New Drama Teacher Toolkit

Exercises and Activities

Having a stash of theatre exercises and activities is going to help keep your sanity in your early days. We’ve got warm ups, get to know you exercises, and activities that work those communication/collaboration skills.

The first task in starting a new year with your students is to get everyone on the same page so you can set the tone for your classes. The best way to do this is through theatre games and warm ups. Here is a list of tried and true games and activities that will help lay the foundation for a successful year in the drama classroom.

• Get to Know You Games
• Student Goal Setting: The Wish Jar
• Community Building Warm ups
• 10 Rounds for Your Next Warm up
• Acting Warm up: Warm Putty
• 3 Physical Warm Ups
• Collaboration Game: Three Things in Common
• Improv Games for Collaboration
• Collaboration Game: One to Twenty
• Collaboration Games
• Secret Code Exercise
• Mixed Messages: Communication Exercise
• Communication Exercise
• Non Verbal Communication Exercises
• Silent Communication Exercise
• Devising Exercises
• Reality vs Illusion Exercise
• Respect the Tech Performance Challenge
• Expression Exercise: Instagram Journaling
• Scenes from a Bag
• Games to Help Students Play to the Audience
• The Show Circle and why it’s awesome

Podcasts

The majority of our podcasts involve interviews with teachers. Listen in to hear your peers talk about their experiences.

Sometimes it helps just hearing what other teachers are going through. Being a drama teacher can feel lonely, but you are never alone! Use these podcasts when you need some guidance or inspiration. Whether it is sharing best practices, or just recognizing that other teachers have been through what you are going through, these podcasts are a lifeline between you and your drama peers.

• Theatre Etiquette 101
• Drama Teacher Struggles and Goals
• Day One in the Drama Classroom
• How to Build a Drama Program
• Putting Together a Tech Theatre Unit
• The Drama Classroom: There is a seat for everyone at the table
• Engaging the Non Theatre Student
• The Arts Don’t Need to Be Isolated
• Successes and Challenges in the Drama Classroom: Firsts
• Successes and Challenges in the Drama Classroom
• Make a Mission Statement for you Drama Classroom
• Dealing with Student Strife

Classroom Management

While a love of theatre or the arts is helpful, it’s not going to make your classroom run smoothly. Knowing how to combine the creative chaos of drama projects with a structure defined by procedure and routine is key to a successful drama classroom.

Here are links to some of the top Classroom Management materials in Theatrefolk and the Drama Teacher Academy. All you have to do to find the answers to your questions, is find the subject that relates to your concern and click the link.

• Top Ten Tips for Classroom Management
• Ordered Chaos: Balancing structure and creative activity in the drama classroom
• Divergent Learning in the drama Classroom
• Learning the rules: Act It Out
• 5 ways to quiet down a noisy class
• Active Listening in the drama classroom
• Three ways to engage a large class
• Classroom Audience Etiquette
• Ten Questions Every Teacher Needs to Ask
• Classroom Skills Reflection
• The Drama Classroom: A Seat for Everyone at the table
• Classroom Communication: The Exit Slip
• Classroom Exercise: Whaddya know?

Advocacy

What does it mean to advocate? To speak or act in favour of; to support or recommend.

The sooner you start communicating the value of your program, the better. If you’ve walked into an environment where there is a lot of turnover, or where there is a lack of respect for the arts, get in the habit of advocating for your program. Start small, think long term and find a way to show the value of what you do in a language your community will understand.

Advocacy is at the heart of any successful drama program. Your administration needs to know that you are doing valuable and important work in your classroom, and that you, your students, and your program needs to be supported. Don’t assume your administration automatically believes what you do is worthwhile. You have to be the biggest cheerleader and advocate for your program. The following are materials you can use to help advocate for your program.

• Using Arts Statistics
• Arts Education Infographic
• Printable Posters

Lesson Planning

Lesson planning is the foundation of teaching. Lesson plans are maps, mission statements, launching pads, and contracts. Lesson plans help keep everyone working together toward the common goals of learning and understanding.

In the toolkit below, you will learn the structure and terminology of a standard lesson plan and how that lesson plan can be adapted in the theatre classroom. You will learn how to identify and utilize Bloom’s Taxonomy in the creation of your lesson plans and explore the National Standards for Theatre with an eye toward including specific state standards in your completed plans.

• Writing Lesson Plans for the Drama Classroom Toolkit
• PDF fillable Lesson Plan Template