This article presents an example of a project designed to get children of different ages working together and working for each other. The project relied quite heavily on children creating a dramatic context and the author shows how the dramatic element has the potential to affect their learning in positive ways. The provision of a shared…

Because they are such effective teaching resources, puppets are an economical and exciting resource for increasing numbers of teachers involved in courses on death education. Puppets help students overcome emotional problems, and, since death is a traumatic area to explore, they provide opportunities to work through social situations not yet…

Encouraging children to develop their imagination through using poetic imagery and pantomime widens and enriches their view of the world. (JD)

Explores the implications of envisioning theater and drama in education as a "laboratory for learning," citing that Theatre-In-Education fits the laboratory model by integrating formal theater as aesthetic experience with informal drama as a learning medium. (MM)

Includes an annotated bibliography of documents in the ERIC system that (1) provide insight on the value of role playing and dramatic play in the classroom and (2) suggest a variety of classroom activities that use improvisation as tool to help children retain ideas, emotions, or any academic lessons. (JD)

This study compared the effects of drama and drawing planning activities with a traditional planning activity (discussion) on the quality of second and third graders' narrative writing. After 15 sessions, researchers found that drama and drawing were effective forms of rehearsal for narrative writing and more successful than discussion. (SM)

Outlines the common features of Theatre-In-Education (TIE), and suggests that TIE provides an integrated structure for the heightening of personal, social, cultural, and political consciousness through its commitment to perform and address topics such as sex stereotyping, racism, and child abuse. (MM)

Demonstrates how role-playing in a mock trial situation allows children to view critically both sides of an issue and introduce them to trial procedure. Offers pre-trial activities, ways to teach students to see both sides of a situation, themes for mock trials, and supporting resources. (GG)

Part 2 of this five part project asks students of the Tasmanian region of Australia to explore the history of Port Arthur, a 19th century penal colony located in Tasmania. The project is based on three ideas: (1) studying history can be educational and enjoyable; (2) imagination is an essential part of studying history; and (3) history is most of…

Thirteen articles on effective classroom teaching of poetry are collected in this bulletin. The relationships of poetry to emotion and to experience are discussed by Barbara Hardy and Donald Thomas. Effective techniques for the British Junior Schools are explored in three articles: Peter Searby and Geoffrey Summerfield create a hypothetical…

A number of techniques applicable to the teaching of Shakespeare are described with some illustrations from the author's own teaching experience. Analysis of dramatic structure receives significant attention with equal space devoted to the Gustav Freytag formula and the author's own technique. Literary, dramatic, social, and personal goals in the…