The Dramatic Roots of The Literacy Tree

Here at the Literacy Tree, we thoroughly appreciate how drama can add a whole new dimension and depth to English. When Drama is peppered through a sequence of literacy lessons, it can bring a narrative and its host of characters to life. It breathes new energy and vividness into dialogue and pathos into scenes from the tender to the treacherous. 

 Drama is also vital in how we share poetry. The most important way for children (and adults alike) to understand the rhythm and pulse of a poem truly is to witness its performance and to revel in its musicality. For both poetry and playscripts, performance is a critical part of the publishing process. Afterall, what better way to get a clear sense of audience and purpose? 

Drama is woven through many of the planning sequences that make up the Literary Curriculum. Indeed, we feel that there are many aspects of Appendix 2 and the Teacher Assessment Frameworks that a well-timed, well-chosen Drama activity will help nudge securely into place. 

Assessment aside, as teachers of English literature, we need to put our best dramatic foot forward - even if that foot is a tentative and shaky one. It may feel awkward at first, but the impact it will have on children’s writing and love of literature will be incalculable. 

Here are some of our favourite Drama activities – some may be very familiar to you - that crop up in our planning sequences and ways they can support children’s written outcomes. 

The Hook for the Book: We always begin with a dramatic bound into a book. This could be a mysterious suitcase or footprint arriving in the class or children handing in their ticket to board a doomed ship. We must create the context of the book in the classroom and spark a sense of excitement and trepidation before our literary voyage begins. This can always lead to the teacher Hot Seating as one of the main characters. Children ask investigative questions and make initial predictions. 

Conscience Corridor/Decision Alley: In every story worth telling there is a problem. A dilemma. Our pained protagonist stands aghast at this crossroads. At that precise moment, before committing themselves to one fated trajectory, multiple possibilities and their consequences unfold.  This activity is a wonderful way to explore these different hypothetical avenues. 

One child in roles as one of our characters walks carefully down a corridor lined with the rest of the class on either side. The character asks each of the children for the pros and cons of their potential decision. “Should I pay the Pied Piper?” “Should I tightrope walk across the Twin Towers?” The children on either side could be advisers in a royal court; wavy trees in a dark forest or simply concerned friends. 

This can lead to children using a wide range of literacy skills to give advice: 

Command sentences: “Please turn back now!” “Think before you act.” 

 Coordinating and subordinating conjunctions: “Before you leave home, think about your dear grandmother!” “When you step out over the edge, don’t look down – be fearless.”

Modal verbs: “You could do a deal with the Pied Piper.”

 The subjunctive voice: this gives proceedings an urgent, formal tone: “I urge you consider your position very carefully.” 

This activity could lead to a rich balanced argument or a persuasive letter.  

Thinking in Circles: The paths ahead for our main character may not always be so clear. In the book Cloud Tea Monkeys Tashi’s mother is so ill that she can no longer work. Tashi lays awake at night being buffeted by a whirlpool of worrisome thoughts that seem to lead nowhere. 

 In this activity, children stand in a circle around a child in role as the main character. Each child repeats a worry that will be circling around the main character’s fraught mind. A great way to practise conjunctions and the conditional sentence:

 “If your mother is ill, she won’t be able to work…If she is unable to work, she won’t be able to earn money…. If she can’t earn money, then she can’t pay a doctor.” It could also lead to a chance to practise question tags, “She will get better, won’t she?” “She must see a doctor, mustn’t she?” Children can chant their sentence at different volumes and the repetition of the conditional and question tags together can express a character’s inner turmoil. A superb springboard into writing an anguish-filled diary entry.  

 Freeze Frame and Thought Tapping: This activity allows children to inhabit the headspace of a range of characters in a particular scene. Print off a range of scenes from the text and, in groups, children chose one scene and create a relief. Once the group have decided on their poses, they can perform this to the rest of the class. The class teacher can move around the children’s created scene and, as they hold their poses, thought tap children, tapping them gently on the shoulder. Actors have to vocalise what they think their character might be feeling. This activity encourages inference and can draw in various sentence types: question, commands, exclamations and statements. 

If each scene is photographed and stuck in books, it can be a fresh way for children to sequence main events in a narrative and write captions. 

 Creating Conversations: Dialogue is a huge part of the curriculum and is an integral part of children writing a narrative. It is important to give the children a chance to plan a piece of dialogue and act it out. Give pairs of children a folded A3 piece of paper and some speech bubbles. Children write the character’s names at the top of each half and record the dialogue in a zig zag down the page. Next to the speech bubbles, children can also record what the character was doing and thinking while they said this. 

 Children can act out their dialogue with their partner for the rest of the class. This activity can develop children’s storytelling amongst their dialogue. It can also allow children to experiment with the language of speech (using the apostrophe creatively to show accent, ellipses and dashes to show pauses and interruption). Children can then “burst the bubble” and frame the dialogue within the appropriate punctuation, developing their use of the reporting clause.

Whilst this list is by no means exhaustive, these activities will help to bolster children’s sense of narrative, pathos and dialogue. So, on occasion, if you haven’t already, encourage children to put down their well-worn pencils, push tables back, limber up, get into character and strut the boards (or the classroom carpet as the case may be). Break a leg! 

Posted in: Curriculum