Process drama is a method of teaching and learning drama where both the students and teacher are working in and out of role.
Drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance: a play, opera, mime, ballet, etc, performed in a theatre, or on radio or television. Considered as a genre of poetry in general, the dramatic mode has been contrasted with the epic and the lyrical modes ever since Aristotle's Poetics —the earliest work of dramatic theory.
A role is a set of connected behaviors, rights, obligations, beliefs, and norms as conceptualized by people in a social situation. It is an expected or free or continuously changing behaviour and may have a given individual social status or social position. It is vital to both functionalist and interactionist understandings of society. Social role posits the following about social behaviour:
- The division of labour in society takes the form of the interaction among heterogeneous specialised positions, we call roles.
- Social roles included appropriate and permitted forms of behaviour and actions that recur in a group, guided by social norms, which are commonly known and hence determine the expectations for appropriate behaviour in these roles, which further explains the place of a person in the society.
- Roles are occupied by individuals, who are called actors.
- When individuals approve of a social role, they will incur costs to conform to role norms, and will also incur costs to punish those who violate role norms.
- Changed conditions can render a social role outdated or illegitimate, in which case social pressures are likely to lead to role change.
- The anticipation of rewards and punishments, as well as the satisfaction of behaving prosocially, account for why agents conform to role requirements.
As a teaching methodology, process drama developed primarily from the work of Brian Way, Dorothy Heathcote and Gavin Bolton [1] [2] [3] [4] and through the work of other leading drama practitioners. [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] Cecily O'Neill describes process drama being used to explore a problem, situation, theme or series of related ideas or themes through the use of the artistic medium of unscripted drama. Process drama was described by O'Mara (1999) as" a dynamic way of working that requires teachers to reflect-in-action", [10] constantly dealing with unique situations that require novel approaches. [11] It has its roots in dramatic play, where normally developing children in every culture in the world will create their own imagined worlds, often with the co-participation of an empathetic adult (usually the parent) in role.
The philosophy of education examines the goals, forms, methods, and meaning of education. The term is used to describe both fundamental philosophical analysis of these themes and the description or analysis of particular pedagogical approaches. Considerations of how the profession relates to broader philosophical or sociocultural contexts may be included. The philosophy of education thus overlaps with the field of education and applied philosophy.
Brian Francis Way, established Theatre Centre in London, England, in 1953. The company originated the modern concept of theatre for children in an educational context.
Dorothy Heathcote MBE was a drama teacher and academic who used the method of "teacher in role" as an approach to teaching across the curriculum in schools and later in other settings. She was a highly accomplished teacher of theatre and drama for learning and amongst her many achievements she defined and developed "mantle of the expert" as an approach to teaching. The key book she wrote with Gavin Bolton, that explains her Mantle of the Expert approach to Education, is called Drama for Learning (1994). The most significant previous book that explains her Drama approach was written by Betty Jane Wagner and was entitled Dorothy Heathcote: Drama as a Learning Medium.
Process drama in school settings usually involves the whole class working with the teacher in role in a made-up scenario. When they are working in process drama, the students and teachers work together to create an imaginary dramatic world within which issues are considered and problems can be solved. In this world they work together to explore problems and issues such as, "How do communities deal with change?", "How do we accept other people into our community?" or themes such as environmental sustainability, betrayal, truth and other ethical and moral issues. Sometimes the work may begin as light-hearted, but the teacher always layers more dramatic tension and complexity into the work as the teacher is aiming for a pedagogical outcome. Students learn to think beyond their own points of view and consider multiple perspectives on a topic through playing different roles. For instance, if the issue being discussed is logging a forest, they may play the loggers, people who live in the forest community and environmentalists. Playing a range of positions encourages them to be able to recast themselves as the "other" and to consider life from that viewpoint, thereby creating complexity and enabling us to explore multiple dimensions of the topic. Process drama does what the character Atticus Finch advocates: the ability to work for social justice comes from the ability to understand another perspective—to be able to try on someone else's shoes and walk around in them for a while. Process drama allows us to "try on" other people's shoes, to walk the paths they tread and to see how the world looks from their point of view.
In the performing arts, a scenario is a synoptical collage of an event or series of actions and events. In the commedia dell'arte it was an outline of entrances, exits, and action describing the plot of a play, and was literally pinned to the back of the scenery. It is also known as canovaccio or "that which is pinned to the canvas" of which the scenery was constructed.
Sustainability is the process of maintaining change in a balanced environment, in which the exploitation of resources, the direction of investments, the orientation of technological development and institutional change are all in harmony and enhance both current and future potential to meet human needs and aspirations. For many in the field, sustainability is defined through the following interconnected domains or pillars: environment, economic and social, which according to Fritjof Capra is based on the principles of Systems Thinking. Sub-domains of sustainable development have been considered also: cultural, technological and political. While sustainable development may be the organizing principle for sustainability for some, for others, the two terms are paradoxical. Sustainable development is the development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. Brundtland Report for the World Commission on Environment and Development (1987) introduced the term of sustainable development.
Lumberjacks are North American workers in the logging industry who perform the initial harvesting and transport of trees for ultimate processing into forest products. The term usually refers to a bygone era when hand tools were used in harvesting trees. Because of its historical ties, the term lumberjack has become ingrained in popular culture through folklore, mass media and spectator sports. The actual work was difficult, dangerous, intermittent, low-paying, and primitive in living conditions. However, the men built a traditional culture that celebrated strength, masculinity, confrontation with danger, and resistance to modernization.
Process drama is also suggested as a tool to promote literacy development through opportunities for dramatic play in early childhood settings within which children speak for a range of purposes in role. [12] [13] [14]
