I love teaching Shakespeare, and I LOVE discovering new and innovative ways to engage students in the material. I’ve talked before about teaching Shakespeare’s language or using abridged versions for in-class productions. I’ve even shared how my 9th graders put on a full production for the middle school! Today, I’m so excited to share about one more way I get…
Thou & You: Rank and Emotion My students know well in advance that I love teaching Shakespeare and drama, so they’re a little surprised when they confront Shakespeare’s language. They always assume I’m some sort of super genius if I can possibly understand that. Who could possibly understand all of those thous and wherefores and yons? Well, I’m not…
Teaching Shakespeare: Tips & Tricks Teaching Shakespeare can be a tricky prospect, but here are some tips to help you and your students get the most out of your unit. Students have very different reactions to Shakespeare based on their experiences and expectations. I want to advocate for teaching Shakespeare through performance, and I’ll be talking more about that…
Introducing Danielle & Michelle, Shakespeare in 30 Creators So, I recently worked with my friend Michelle to release a collection of plays to use in the ELA Classroom called Shakespeare in 30. Since we collaborated on this project, I thought I’d take the time to talk a bit about us and how we met. It’s weird for an introvert…
Using Staged Readings in ELA It’s no secret that I love using drama in the ELA classroom, and I’m here today to advocate for using more rehearsed, scripted drama as you teach English. Maybe you’ve avoided this because it has seemed overwhelming. Maybe you think you don’t have enough time. Well, friends, you do! This post will help you…
Now, let’s talk about the best part of doing a class play: the performance! This is the fourth part of my class play series, so be sure to check out the posts on Logistics & Prep, Filling Their Toolkit, and Evaluation Ideas. We had two performances of our class play, and this was a good amount for amateur student actors.…
Introducing Shakespeare’s Language Understanding Shakespeare’s Language can seem like a daunting task for students, and many of them give up on a great story because of language that seems too difficult for them. I have always loved Shakespeare’s language (that should have been an early clue that I was bound to be a linguist and an English teacher!), so I…
Tips to Save Your Sanity Before Winter Break Teaching in the weeks leading up to Winter Break can be a challenge, you can save your sanity by following a few key tips. It can be hard to keep students’ attention before the holidays: they’re tired, we’re tired, and we all just want to push through. Plus, with various “treats” throughout…
So, you’re considering doing a Class Play or you’ve started practices. Now, you’re wondering how to get students really working and eventually evaluate them. But how do you go about evaluating drama? It’s a process, right? It’s subjective, I hear you saying. Read on to see how I graded students on their effort and achievement in the class play. In…
Calming the Chaos at the End of the School Year Hello, all! We just had our final exam today, but I know that many of you are still guiding students through the end of the year. It can be a crazy time, and here’s an idea of how I calm the year end chaos. Keep reading to the end to find…
When You Get Irritated in Rehearsal We are in the last few days of rehearsal for our Spring Musical, and I’ve been thinking about irritation a lot. I’ve been getting and trying to reflect on what makes me so (INFJs for the win!). I got home today from our big Saturday practice (9-3, phew!), and saw that Lisa and Jonathan…
Drama Skills for the Class Play In the last post, I talked about casting the class play. Now, I want to talk about developing basic drama skills. This will encourage engagement from all students, all the time. This is something that I struggled with in the beginning, but I developed some tools to help my students. If you’re like me,…
Drama in ELA: The Class Play In this series, I’m going to share my experiences integrating Drama in ELA and producing a class play with my 9th grade English class. Drama is so engaging for students, but is often put aside because it seems like a lot of work or doesn’t obviously correlate to higher test scores. In this series,…
3 Games to Introduce Drama in the ELA Classroom I have loved drama since my 3rd grade class got to be Arabian dancers in the school’s performance of “The Nutcracker”. When I was in middle and high school, I always wanted to do “acting” options for projects, sometimes asking my teachers ridiculous things like “can I show you the parts…