As I have started teaching Key Stage 3 Drama for the first time in several years in my school I am reunited with, what we call in my school, Achievement Assistants (Learning Assistants or Teaching Assistants in old language). Having previously been only a Key Stage 4 and 5 teacher I haven’t had the presence of anyone else in my room for a while. I wanted to do … Continue reading Teaching Assistants in Drama
I am always on the look out for ways of communicating to parents and others the value of studying drama has on a young person. Recently I’ve had the opportunity to re-instate Drama at Key Stage 3 in my school, a major step forward in the current climate. As part of that I’ve been building a display in my Drama Studio which focuses on the … Continue reading Building on Drama’s “Soft Skills”
Yesterday I wrote a post about how I intend to change Key Stage 3 Assessment to using a Graded system of 1 – 9. I have decided to go back to the Drama in Schools document published in 2003 by the Arts Council and build this new assessment system around the model of Make, Perform and Respond (MPR). I’ve broken MPR down in 6 different … Continue reading Changing Levels: Making KS3 Assessment Work
I wrote a post a few months ago about the change to no longer using levels and the fact that, as Drama didn’t actually have any officially recognised levels anyway, we should be in a position to lead the way on the change to levels. Over the last few months I’ve been developing and creating a method of assessment using the idea of a system of … Continue reading Changing Levels: Key Stage 3 Assessment Overview
With the exams over and the coursework (nearly) sent off, it is time to turn my attention to preparing for the new GCSE and A Level courses that will come online in 2016. Initially I’m reading the subject content document straight from the DfE, which pretty much says very little about specific content but it does point towards the direction that the DfE wants us … Continue reading New (2016) Drama GCSE Subject Content: Seperating Theatre from Drama
I think starting the students off with a basic understanding of how to write a compound sentence that will communicate to the reader not only what they did, but how and why is a great point from which to work with. Especially for the lower end, the questions at GCSE are often baffling and difficult to comprehend. Describe how you used your acting skills? I … Continue reading 4 Rules to make an effective sentence for Drama written work.
BURT'S DRAMA 