 225).
The class in groups of five have created tableaux as families taking part in
bread-making in the kitchen. They then adapt the picture when a rat invades
the space. You set up going into role with one of the groups that you know will
handle the situation well.
OoR is very important as a way of negotiating the intent and meaning of the role and is the way the teacher can best control and manage learning. For the
class are both an audience and observers of their own activities. When the
drama is stopped they can describe, recap, interpret, think through, consider
next moves and understand what is the significance of their work.
It is very important to get the participants to look at and interpret what is
going on, frequently by stepping out of the drama. Depth in drama depends on
the very clear and regular use of OoR negotiation so that the awareness of the
co-existence of two worlds is effective at all times. Children commit to the fictional world of the drama but need always to be aware that it is fiction and to
step outside it often to look at what they are doing. Contrary to some opinions,
depth is not dependent upon maintaining the fiction all of the time, nor does it depend upon the children losing themselves in the drama. Learning depends
upon awareness, not total immersion. In fact, if the latter takes over, children
will get an experience but not understanding. In effective drama, children can actually feel the ‘as if’ world as real at certain points. The teacher must make sure that if the drama does engage in that
way, the pupils know it is a fiction at all times, especially by stopping and
coming out of role frequently. That is also a protection.
A class reflect together in order to draw conclusions and consequently can
influence each other far more in their understanding. They are in the process of
negotiating a group meaning, something that can be held true for all of them.
The relationship developed by the teacher with the class is dependent on the
movement between these two worlds. TiR changes the nature of the contract
entered into by the class.
The requirements of working in role
The teacher, working in this way, is an important stimulus for the learning. It is
not necessary to use role throughout the piece of work. It can be used judiciously to focus work at strategic points or to challenge particular aspects of the
children’s perceptions whilst other techniques and conventions are used to
support the work and develop it.
In order to make the TiR most effective, we need to look at educational
drama from the point of view of the ‘audience’, an audience who in this
instance are participants at the same time. This will help us shape up the TiR
elements particularly according to how the audience is seeing things. Here are
two responses to considering the ‘audience’ position.
An example of responding to the critical incident occurred in a session on
the drama based on Macbeth. When considering the way of showing the over throw of Macbeth, one of the class of 10-year-olds said, I want to sit on the
throne and stop him sitting on it. The teacher took this up and put two of the servants on the thrones of Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, with the rest of the
servants gathered behind the thrones. He then set up the entry of Macbeth to
the throne room. TiR as Macbeth entered slowly and stopped as though taking
in the situation. How dare you sit on the sacred seat of power! Relinquish it at once.
Of course, the pupils sat firm and outfaced him. He froze and one of the ser-
vants, picking up the idea of the situation, strode up to Macbeth, ordered him
to kneel and took the (imaginary) crown from Macbeth to carefully and ceremoniously place it on the head of the usurping servant. The overthrow was
fully symbolised, created by taking and formalising a very powerful idea from a
pupil. The class cheered as Macbeth bowed his head and the two pupils stood
up, triumphant.
Disturbing the class productively
Discovery/uncovering – challenge and focus
The ownership also arises out of the way the teacher operates. The teacher’s
function is to provide challenge and stimulus, to give problems and issues for
the class to have to deal with. The drama is developed through a set of activities that build the class role, which is usually a corporate role.
We have to help them into the drama, making them comfortable, and then
disturb that comfort productively. The fact that, as in any good play, the class
discover things as they go along provides the possibility of productive tension.
In setting up the drama we are doing what Heathcote calls ‘trapping [them]
within a life situation’ (Johnson and O’Neill, 1984, p. 119). The result of constructing the situation thus is that they can then discover what it all means.
There, and in the resulting choices and decisions, lies the learning potential,
borne out in an exciting challenge.
The key is how children are given information. They can be handed it on a
plate or they can be given opportunities to uncover/discover/be surprised by
information. In this last case there is much more involvement and ownership,
especially if they have to work to get the information from someone who is
reluctant to give it (as with Tim the Ostler in ‘The Highwayman’), someone
who only gives clues as to what is really going on (the central TiR in the
‘Macbeth’ drama), someone who does not realise the importance of the information (Icarus in the ‘Daedalus and Icarus’ drama). Hence the skill of the
teacher lies in the art of the unexpected.
Responding to your class
The art of authentic dialogue – needing to listen – two-way
responses
The class working as a community is the key to the use of drama as a teaching
method. This is another reason that the class have more ownership.
This community is made most effective by the teacher participating in role.
The art of teaching and learning should be a synthesis from a dialectical
approach. If a teacher runs drama without using TiR there tends to be a lack of
dialectic because the teacher produces the structure that the children engage
with, but the teacher can only manipulate it from outside that structure.
The teacher–taught relationship
In all teaching situations there exists a power relationship between the learners
and the teacher. The learners are bound together as a group merely by being
the learners and, of course, as there are more of them than there are of you,
they hold the power.
If the class decide as a group they do not want to learn and they wish to
make your attempts to teach them impracticable, they can do it. The power in
the classroom lies with the class. Of course, it does not look like this when the
class are responding and contracting into the tasks set by the teacher but
should some or all decide not to, the cohesion can be broken. In drama this
power relationship is made overt. We must start from the point of view that if
the class do not want the drama to work then it will not.
What we have to counter this with is a methodology that, if set up right and
handled judiciously, offers interest and engagement to hold the class’s attention. So much so that if a minority of the class start to undermine it, the
committed will demand they stop; the disrupters are seen as spoiling the enjoyment and it is not unusual to see the majority let them know this fact.
In the classroom, the pupils enter into an agreement with you the teacher
that you are in charge. This may be a tacit agreement, it may depend upon
many factors but in it the teacher is in charge and there are certain rights and
privileges attached to your role. The power relationship is asymmetric. Of
course, in drama we have the possibility of shifting the power when we are
inside the fiction because we may choose a role that has low status and has
little power. This shift in status and power is very engaging for pupils. It can
result in a different kind of dialogue from the usual teacher/pupil one and this
can be very attractive to pupils.
So what are the possibilities in terms of power and choosing a role? There are
five basic types of role and mostly can be illustrated from the ‘The Dream’ drama.
The authority role This is a role like the Duke in the ‘The Dream’ drama,
who is presented with Egeus’s problem and has to rule on it. This figure is usually in charge of an organisation and has the class in a role subordinate to
him/her. The role is fair, applies rules and governs properly, but often does not
know the full facts and issues and needs the class to investigate and enlighten
him/her. It is very close to being teacher and can be reassuring for a class, but
also has the negativity of not changing the teacher–taught relationship enough
to allow more ownership for the class.
The opposer role This is a role that is often in authority but dangerous to
and/or creating a problem for another role and, by extension, the class. Egeus is
an opposer role who is against Hermia and therefore in opposition to the class
role, as they take her side against his dictatorial treatment of her. This is a stimulating position for many pupils as the opposition of parents is something they
have all experienced. The opposer role has to be used carefully because the
response to it can be difficult to handle if it becomes too strong. We have to
know what response to expect and be able to channel it productively.
The intermediate role This is often a messenger or go-between, as the ser-
vant role used in the ‘The Dream’ drama. This role is then caught between
opposing sides and can appeal to the empathy in the class to help them out of
the predicament. In the ‘The Dream’ it might be a servant to Egeus who is sym-
pathetic to Hermia but does not know what best to do as she cannot just tell
her employer what she thinks he should do. So she seeks the help of the class
to solve her dilemma.
The needing help role This is a role like Hermia, who is in need of help to
fight the injustice of her father’s decision. This role, like the servant described
above, is the best way to get empathy from a class and most raises the status of
the class, putting them in a position of responsibility and thus generating
interest and learning possibility because the teacher is the one who does not
know what to do for once.
The ordinary person This role is in the same position as the role given to
the class. We do not have this sort of role in our ‘The Dream’ drama but the
Steward in the ‘Macbeth’ drama is like this. He faces the same problem and
danger as the other servants represented by the class. Even though he is in
charge of them, he needs them to sort it out for him and make decisions.
Therefore this is a lower status role, the teacher being ‘the one who does not
know’, a very powerful position of ignorance that teachers cannot ordinarily
occupy. It is powerful because it shifts responsibility more to the pupil roles.
Summary of points to consider
● Why we use teacher in role – pupils listen to teachers in role
● How we expand the possibilities of story and explore story
● Operating the two worlds of drama, inside and outside the fiction
● Moving in and out of role – managing the drama and reflecting on it
● Building the teacher role with the support of the class
● What, when and how to give information for maximum influence and effect
● How to dialogue with the class – teachers learning to listen well
● How we work with the class as collaborators
● Choosing the role – the low status roles offer more learning possibilities
● Handling drama – structuring for control – imposing shape and constraint
How to Begin Planning Drama
In this chapter we are going to describe and analyse the main components of
planning in drama. On this journey we will visit a number of key planning
decisions and approaches. These are:
● How to begin a plan
● The frame of a drama – first example
Komentar
Posting Komentar