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Drama and Theatre Studies Curriculum – Intent, Implementation and Impact

Intent

We aim to give our pupils a rich and broad experience of Drama and Theatre which incorporates a consideration of our cultural capital through our playwrights and practitioners. We enable our pupils and students to develop their skills of collaborative creation, performance and informed evaluation.

Our curriculum explores the history of theatre, from Greek theatre through to the most modern practitioners such as Frantic Assembly and the Kneehigh Theatre Company. We explore a range of genres practically and theoretically.

Our Key Stage 3 curriculum builds the skills of responding, making, performing and evaluation – each of these areas developed through the exploration of a range of texts and stimuli, including the Mystery Plays, Commedia dell’Arte, the Holocaust, Shakespeare and Theatre in Education. Pupils learn the 6 ‘Cs’ of Drama: Communication, Courage, Consideration, Commitment, Co-operation and Concentration – these skills are the foundation to success in Drama and Theatre.

At GCSE, our skills journey is consolidated and shaped to the requirements of the specification, where we apply the skills of devising (making) in groups, responding to increasingly complex texts and stimuli and performance to an audience and examiner. Evaluative skills developed at KS3 are formalised into the written form where students are taught a What? How? Why? format to structure their responses in readiness for their written exam.

At A Level, the journey of skills is deepened and becomes increasingly more theoretical with a complex and reflective study of practitioners such as Artaud, Brecht and Berkoff, along with their textual correlations. The development of theatre through time is a key area for study, studying how humanity has articulated and dramatized shared experience from the oral tradition and how this can be re-shaped for a modern audience.

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Implementation

As subject specialists, enthusiasts and lifelong learners, our department discusses developments in theory and practice; we are in regular contact with colleagues from across the country and take part in specification specific online fora in order to share ideas and develop our own curriculum. We take time to plan and reflect, formalising our findings into an organic provision for our students.

Our schemes of work implement the range of skills which allow our students to become confident practitioners. We regularly visit live theatre in order to reflect on text in practice and the process of page to stage, enabling our students’ skills to develop across each key stage.

Our extra-curricular provision allows our students to experience live performance and what it means to work as part of a cast or production team. We stage a regular Shakespeare Evening which allows our most advanced students from all years to explore the work of the Bard in detail and depth.

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Impact

Pupils and students report a high level of enjoyment on Drama and can reflect clearly on the skills they are able to take with them into their next level of education or employment. They become confident, articulate and can think creatively, a key skill in our changing world.

Many of our students go on to work in the industry, recent alumni earning lead roles at the National Theatre, in TV roles and jobs behind the scenes.

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DRAMA

Keystage 3

 

Year 7

• Introduction to Drama

• Puppetry

• Storytelling

• Greek theatre

• Shakespeare

 

Year 8

• Slapstick

• Pantomime

• Peer Pressure

• Mystery Plays

• Script writing

• Script performances & evaluations

 

Year 9

• Commedia

• Secret Annexe

• Script work – ‘Blood Brothers’ extracts.

• Live Theatre evaluation

• Understanding & Application: Theatre terminology

• ‘DNA’

 

 

Pearson Drama GCSE

 

Devising (40%)

• Devising an original piece of theatre from a stimulus text.

• Tracking the progress of the piece in a portfolio (3000 words) – 30%

• Performance in a group performance – 10%

 

Performance (20%)

• A group performance, duologue or monologue from a script with a visiting examiner and an audience. – 20%

 

Written Exam (40%)

• A written exam – 1 hour and 30 minutes

  • Section A – Page to Stage – ‘An Inspector Calls’

  • Section B – Live Theatre Evaluation

 

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Pearson Theatre Studies A Level

 

Devising (40%)

• Devising an original piece of theatre from a stimulus text.

• Tracking the progress of the piece in a portfolio (3500 words) – 30%

• Performance in a group performance, duologue or monologue – 10%

 

Performance (20%)

• A group performance, duologue, or monologue from a script with a visiting examiner and an audience – 20%

 

Written Exam (40%)

• A written exam – 2 hours and 30 minutes

  • Section A: Live Theatre Evaluation – one question based on experience of a live theatre performance, as a knowledgeable student of theatre skills.

  • Section B: Page to Stage: Realising A Performance Text – two questions which address how a student would using performer, director and designer skills to put on a performance of a set text, currently Peter Shaffer’s ‘Equus’.

  • Section C: Interpreting a Performance Text – one essay question assessing how a student would use a theatre practitioner to stage an interpretation, currently Aristophanes’ ‘Lysistrata’.