This study investigated the effects of teaching sociodramatic scripts on interactions among three triads, each containing two typical preschool children and one child with autistic characteristics. Results supported the inclusion of systematic training of scripts to enhance interaction among children with and without disabilities during…

Describes research in which the author studied his own teaching over a two-year period and, based on the research, developed a model for structuring drama to support reflection and learning. (SR)

Describes the City at Peace program originated in Washington, DC, by Creative Response, a nonprofit group that promotes international peace and cross-cultural understanding through the performing arts. The Washington program staged an original musical in January 1993, written and performed by local teenagers, about the problems of racism, drug…

An inmate and literacy prison educator describes how she sought to make literacy instruction more relevant to women by using the subject of AIDS to link student experiences with the acquisition of literacy skills. She emphasizes that the process is applicable to women in the larger community who are dealing with multiple social problems. (SK)

Explores the conflict between views of drama held by foreign language teachers and proponents of creative dramatics. Explains how formal rehearsal and public performance of plays in elementary school foreign language classes offer significant educational benefits toward fluency in a target language. (SR)

Presents a lesson plan illustrating how creative dramatic techniques can go beyond basic enrichment to provide a meaningful milieu for thinking and language development. Presents content, form, and evaluation of a lesson for a third grade class. (SR)

Twenty-six precocious preschoolers exhibited high frequencies of dramatic and associative play. Girls engaged in more cooperative and less solitary play than boys. Elder children participated in more solitary, parallel, and less cooperative and less dramatic play than younger peers. The higher intelligence quotient group undertook less…

Examined the play activities of 49 at-risk (AR) and non-at-risk (NAR) elementary school students, using the Smilansky Scale for Evaluation of Dramatic and Sociodramatic Play measure. Found that AR students displayed higher levels of hostile acting out behaviors than did NAR students, whereas the NAR group engaged in more verbal communication…

Discusses the efforts of a fifth-grade teacher and a visiting poet to rekindle students' sense of poetic passion and pleasure. Describes how the authors introduced students to poems for two voices (using P. Fleischman's "Joyful Noise"). The poetry unit culminated in a project in which students read and performed Fleischman's poems, then wrote and…

The use of theatrical techniques combined with factual information creates dynamic, memorable programming on sensitive subjects while enhancing audience awareness and providing information. Psychoeducational Drama (PED) is an effective and powerful approach to educational programming. A model for PED, techniques, and uses of the approach in…

Claims there is a missing link between the two seemingly independent stories in Will Hobbs' novel "Bearstone." This missing link can be found through looking at four kinds of play that occur in the novel. (NH)

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)

Describes the profound learning that took place at the International Children's Theatre Festival in Toyama City, Japan in July 2000. Argues that participation by the Japanese-American Drama Ensemble, a youth group from the public schools in Lexington, Massachusetts, and more than 400 children from all over the planet, showcased the cultural…

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…

Incorporates dramatization into science teaching to explain difficult phenomena. Uses three different types of dramatization: teacher-performed dramatization, teacher-directed dramatization, and student-directed dramatization. Presents student analyses of the dramatizations. Introduces an instrument that is designed to measure student perceptions…