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Curriculum & Lesson Planning

Teaching drama made practical.

Explore strategies, ideas, and insights to help you plan, teach, and inspire with confidence.

Acting Technique

Creating Your Audition Toolkit – Songs

In our last post, we talked about creating a monologue notebook to help students collect and reflect on various monologues that could be useful for any upcoming auditions. In this post, we’ll be...
Curriculum & Lesson Planning

Creating Your Audition Toolkit – Monologues

Finding the perfect monologue for an upcoming audition is often challenging. Students want to have the best piece possible, but may not know how to go about finding a good monologue, or what even...
Directing & Production

Tips to Keep Your Rehearsals Focused

We asked drama teachers: What tips do you have for keeping your rehearsals focused? Let’s hear from the front lines! John H. subscribes to short and sweet: • My rehearsal schedule is short. 25 days...
Acting Technique

What Skills Do You Need to Work on a Show?

When students are looking to get involved in theatre, do they have the needed skills? We aren’t just talking about “hard skills.” Hard skills are the specific abilities or knowledge needed to do a...
Directing & Production

Getting Other Departments Involved in Your Production

Creating a theatrical production is a group effort. For every student who appears onstage, there are even more students, staff members, and volunteers who help breathe life into the production....
Games & Exercises

Prompting Creativity in the Classroom

Character Prompts“You cannot dream yourself into a character; you must hammer and forge yourself one. ~ James Froude” Students often miss connecting character development as part of the writing...
Acting Technique

3 Tips for Keeping Your Voice Healthy

Vocal health and hygiene are crucial for drama students. Whether students are working on monologues, group scenes, or musical numbers, having a healthy voice is a must. It’s important for drama...
Acting Technique

Exercise: Same Lines, Different Meanings

One of the exciting aspects of rehearsal is experimenting with the text of the script and figuring out what the characters are saying and how they should say it. Each approach to the text will...
Games & Exercises

Dancing in the Drama Classroom: 3 Ways to Get Started

For those students who love dancing, simply mentioning the word “dance” gets them up on their feet and immediately moving. For other students, the idea of pirouettes, step-touches, and fan kicks...
Curriculum & Lesson Planning

Stage Combat 101: Before You Even Begin

Stage combat is always one of the most eagerly anticipated lessons in drama class. Stage combat is fun to do and it’s a great workout. And when it’s done well it looks spectacular onstage. It can...
Curriculum & Lesson Planning

3 Fitness Tips for Drama Students

Fitness? Hey, this is supposed to be drama class, not gym class! I’m not a jock! I’m terrible at sports! Are you telling me I need to lose weight? Fitness is so important for drama students. Drama...
Curriculum & Lesson Planning

#MeToo in the Drama Classroom

Nineteen million people tuned in to watch the 2018 Golden Globes. And I bet you a number of them were students (maybe some in your classroom), and many were drama educators. Listening to the...
Games & Exercises

What’s Your Character’s Signature Gesture?

What is a signature gesture? It’s a nonverbal, repeated movement your character is known for, that you perform in a particular way that is unique and identifiable. Common, well-known gestures...
Games & Exercises

Reflection: Looking Back and Looking Forward

After a production closes, reflecting on your process and thinking about the future are the natural next steps. They’re definitely an important part of the process, for you as a teacher and for...