Theatre in Grade 10 English

I am a big believer of drama in the classroom, and this week in my field placement, I did just that. I had the opportunity to teach an ELA A10 lesson this week on one of my favourite short stories of all time: The Lottery by Shirley Jackson. We began the class period by reading the short story together. After reading, the students expressed confusion about the story’s events, but have no fear; drama is here! We acted out the story, complete with a paper ball ‘stoning’ at the end for the unlucky winner of our lottery. Don’t worry, the unlucky student walked away with a printed Oscar award for her spectacular role in The Lottery! Students expressed that they had a better understanding of the story’s events after bringing it to the dramatic world.

The beautiful thing about drama in the classroom is that it increases comprehension and allows students to bring themselves into the story. It also allows the students to show that they understood the story without analyzing it to death with questions. Theatre can be used in many other class areas in schooling as well. For example, in science, theatre can be used to investigate hard-to-understand concepts, such as the properties of matter. By acting it out, students have something to recall when thinking about the subject later. In 5 years, the students may not remember the specific details of the story, such as specific character names, but they will remember the experience they had with the story as it was something outside the box.