This article offers playwriting and other arts-based literacies as dynamic and multifaceted alternatives to the traditional high school research paper. The authors present an analysis of what happened when a teacher asked students to conduct research on a human rights issue and represent their research in a five-scene play. They contend that…

This article discusses the successes and vulnerabilities associated with combining the pedagogical methods of Theater, Composition, and Community Literacy in the Composition classroom. It examines how the ideas of Augusto Boal's "Theatre of the Oppressed" and Paulo Freire's "Pedagogy of the Oppressed" can be combined to support…

The treatment of a research paper as an isolated utterance within a composition classroom is problematic in that such papers may fail to encourage transfer of writing knowledge. In this essay, I argue that a research paper's failure to work as a utterance situated within a conversation--as critiqued through a framework constructed by Mikhail…

Describes a successful exercise which involved junior high school students in writing a musical comedy. (DD)

Presents and discusses a course outline for a high school playwriting course (for which English credit is earned). Offers several writing assignments and a series of sequential steps designed to help students reach the goal of writing a one-act play. (SR)

Suggests that the theme of Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet" is an oxymoron linking the two apparently contradictory ideas of death and sexual love. (RBW)

Describes a classroom collaborative activity in which students are asked to write one-act plays based on three characters, two of whom know each other, and a third who affects the other two. Presents details of carrying out the assignment, and evaluates student response. (HB)

Describes an assignment for the study of Shakespeare's "King Lear" in which the students were to take a small section they thought thematically important and describe clearly how the page should be read and performed. (HOD)

Describes an educational program that involves the use of theatre and dramatic approaches by a team of actor/teachers in order to promote learning in a school. Contains a script for a play developed by a Theatre in Education team and its students. (HTH)

High-school English students learn to analyze short stories by being given a situation the actual author has used and writing scripts to develop the plot and situation. Only later are they assigned the story to read and discuss. In Nold's experience, they develop both imagination and heightened critical awareness. (PD)

Describes a senior elective course in Western Civilization which focused on an original play written by the teacher and produced by the students. (DD)

Some of the current approaches to the teaching of film include utilizing the medium as an audio-visual aid, as an attempt to inundate the student with sensations, or in a study of cinema arts and film manufacture. However, the integration of film and literature, in which students can see how each medium functions, seems most viable. Films and…

Describes a classroom program in which students adapted and then produced a play based on the adolescent novel "The Chocolate War." Notes group improvisation strategies for adapting internal monologue to dialogue. Argues the advantages of such a project over class discussion and book reports. (JG)

Gives an overview of how one English teacher uses students' inherent understanding of film by asking them to write movie scripts. Advocates the use of screenwriting in the classroom. Details numerous reasons for such methods, and describes eight specific suggested class activities employing script writing. (HB)