Dramatization
Another strategy for teaching story elements that is extremely effective and loved by the students is dramatizing the stories or parts of the stories. The best thing about this strategy is that most of the ways you will use this approach will be so much loved by the students and so much fun and so active that the students will not even feel like they are working. But in particular using drama to teach story concepts is effective because it involves the whole child, differentiates the instruction for students who are strong kinesthetic or intrapersonal learners, and really gets to the essence of what storytelling is. I find that dramatizing a story is especially effective in helping children to understand sequencing, main idea, themes, and of course characters, settings and problems and solutions. These dramatizations can be set up formally or informally. I will give an example of how to set up a dramatization more formally in the final project so here I will try to explain how I make it easy to have quick and informal dramatizations of popular stories.
Make sure that you have an easily accessible place to have the students act out the story. Because we always have a large rug in our room for meetings I usually use this area as the "stage". The students who are the audience gather at three sides of the rug, and one side we use as backstage, or off stage. Unless it is a story that we are extremely familiar with and I have been using dramatization in the class for some time, I usually act as narrator. Costumes for these informal dramatizations can be as simple as a sign around the student's neck, with the character's name and a picture. I also collect plates with animal faces on them and animal noses, as so many children's books have animals as central characters. Hats and smocks can serve as costumes for stories with human characters. I try not to use full facial masks so that the students can be expressive. If it is a story with few characters and many students want a chance to participate I will simply reassign the roles and perform the story two or three times. The students in my classes have never seemed to mind this; in fact they enjoy watching their peers. It gives everyone a chance to perform, and allows students to experience a favorite story more than once.
Acting as narrator, I will read the story while the students perform it. I often encourage the students to say the lines as they remember them, but will read them from the text for students who are shy or unsure. In first grade and Kindergarten, I think that it is much more important that the performing students get the gist of the story or character or situation that they are dramatizing than remember actual phrases. Therefore I do not correct a departure from the text in what children say in their roles if it does not detract from the characters' essence or the storyline. As narrator I am able to guide the story in a way that lends itself to the literary element that I want my students to get a better handle on. For instance, if I am addressing the element of sequence in literature, I will structure my dramatization so that that element is highlighted. I will encourage audience participation by asking continuously what happened next, and getting responses. For consistency's sake I use the same terminology that we used on our graphic organizers and in our book talks to do this. When I teach sequencing in literature, for example, during book talk I have the students refer to the parts of the story by saying in the beginning, in the middle and in the end. I also have them tell a story in sequence, saying first, next, next etc. and last. These are also the words that are present on the two graphic organizers designed for sequential order. So naturally these are the terms I use as narrator to elicit the responses from the audience when this element is my focus.
I find that the use of dramatization is most effective as reinforcement. The students need to be not only familiar with the text but also with any literary elements that we are addressing for the occasion to be fun and successful. Therefore I will often make this a Friday activity. I was trained, both in New York and New Haven, in a literacy program called Breakthrough to Literacy. In this program you focus on one book for the week, addressing a different element each day. Fridays are left for celebration. Unfortunately the books in the program did not often have substantial storylines, so I found it difficult to pull everything I needed to keep the children engaged for these daily lessons until Friday. Because of this I often ended up supplementing these books with a book that had a similar theme from classic literature. Often for our celebration on Friday I would have the students dramatize the story from the classic literature. I find this is good way to get some energy and frivolity into the last day of the school week, as well as show off the fruits of our hard work.
Because I like to give my students a chance to practice all the learning structures we set up in the classroom independently, or in small groups, I also have found some ways to allow students to bring the practice of dramatization into centers. This can be a bit tricky, as students can get rambunctious when left to act out a story on their own. Therefore when I set up dramatization activities in centers I try to create clear and very well structured guidelines. I often will limit the number of students allowed in the center at a time to a very small group, and have alternative centers for students to go to if they do not adhere to the guidelines set for noise level and conduct within the center. I also have found that using puppets and/or small figures can be extremely helpful in controlling the center, so that it can work effectively during a time when we are concentrating on literacy. I will create hand or stick puppets for stories that we have already worked on and dramatized in class, stories the students are already well acquainted with and can revisit. I put copies of the story in the center along with the puppets and perhaps a small stage set so that the children can perform. This center is usually set up in a corner that will be the least disturbing to other students, a place such as the classroom library or an area where other centers and guided reading are not taking place. As the students become familiar with this type of center, I will allow them to create the puppets and settings themselves. To advance the center farther, I will instruct them to bring in elements of mood or character traits. I will also have them write a summary of the story as a closing activity when we are focusing on summarizing.
Comments: