Often the way one communicates ethical choices is conditioned by the dynamics of the communication process more than by a well-developed "ethical system." Sociodrama is an excellent method of teaching both ethics and communication skills. The technique can be used for playing out any real-life situation, but unlike much actual life experience, it…

Guidelines and examples for using dramatization to teach elementary German are presented. Dramatization can be used productively as an aid to learning even at the very beginning of a course or in an academic environment that is hostile to innovation. In order to learn an utterance in a foreign language, the students must be able to project their…

Dramatic play, an activity for which children show a natural inclination, provides kindergarten children with the opportunities for acquiring new vocabulary, extending word meaning, acquiring and practicing verbal expression and syntactical patterns, and gaining in language facility. In order to foster this language development, kindergarten…

Oral language development, the single most important factor in determining readiness for reading, may be enhanced through creative drama, especially role playing. Role playing is spontaneous play which traditionally has served many purposes, including promoting socialization. It can also be a unique method of recreating historical episodes in…

This paper reveals ways in which teachers can use roles and role playing to facilitate children's understanding and expression, by giving an example of a drama in which the teacher assumed a role. In this dramatic situation, a group of eight-year-olds and nine-year-olds was asked to assume the roles of American Indians whose valley was threatened…

This study compared the quality of preschool children's sociodramatic play in classrooms that used centers for housekeeping role play with those that used centers for various other types of role play. Classroom play sessions in the preschool were videotaped biweekly over the course of the 1992-1993 academic year. These videotapes were then…

Systematic efforts at the Arizona State Child Study Laboratory were successful in replacing children's undesirable superhero play with other types of sociodramatic play. Teachers found superhero play undesirable because it was aggressive and noisy and was accompanied by an increase in random activity. Observations indicated that superhero play had…

The full power of drama as both a teaching and learning medium can be realized only when the inner world of meaning is harnessed to the outer world of expressive action. The teacher has available a number of techniques that can involve the students in the vital interaction of both frames. To involve the students in the expressive frame, the…

This introduction to, and comment upon, a symposium on communicative competence argues that the appropriate unit of analysis in language development is communicative competence and proposes that the development of communicative competence can be studied usefully through observing children's communication during role play. Communicative competence…

Research findings indicate that role play can contribute to children's language growth through furthering: (a) growth in imaging, (b) increased recall, (c) discriminative listening, (d) development of novel forms of communication, (e) learning of socially appropriate communication, and (f) motoric actions. Teachers can facilitate role-playing by…

This brief paper is an anecdotal commentary on a class exercise developed for an advanced European History course covering the period 1815 to the present. It describes a role-play, case-study exercise designed to reinforce previously covered material. Students are directed to attend a mock peace conference to consider if any one country was…

Superhero play among preschool children appears to be quite different from socio-dramatic play. While exhibiting characteristics of socio-dramatic play, superhero play does not facilitate the development of social or verbal skills. Observations of television programs indicated that superhero play provides little opportunity for verbal reasoning,…

Noting that new approaches must be found to decrease the numbers of inmates returning to United States prisons and to provide means for productive changes that will result in self-improvement and new options for inmates both inside and outside the prison after their release, a drama program was established in 1979 for inmates at the Federal…

This paper reviews theoretical writings on the importance and function of imaginative play in the development of young children, and describes measurement instruments and instructional aids used for imaginative play in home and school settings. A historical summary of the function of play in the young child's life is presented. Early theories saw…

The discourse of Mexican-American preschoolers during sociodramatic play was investigated to learn what the children knew about the social world and how this knowledge was organized in their speech. The theoretical framework for the study was derived from two sources: the psychological construct of the script and the sociolinguistic view of play…