One of the best means to create student awareness of play structure is through assigned reading and classroom discussion of successful plays used as models. Various plays from the 1982 edition of "Best Short Plays" are appropriate for discussion of the following structures and techniques: (1) development of conflict and action, suspense,…

The skills of playwriting are correctable, the craft of playwriting is teachable, and the art of playwriting is encourageable. In the area of craft, students can learn through models how accomplished playwrights deal with plot, characterization, dialogue, and theme. For the first element, plot development, students can look at written models to…