A Drama Portfolio

1. Learners Theory 

Theory Into Practice: Machine Drama Activity 

The activity Machine is a great way to incorporate Learners Theory into the classroom. This is a game in which students connect multiple, simple repetitive body motions in a sequence to represent an idea, theme, or process. By completing this activity, students are able to explore body and vocal theater skills (ie. projection, articulation, shape and level in space, quality of motion, and tempo). By practicing these skills, students are able to consider how an individual action is part of a larger connected system. 

This activity has a great cross-curricular connection to the science curriculum. I would introduce this activity by having students meet together in a large circle and by asking the question What is a machine? This provides an opportunity for the whole class to develop a definition, providing various types of machines for examples. The class will then pick a machine to explore. I would brainstorm with the class the simple sound and movements that this machine might produce. I would invite one student to come to the center of the circle to make the simple and repetitive movement and then label this as the first piece of the machine. I would then invite another student to think of another sound or motion that could be added to the first persons. I would continue to call students or have students volunteer to add parts to the machine. Ideally each continuing motion would relate to the movements of the other students, just as parts of a machine do. 

Once the majority, if not all students are joined in, the teacher can then change the tempo."Turn up the speed" so that the machine is working faster, or slow it down so that the machine is working very slowly. 

To incorporate the students who are not acting as a piece of the machine, ask them to consider the movements that they are observing and have them consider what kind of machine it is. Encourage students to consider if the movements have altered their interpretation of the machine and ask What else could it be? 

Have students return to the circle and as a class discuss what worked well when creating the machine. I would then repeat the activity, giving them a theme that is less familiar, or have them make a machine that is named in the end. As the activity it repeated,  have students explore levels, tempo, quality of movement, and effect. 

Resources:

 DBI Network: Activating Learning through the Arts, Machine

Sourced from: http://dbp.theatredance.utexas.edu/teaching-strategies/machine  

2. Blooms Taxonomy 

Theory Into Practice: News Reporting 

Bloom's Taxonomy is a theoretical framework linked to learning and education. Drama is such a versatile subject because it enables students to go through different stages of the learning process, which can be observed in the chart above. 

One great way that this theory can be applied to a drama lesson is to use the "Newspaper Report Strategy". The link below is a great resource, outlining a workshop that can be used with students entitled, Exploring The Stories Behind The News Headlines. This workshop provides an excellent opportunity to connect the literacy curriculum and is adaptable to meet the needs of various students. This workshop also enables students to explore an incident from various perspectives.

By completing this workshop, students will learn to write for a specific purpose, while ultimately being able to devise, write, and perform a television news broadcast. This activity does a great job of incorporating Bloom's Taxonomy throughout the writing, editing, dramatic enacting, and evaluating.

3. Drama + Math = Dramath 

Drama can be an excellent tool to help students make sense of concepts that may at first seem confusing, thus meaning drama can be used as a source of clarity. One activity that I have discovered and used is entitled Word Problem: Acting Solution. This is an activity that I have found through an online resource entitled Drama + Math = Dramath. This resource provides a framework for connecting dramatic arts to the mathematics curriculum to ultimately enhance student understand and engagement. This resource also includes a nine lesson unit with a focus on writing mathematical word problems as scenes and paragraphs. 

To elaborate on how each lesson is designed, I will provide a brief overview of the introductory lessons. In lessons one and two, students begin by writing simple scenes with a given format (Action/Dialogue/Dialogue/Dialogue/Action/Dialogue) also known as the ADDDAD structure. 

An example of this is as follows:

A - Jennifer walks to a counter in a coffee shop.

D - Cashier: Can I help you?

D - Jennifer: Yes, I’d like a cup of coffee.

D - Cashier: That’ll be two dollars.

A - Jennifer hands Cashier two dollars.

D - Cashier: Thanks. 

Each scene has two characters and must happen in real time. In Lesson Three, students begin

adding mathematical components into their scenes which will be acted out in class. These scenes

still use the ADDDAD structure:

A – Byron drops a bag of marbles and they roll all over the floor.

D – Bruce: I bet I can pick all of those up with one hand.

D – Byron: No way, there’s 26 marbles.

D – Bruce: Watch me.

A – Bruce picks up 20 marbles.

D – Byron: Told you! You left 6 of them on the floor. 

During lessons four and five, students are provided with multiple opportunities to act and share the "word problem scenes", to help students develop an understanding of how math and text are translated into the real world. Students are able to learn from their peers by listening and observing the through processes of their fellow students. Students begin to shift the scenes they have enacted into a paragraph format, this serves as an introduction to the traditional mathematical word problem. 

To continue from our previous example, this is what the final product for lesson three should look like:

Byron drops a bag of marbles and they roll all over the floor. Bruce thinks he can

pick them all 26 up with one hand. Byron thinks he can’t. Bruce picks up 20.

Bryon points out that he left 6 on the floor. (The last line could be

replaced with ‘How many marbles were left on the floor?’ to become a

recognizable word problem.)

In lesson seven, students continue translating scenes, however, now they are written as all action and no dialogue and into paragraph form word problems. Lessons eight and nine allow students time to focus on interpreting the word problems and then staging and performing their scenes. 

The goal of this unit is that to have students write word problems based on dramatic reenactment. This would ultimately serve to make solving the mathematical component of the problem a more natural process that can be more easily understood.

4. Tableau 

The dramatic strategy of tableau comes from the French term tableau vivant, which when translated to English means "living picture". Students create a tableau by enacting a still picture, without talking, to successfully communicate a concept or ideas. Tableau is an excellent method for students to communicate their understanding because a true understanding is required in order to communicate it using physical poses, facial expressions, and gestures, rather than words. Tableau also provides learning opportunities for kinesthetic learners, while encouraging students to gain a deeper understanding of a concept collaboratively. 

Extensions of the Tableau

There are many extension activities that can be applied to the dramatic strategy of tableau. I have included some of these strategies I discovered at The Teacher Toolkit below:

Guess the Tableau

Give each group of students their tableau topic as a secret they should keep. When each group presents, the class should guess what each group is presenting and provide evidence for their choice.

Tableau Series

Have students create a series of tableau's with short narration or dialogue in between to link the tableau's (assuming each group has a different prompt or concept that they are working on, within the same unit).

Tableau With a Twist

After the students "freeze" into their tableau, the teacher taps a student in the tableau on the shoulder and the student makes a short statement about their character in the scene.

Tableau Interview

After the students "freeze" into their Tableau, the teacher (or a student) acts as a reporter and conducts short interviews with individuals acting in the scene.

5. Choral Speaking: There Is Meaning In Our Voices

Choral Speaking is defined within the Ontario Arts Curriculum as "The reading or reciting of a text by a group. Preparation for a performance may involve interpretation of the text; experimentation with language, rhythm, volume, pace, and different numbers of voices; and rehearsal".

The Council of Ontario Drama and Dance Educators (CODE), provides effective instructional approaches that can be used when teaching students choral speaking. These approaches include:

• Pre-select and display several short poems. (Some poems that work well are from authors Dennis Lee, Loris Lesynski, John Mole and Shel Silverstein.)
• Through a selection process (i.e. stars, vote) have the class select a poem.
• Students will need to have access to copies of the poem selected.
• Read through the poem with students, (focusing on interpretation), so that all students understand the meaning of the poem.
• Recite the poem with the students (everyone speaking at the same time).
• Following the first recitation, encourage the students to make the poem more exciting by emphasizing vocal elements in their reading.
• Repeat the choral reading of the poem several times, introducing and experimenting with different elements, deciding as a class how each element works best for the performance of this poem:
• Dynamics: Volume
• Pitch: the highness, or lowness of sound
• Tempo: speed
• Tone: light, medium or heavy sounds
• For more advanced lessons, develop the use of voice production stages: Respiration, Phonation, Resonation, Articulation.
• Once you have decided on how the poem will be vocally performed, ask the students what movements would make the meaning of the poem come to life. They could use gestures, large actions or even choreograph some movement phrases.  

Planning for Different Levels of Readiness

I really like the CODE website, as it provides educators with a toolkit to successfully teach drama strategies while considering planning drama instruction for diverse learners. When planning for students with different levels of readiness, there are many things that educators can utilize to ensure that they are meeting the needs of all students. 

Text Forms:

There are a variety of text forms that can be utilized for a choral reading lesson. This includes; writing in role texts created by students, fictional stories, newspaper articles, non-fiction literature, plays, etc. 

Experimenting With Format:

Students may experiment with canon, rounds, pair, small group or solo sections within a choral reading involving the whole group. One half of the class might read one section and the rest of the class can read another.

Alternative Vocal Techniques: 

Alternative vocal techniques that students could use includes; echoing words and phrases, alternating lines, chants, overlapping lines, repeating lines or words, whispering lines or words, changing tones in mid line, singing, creating sound effects, crying, whistling, clapping or other body percussion, and altering the tempo and rhythm or inserting pauses.

Extending the Lesson 

There are a plethora of ways that choral reading can be intentionally extended to create deeper understanding. The teacher could plan a presentation on a particular theme using various texts based on that theme. Another way to extend a choral reading lesson is to have students write a piece to be presented through choral speaking.

Choral speaking can easily be connected to other strands of the curriculum. When connecting it to the language curriculum, choral speaking can be used to demonstrate the interpretation of a text. When connecting it to the social studies curriculum, the teacher could select a text that has a cultural or historical significance, to have students then use choral reading to communicate the given meaning of the text.