Drama: Learning Connections in Primary Schools takes a problem-based approach to integrating drama with other creative arts, and provides pre-service teachers with classroom-tested activities for teaching drama to children in primary, upper primary and middle-school years. The book combines a strong research foundation with 'stories from the field' to examine the learning connections that can be made with drama, and develops strategies for incorporating the use of drama across the curriculum. Written for both pre-service teachers and experienced teachers working within English and creative arts curricula, the book encourages a view of drama as a learning tool rather than just an art form. With its focus on evaluation and assessment within a practice framework, students learn how to develop an integrated drama programme, which is an invaluable basis for developing teaching and learning programmes in general.
- Provides rationale and support for drama in the curriculum based on previous literature, research and author's experience with teaching drama at the academic level
- Selected examples and exercises to demonstrate major points which can be used directly by teachers with students
- Problem-based approach to integrating drama with other creative arts and across the curriculum
- Includes a section on the elements of drama, including space, focus, contrast, time, symbol,tension and mood, each with in-depth examples
- Section 1 Drama in Learning Contexts
- Part 1 Introducing Drama: Parameters and Possibilities
- 1. Describing Drama
- 2. The Drama Mentor Prepares
- Part 2 Maximising Learning: Drama in the Curriculum
- 3. Systematic Planning for Drama
- 4. Integrated Learning through Drama
- 5. Social Learning through Drama
- Section 2 Drama Building Blocks for Learning
- Part 3 Realising Drama: Developing the Senses
- 6. Sense of Self
- 7. Sense of Others
- 8. Sense of Drama
- Part 4 Activating Alternatives: Shaping Drama Experiences
- 9. Improvising, Role Playing and Playbuilding
- 10. Story Making, Telling and Dramatising
- 11. Puppet Making, Operating and Presenting
- Part 5 Appreciating Drama: Performance Perspectives
- 12. Readers' Theatre: Scripting and Staging
- 13. Children's Theatre: Playwriting and Performing
- 14. Theatrical Traditions: Appreciating and Responding
- Appendices
- Glossary
Barbara Poston-Anderson - Associate Professor and Drama specialist at the Centre for Research and Education in the Arts, Faculty of Education, University of Technology, Sydney.
