This book is about using movement, shape, color, texture, rhythm, sounds, and words to express ideas, attitudes, and feelings. It is about learning to be open to one's feelings and the feelings of others. The first four chapters deal with questioning, groundwork, and evaluation; they discuss such topics as arranging space, teacher participation,…

The contents of this booklet focus on effective techniques for using dramatics in the classroom and are based on the premise that drama can integrate all skills and help to avoid fragmentation in learning. Chapters discuss motivating the dreamers in the classroom, curriculum dramatics--eclectic teaching, training the teacher, transforming the…

Presents basic information for teachers about how to use role-play, dramatic play, and simulations in the elementary social studies classroom. Explains how to proceed through the introduction or warm-up, the activity itself, and the follow-up evaluation. (AV)

Describes historical background of the "Living Newspaper" theater, the procedure in using the genre as a classroom activity, and the evaluation of the activity for student learning. Presents an example of play design and an observation-debriefing form, concluding that this medium stimulates student curiosity about the past and may be…

Puppets can be used in the classroom to teach, to tell stories, to introduce new students or books, and to develop children's cooperation, creativity, and coordination. Instruction on how to make and manipulate puppets, plan puppet plays, and locate information on puppetry are given. (PP)

Notes that dramatic play is an important outlet for toddlers and small children, and that prop boxes allow children to know their world, role play, and enhance their imaginations. Provides lists for 20 different prop boxes, and information on getting started, collecting, organizing, and using prop boxes. (SD)

Describes a class activity demonstrating the reality of revolution to introductory political science students. Student "plants" rebel against a teacher's "injustice," overthrow the teacher when he calls on a higher authority, and mobilize the class to sign a petition. Follow-up discussion covers elements required for revolution. (LS)

Examines connections between children's social pretend play and their improvised classroom drama. Describes similarities and differences between language used to frame social pretend play and language used by teachers and students to frame the imaginary worlds of drama. (MM)

In six brief vignettes, Carol Stock Kranowitz, Bonnie Neugebauer, Shirley C. Raines, and Margie Carter discuss the use of folk and fairy tales in the preschool classroom. (DR)

Summarizes the author's dissertation following a group of bilingual first graders as they created an opera with their teacher and an artist-in-residence. Summarizes the opera process using the libretto format. Discusses the setting, perspectives of all of the collaborators, what was learned, and the educational implications. (SR)

Discusses the benefits for children's literacy, creativity, and enthusiasm for classroom activities of taking dictation of preschool children's own stories and facilitating dramatizations of these stories. Considers issues in the process of dictation and dramatization. Describes differences and similarities in children's stories and their relation…

Article is aimed at teachers only, presenting a monthly exchange of tips, projects, ideas and resources. (Editor/RK)

Defining creative drama as a teaching process that uses the inherent ability of each person to explore ideas, behavior patterns, and human relationships, this monograph is designed to help teachers create a working environment within which this process can be most productive. Various sections of the monograph provide information about how creative…

Examines discourse patterns in playmaking to see if they differ from those found in more traditional settings. Indicates that playmaking can foster students' empathy, utilize their logic and creativity, and provide them with the experience of working in a group to a common end. (JD)

Describes children's dramatic play behavior as a structured, recognizable phenomenon that is the result of careful nurturing by caregivers and a future tool to make vivid the actualities and potentialities of human experience. (CRH)