Critical Thinking Articles for Drama Teachers

Do your students know how to form their own artistic opinions without being swayed by others? Can they confidently stand by their perspective, even if they disagree with a show that has received...

This exercise is inspired by the theatre game The Machine, where students work together to create parts of a factory machine with repeated movements and sound. In The 20-Step Process, we take this...

Do your students know how to annotate a script for analysis? Script analysis gives every actor a foundation to build on for character development. Teach these steps to your students and they’ll...

Drama is one of the few classes that teachers real world skills. This is something that every drama teacher knows well. You know this. Despite resistance you may receive from parents,...

We’ve all seen those reviews. The ones that rip the theatre production up one side and down the other. They criticize the scenery and the script. They suggest that the leads take up basket weaving,...

It’s the first day of semester. You have a Grade Nine / Drama One class or a group of students you haven’t worked with before. They stare at you, you stare at them. How can you determine what they...

Not only is it important for students to reflect on and evaluate the work of others, they also need to build self evaluation skills. But self assessment can be tricky. It takes a lot of practice to...

Peer evaluation is a process whereby learners give feedback to other learners. It is key to the learning process for a number of reasons. Curriculum Understanding In order to assess an activity,...

Who is the most interesting person you know? Who is the most interesting person your dad knows? Who is the most interesting person your boss knows? It could be a specific story, a whole history or...

Whether you’re performing your first role or your fortieth, Theatrefolk has a great roundup of guides to help you prepare for your role, to analyze the script from a few different angles, and to...

Character analysis can be done in many forms: • You can analyze a character in a play you’re studying. • You can analyze a character you’re playing in a production. • You can analyze a character in...

How do people create illusion out of harsh reality? In the play A Streetcar Named Desire, Blanche Dubois works hard at creating an illusion. She tells lies about her past so that others see her in...

Drama Teachers! Do you want to teach musical theatre in your program, but you’re getting feedback from students like I can’t sing. I could never be in a musical. If you can’t sing you can’t be in a...

“Shakespeare is too hard… Shakespeare is too old… I can’t relate to Shakespeare….” It’s one thing to tell students that they should study Shakespeare, it’s another thing to get them engaged in the...

Ideas are not magical ponies. They don’t appear instantly. Writers know they have to look for ideas. The more they look for them, the more ideas they have. The key with ideas is not to focus on the...

The biggest obstacle to writing a play often comes before the first word. It happens in the idea stage. I want to write, but my ideas are stupid. I know I could write something great but where do I...

Characters come alive in the smallest details: a favourite food, a favourite type of music, a fear of spiders, an allergy to plums, a scar from a fall at two years of age, a love of reality...

Critical Thinking is a buzzword. It’s one of the keystone 21st century skills. How do we incorporate critical thinking into the drama classroom? Provide steps not buzzwordsCritical thinking is a...