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A photo of a woman with brown skin and red-painted nails reading a book. There is a white border at the top of the image with pink and black text that says Reader's Theatre for Secondary ELA

Why I Love Reader’s Theatre in the ELA Classroom

Reader’s Theatre is a fun, low-stress way for students to learn about drama, practice public speaking, and embrace their creativity. What is Reader’s Theatre? Reader’s Theatre is the lowest-risk way you can bring drama into your ELA classroom. Students have the support of a script, but you encourage them to add vocal inflection and potentially some light blocking. You want to see some emergence of characterization and fluency. Reader’s Theatre, however, doesn’t have to be super-rehearsed. In my classroom, Reader’s Theatre replaces our in-class reading for that day. I try to choose scenes so that we have a mix of RT and reading/discussion days. If you want students to become super familiar with the script and have rehearsed blocking and even costumes, you’re in the realm of a Staged Reading. What does good Reader’s Theatre

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Danielle Hall October 25, 2022
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Drama in the Classroom: Tips & Activities

Using theatre in Secondary ELA is a great way to build classroom community, increase public speaking skills, and get students to understand complex texts. Here are some ideas for how to introduce drama in the classroom, from quick, 5-minute games to a class play.  Improv Games build public speaking skills In every English class I’ve ever taught, I’ve used improv games to help students build public speaking skills. When I taught ESL in Germany, my students LOVED telling wacky stories in games like “Story, Story, Die!”  Here are two sets of improv ideas you can use in any class! Improv games are a great way to spend an extra five minutes or what’s left after a fire drill, so you should definitely have a few in your pocket. Halloween Themed Drama Games Drama in the

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Danielle Hall November 30, 2021
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Halloween Themed Drama Games for the ELA Classroom

These Halloween themed drama games will help students flex their creative muscles & boost their public speaking skills, all while having fun. I’ve blogged about Halloween themed ELA activites before, but this year I wanted to focus games. Drama games and improv are a great way to boost student confidence and increase collaboration in your classroom. These Halloween themed drama games will give you those same benefits, while adding some seasonal flair! Drama is a great way to build public speaking skills, memory, and community in the classroom. I have used drama with grades K-12 in France, Germany, the US, and Puerto Rico, and students beg for more. Literally. After finals one year, I was planning to show a movie, and students asked to reprise some improv games instead. How cool is that? So, where

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Danielle Hall October 5, 2021
Evaluating drama can be tricky, but in the ELA classroom, it's important to still hold students accountable. Here's how I assess a variety of skills. This is a mix of objective and subjective assessments every step of the way in the process of putting together a class play. This is applicable for every drama activity in the ELA classroom.

From Casting to Confidently Evaluating Drama in the ELA Classroom: An Actionable 5-step Guide on the Class Play

So, you’re considering doing a Class Play or you’ve started practices. Now, you’re wondering how evaluating drama will unfold. Or you’re wondering how to cast students or deal with irritation during rehearsals. This post breaks down the class play into 5 actionable categories to give you confidence in your drama unit! 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, I’ll show you that Drama in ELA is not only possible, but beneficial to all students. How to Set up and Cast the Play When I first

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Danielle Hall August 16, 2016
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Drama Games for High School: 3 Easy Improv Games

Are you looking for ways to integrate drama games for high school? Get started with these three zero-prep improv games! Why drama games? 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 of the cell as an interpretive dance?” As a teacher, I seek to give my students the same opportunities. Drama in the ELA classroom is a great way to build public speaking skills, memory, and community. I have used drama with grades K-12 in France, Germany, the US, and Puerto Rico, and students beg for more. Literally. After finals one year, I

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Danielle Hall February 21, 2016