Unit 4

 For this unit, we addressed using process drama within the classroom to help students comprehend literature and lessons, and to help them make it their own. We covered several different articles, all of which I will break down and talk about how I can use them in my future classes.

The first article is called Using Drama Strategies to Foster Interpretation. This article addresses numerous ways in which teachers can utilize drama within their classroom, providing both specific types of drama and the activities that can be done with them. This includes hot-seating, role-playing, discussion dramas, and tableaux vivant to name just a few. Each type is defined in detail, noting exactly how the individual activity type benefits the students differently than the others. The article talks about the benefits of drama towards cultural understanding, students utilizing information from their text more personally, and how the involved process of having students act out as characters helps build a deeper understanding of the point of view that the individual character has in the text (somewhat like the comment about making it more personal). This was a very beneficial article, especially with all the examples of activities that could be done given with each type of drama, and the detailed walk-throughs that the author gave for the last third of the article, showing the interactions between the students and the text, and how the process drama helped them. I could easily implement any of the types of drama listed here with barely a change to the activity given, no matter the grade level, in my classes.

The second article is called Exploring Castles: Authentic Teaching and Learning Through Drama. The primary focus of this article was on an activity that the author did "to show teachers how drama could create an integrated curriculum and transform study of a specific curricular area, like history, from an obsession with dates and facts to a commitment to inquiry" (7). There were many questions that the students came up with on their own, aka natural questions, having to do with the castle. What would it would be like to live in a castle, how the castle was made, where it was made, what it was made of, what weapons it was armed with, were there schools inside, etc. The teacher "used the mantle of the expert drama approach,"  leading the project and acting as the director of the students' inquiries into their own questions. Students designed exhibits, spoke in the way they imagined the people who lived in their fictitious castle would speak, and much more. This kind of activity is fully immersed, truly allowing the students to let themselves go and be a part of the project; not just analyzing something form the outside, but actively being a part of the inside. Again, this is an incredible lesson idea that I could use in my class, and it would be very beneficial to get students involved who couldn't see themselves in the characters in texts we would read, as they could create their own character to be.

The third article is called How Improv Helps Students Connect to Real Readers. This article focuses on the value of improvisational activities and the effects that improv has on those doing it. Mainly, that individuals need to "listen before they speak so that when they do talk, their message is designed specifically for its intended audience" (27). This is heavily important for young students in general, as the skill of listening to understand is not always a strong suit. Many people tend to listen to respond, not to understand, and you cannot do so with improv. Students can use this skill to make connections between the writer and the reader as they do their own writings. Students can better make connections to their readers if they think about the audience, understanding how their own reading will be viewed and what all comes into their writing (who are they to their reader, what's their status on the topic, how are they presenting their information, etc.). It helps establish empathetic writing for the learners, a valuable skill that they will want later on in higher education (and a useful skill in general to get what they want). Having students do improv activities with their fellow classmates helps them understand where they stand on certain topics, how they received the information that is being given, such as one student who reiterates the primary points that a fellow classmate makes about people who listen to music without headphones while in public. This helps the listening student to make connections between the speaker and their emotions and feelings on the topic, and the ability to explain what was learned from listening is invaluable for understanding where she stands. These kinds of activities help listeners "listen for what's underneath this information--what's revealed about the characters, how they feel about each other, what's going on in the scene" (31). All of this is invaluable to students learning to write and stage their papers to a specific audience, and my implementation of these kinds of activities will help my students both be more involved and active in their learning process, as well as learning skills that they themselves can utilize to be better writers.

This was an excellent unit in finding ways to get students more involved in their reading material, and I think this may have been my favorite unit so far. There is so much to take away from these readings, and I've decided to save every article from this class for future rereading and the shaping of my own lesson plans when I'm teaching.